We are targeting pupils at the age of fourteen as in many countries this age marks the end of a cycle and implies a choice of professional or academic studies. Our project aims to highlight strenghts in our school systems in regards to autonomy and citizenship and to develop them and make them applicable to other situations in other countries. In order to maximise our chances we find that the study of the methods in several countries is indispensable. We also intend to put a special focus on individual needs and it will be interesting and useful to compare our various approaches and put them in a different perspective.We all want our pupils to experience well-being and a sense of meaning in school, but this is far from being the reality for many children. We aim to render our pupils autonomous and responsible in that they will 1; investigate their respective study conditions, 2; Analyse and question them, and 3 ; propose changes. All based on their own studies and findings. In previous European projects, pupils and teachers alike have been surprised and intrigued by the different workmethods and approaches of their partner countries. This experience encouraged us to further our investigations and compare our experiences and methods, but in a different field, all the while taking into account the particularities of each country. We chose to work around situations we face on an everyday basis and that can be recognised in each member country ( and probably in all European countries). The questions of how to best equip our school children for adulthood, how to best guide them in their choice of studies and work, how to evaluate difficulties and work with and around them and least but not last ; how to enhance confidence and selfworth are issues that concern the local and national education ongoingly. We hope to attain tangible results and come up with applicable tools drawing on our pupils quantitative and qualitative research across the seven countries.These seven countries are Portugal, Slovenia, Bulgaria, France, Holland, Poland and Greece all of which form a good variety of Western/Eastern European countries as well as other interesting comparative factors such as economic situation, relative length of EU member-ship, ICT politics in school, Sport-studies contraints etc.Our different historical and political contexts are deeply intertwined in our school systems and our ways to perceive the world and we hope that our project work will open up our pupils' eyes to other situations and other ways of doing things. By analysing their own schooling and comparing it to that of their fellow European pupils, we hope they will become more aware of their own role in their choices and possibilities. All partners have previously taken part in international projects where we have been intrigued by other countries' methodologies which is why we wish to take it to the next level and study these differences and similarities. We will work with pupils aged 14-15 years old who are at the verge of stepping into their adult life and need to be equipped with knowledge, competence and a confidence in making choices. Our pupils will conduct surveys on study habits and ICT uses in order to propose improvements, they will do research and investigate school systems and curricula and question what they do and why in order to become aware of their own situation. They will also visit various workplaces and look into career guidance and options. Team building events and drama sessions are important in our project as they involve ALL pupils in ALL partner schools and will be a permanent aspect of our schools so as to create a good school atmopshere and - in the long run - lead to responsible and autonomous citizens of Europe.
The main objective of our project was to bring up competent, flexible, responsible, self-confident, satisfied, healthy and successful individuals that will be able to cope with the challenges in the future. In order to achieve such an ambitious goal, we realised we needed competent and qualified educators as well as a school management that is open for change. Coping with challenges involves courage, hard work, stepping out of one’s comfort zoneand - perhaps most importantly - collaboration among all the participants in the educational process (educational staff – students – parents) as well as understanding one’s impact and influence in a local and global community, cultivating empathy and taking positive action. The partner countries ; Bulgaria, Portugal, France, Slovenia, Greece, The Netherlands and Poland worked together for one year before the application to come up with a project involving four differents stages ; Good pracices in study habits, Pros and Cons of Internet, Career guidance and sports / Food. Through these four "fields" we constantly aimed for autonomy and responsabilisation of our students. We wanted them to take their work and choices in their own hands and also reflect upon what they were doing, and can do and what might help them succed in their lives. During the two parallel mobilities (in France and Greece in February 2017 and in Slovenia and Bulgaria in October 2017) students worked together on the project topics of those legs. They presented their pre-mobility work to the other partner countries, compared it to those of the other schools' , discussed the results and came up with conclusions and / or more or less concrete suggestions so as to improve educational situations and circumstances in European countries. For the first mobility they compared pedagogic conditions in their respective countries - homework, study hours, help available, marking, stress etc. and working in groups they produced small guides on good practices on how you can prepare for tests or improve our results or become more organised in your studying. For the second parallel mobility our students had prepared presentations and had conducted surveys on what career guidance was available to them in thei school and on how they were prepared for adult professional life and also on their role in the decision making. During the mobility, students participated in career games and worked on 21s century skills. They conducted personality tests to help them choose a future career and conducted interview with people from different fields of work. For the one mobility where all partner countries met (Portugal May 2017), we worked on pros and cons of Internet. For example did our students reflect over the potential dangers of social networks, but also the potential benefits, which led to the production of several short films and theatrical representations of various scenarios. They alsoconceived quizzes on internet awareness. The final mobilities could not be parallel due to individual contraints in the host countries, so the two last mobilities were undertaken in February ( The Netherlands) and in March (Poland) 2018. The topic here was sports and food so the students prepared preparations and demonstrations of national/ regional sports/ dances / activities. They also came up with (relatively) healthy recipes made up of local ingredients. These activities helped strengthen their national identity on one level by researching and sometimes even discovering what is close to them, and also their sense of belonging to a bigger, European picture while discovering, tasting and trying out new food and sports with their fellow European youths. Parallel to the students' work, teachers in all countries also carried out surveys and prepared presentations in order to compare the systems in our repsective countries. For the first leg we carried out an online survey on teachers' profile in regards to qualifications, numbers of work hours, perceptions on pedagogy, contraints, colleague relations etc. It was very interesting to compare the results and the conclusion we came to was that we pratically do the same amount of hours, feel practically the same frustration about contraints and unability to help students with difficulties and share a feeling that ther is space for improvement in all areas of education. We can all learn from each other and must work together, across nation boundaries in orde to create a coherent and functional Europe, starting with the young. At the end of the project the students came out richer in cultural experiences, a better level of English for communication, a stronger feeling of European belonging and sense of a European citizenship and more self confident in that they actually can influence, adapt and adapt to as well as are capable of taking things such as their own career or their own study habits in their own hands. With a little help from their adult companions that is.