Increasing attainment levels and reduction of early school leaving rates are key issues for Member States and for each school in all Europe.Career guidance shall play a strategic role in supporting students' choices and their professional plans. In many countries, career guidance at school is becoming crucial for preparing students to initiatives of work-based learning and for fostering students' transitions from school to careers and to further learning paths.The quality of career guidance provision at school is based on the qualification of staff, on the tools and resources available for students and teachers, but also on the capacity of schools to establish and empower cooperative relationships with the "real word" through the collaboration with other local career guidance services.The project MYFUTURE will improve some of the main factors for ensuring the best quality of career guidance services: the methodological framework, the key skills of practitioners, the information resources and new guidance tools based on ICT.This project will have an impact on the strategic relationships and cooperation among schools and local career guidance systems: in particular, those provided by Public Local Authorities and by Career Services of Higher Education Institutions (HEI).The international consortium is promoted by the University of Camerino in Italy and it includes partners that are engaged in this field, with great experiences and innovative proposals in using and developing new technologies for career education and guidance. The consortium involves 5 territories with different career guidance systems (Italy, England, Holland, Romania and Malta), in order to test the model and the tools in rural, urban, suburban and insular contexts. Starting from a participatory research action, international working groups will develop a coherent set of web tools and devices, with the needed methodological knowledge and with the related open training resources for teachers and practitioners. At least 240 teachers and career guidance practitioners will be involved in the international working groups and in training paths.The main activities of the project includes:- local and international focus groups;- international survey on career guidance at school (emerging needs, models, case studies, tools and web resources)- local and international working groups for the development of the MYFUTURE web platform and e-guidance resources (career database, information, videos, web meeting and web interview, CV on-line, e-portfolio, e-learning paths on CMS for students)- local and international training paths for teachers and creation of the e-learning platform- national pilot actions for testing the models and the web tools- multipliers events- evaluation and exploitation of the project results.This set of project products will foster:- the right of an individualised career guidance for all students;- a qualified support for the preparation of school transitions and work-based learning experiences;- the cooperation among schools and local career guidance services (provided by Universities, Public Employment offices, others local services);- a better allocation (in one shared web platform "MYFUTURE") of career guidance resources and services for students;- higher quality standards of career guidance provision at school;- a new training offer and e-learning resources for teachers and practitioners.The main products of the project includes:1 - MY FUTURE - Improving career education and guidance at school. Guidelines for teachers2 - MYFUTURE - Web portal for career guidance3 - Q-GUIDANCE - Proposal for a Quality framework for career guidance resources.4 - MYFUTURE - Web map device5 - MYFUTURE - App6 - MYFUTURE - E-learning platform for teachers and practitioners.The project will also identify the key skills of teachers and practitioners for improving the quality of career guidance. The international working grops will also develop models for training the teachers and practitioners in different contexts, through blended cooperative learning pathways.The great risk, also for the most engaged and dynamic schools and education insitutions, is the lack of effective and operative models and tools to answer the emerging needs of a huge population of students, facing the challange with the career development.In this meaning and as long terms impact, the MYFUTURE project aims at addressing complex structural needs in the field of career guidance and education, fostering cooperation and mutual learning at European level, to share different approaches, to define and test innovative career guidance resources for students.
According to the European Lifelong Guidance Policies, career guidance should be based on the European framework of the Career Management Skills (CMS) because it represents the set of competences and skills each person needs to take strategic e suitable decisions about the own future. MY FUTURE project stressed the main findings of a previous project (Learning and decision making resources Project Number 2014-1-IT02-KA200-004105) to improve and develop innovative practices and career learning tools for school systems in Europe. Learning Career Management Skills is pivotal for the implementation of the European Lifelong Guidance policy and for reaching the goals of the Education and Employment strategies. Furthermore, the growing of the information and communication technologies in the field of lifelong guidance opened new opportunities to integrate theoretical and participatory research findings with digital technologies that enable teachers and practitioners to get a concrete impact in the development of the career management skills of youth and youngers. Main objectives of MYFUTURE were: 1- Supporting schools to tackle early school leaving 2 - Developing assessment and evaluation methods and practices to improve the quality of Career Guidance at school, involving the local career guidance systems and the main stakeholders; 3 - Strengthening the capability of schools to cooperate and share open web resources with Municipalities, Local Authorities, Public Employment Services and Universities. 4 - Identifying and developing innovative teaching and learning approaches, methods and ICT resources that effectively support the development of Career Guidance activities at school; 5 - Sharing and spreading the European concept and framework of Career Management Skills, as transversal key competences for managing lifelong study and work transitions; 6 - Providing coherent and "user friendly" tools and learning materials for students, teachers and school counsellors, in different languages. The partnership was a balanced mix of competences and knowledge made by academic institutions, with experts and researchers, and public and private providers of career guidance at school: 1-The University of Camerino (Italy): Lead partner 2- Regione Marche (Italy) 3- Centre Studi Pluriversum (Italy) 4-The University of Derby (United Kingdom) 5-Hertfordshire County Council (United Kingdom) 6-UU-Lillebælt (Denmark) 7-University of Malta (Malta) 8-CMBRAE Bucuresti (Romania) The methodological approach of the project was based on the participatory action research, with direct involvement of students, teachers and career practitioners to set out priorities and to share best practices and resources. Main activities implemented were: -Organization of focus groups with students and teachers in each partner countries; -Construction and sharing of questionnaires to collect data on needs, practices and tools; -Analysis of data and production of relevant knowledge in the field of career guidance practices; - Setting out and sharing guidelines for using the tools and to design guidance activities; -Development of open educational resources available on-line freely; -Development of ICT tools for teachers and students; -Dissemination of the project activities in events at national and international level; -Organization of conference seminars and training activities for teacher and career guidance practitioners. During the implementation of these activities were involved 174 students and practitioners for the field research, more than 205 questionnaires were administrated, 1152 among students and practitioners took part to the pilot actions, 121 participants attended the multiplier events,333 people subscribed the website, more than 1000 practitioners were reach with the social network and on line articles, 369 users download document from the platform. The intellectual outputs produced were: IO1-Developing career education. Publication. IO2-The potential of e-portfolios in career guidance. An innovative web site. IO3-Enhancing the quality of career guidance. The handbook for schools, with the on line check list to self evalutate quality standards. IO4-The map of career guidance. IO5-Career guidance App. A new tool for mobile phones. IO6-E-learning platform for teachers and practitioners The products were designed for students services that reach ever-increasing numbers of young people in a cost effective and efficient way. The e-learning platform and the open education resources guarantee an increasing impact on the regional systems in each partner country. All the partner are implementing activities and planning new programmes based on the evidences of MYFUTURE project. The contacts achieved during the dissemination are creating new partnership and enlarging the communities of teachers an practitioners interesting in the development of digital resources and tools for career guidance at school. info on www.myfutureproject