According to the World Health Organization, in 2050, 7 out of 10 the world's population will live in cities. Increasing urbanization brings serious economic, social and environmental risks. Lack of awareness of the environmental processes and incompetent dealing with them also applies to countries that have already gone through a period of transition and are among the developed countries. In the light of this information people have been questioning the origins of their food and making informed food choices for decades,according to us flowers are a part of agriculture, too, so we should be conscious of the way in which we produce and consume them. The slow food movement (with its hundreds of thousands of members and supporters) has changed our relationship with the foods in our lives. Now the slow flower movement is changing the way we think about cut flowers: Yes, we'd all prefer seasonal, local, sustainable, fresh, fragrant flowers in our bouquets, not the chemical-laden lifeless blooms flown in from afar. Training of vocational school students on how to adapt Slow Flower Farming to the education project is a development of innovation project through partnership among different organizations as Fatma Aliye Vocational and Technical High School, Nordwin College, IPSASR and DEULA. All these organizations are well established and experienced bodies on flower farming issue and school education. The overall objective of the project is to train the students on education about the slow flower farming.As metodology, the project foresees the sharing of knowledge and competences between students and also teachers belonging to different schools and institutions. More precisely, the German DEULA will make available its knowledge of Slow Flower Farming, organizing 3 training session to 36 agriculture students from Turkey, Italy and the Netherlands. While DEULA practices an extensive farming of Slow Flower in its institute, in other partner countries Slow Flower Farming is diffused only at the university level. During the training sessions process of Slow Flower Farming will be taught by German teachers. Students from other countries will improve their knowledge and will be provided with an innovative and unexpected point of view on their professional career. After the training sessions finish, partner schools will host the students of other schools to make them know how the flower industries work in their countries, exploring how Slow Flower Farming could be applied to this sector. There will be agriculture 4 students and a teacher from partner schools for each visit. In this regard, the partner schools will organize visits to enterprises and teachers will carry on surveys among enterprises to test their needs for this kind of farming. The project was developed in partnership with the 4 organization, Turkey, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy. Each of them brings to the project a unique experience enriching its scope and dimension. Also the "sFlowER" initiative is the initiative of VET providers who want to set up structural partnership for the implementation of an ECVET system. It is not about inventing a new system, but the methodology will be based on initiatives of the partners which are dealing with specific aspects in the whole process from developing and training process till the recognition of learning outcomes. "sFlowER" is all about creating harmony in a way that it fits the needs for the partners for a practical and efficient methodology for the transfer and recognition of learning outcomes. The specific context is the agricultural sector. This is one of the most internationally oriented sector and that is one of the reason why international mobility should be encouraged in a better way in this sector. However, we can only speak from a success when we really manage to validate, recognize and transfer these learning outcomes which are gained in a context abroad. The involvement of students and staff will be helped by different online tools as a website and a Facebook/Twitter page where students and staff could exchange their feedbacks on the project and their proposals. This network among students and staff, will also give them the chance to improve their knowledge of English and to exchange information about job opportunities in Europe.All the partners are involved in every step of the project. However, their role can differ, depending the nature of the organisation. 3 transnational meetings are planned over a period of 24 months. The meetings are working meetings, centered around the achievement of the milestones as described above. As a result we will disseminate the project by:Printing and sending the outputs to the target groupsSending the outputs in electronic wayWeb SiteSocial MediaMediaPrinting Raising Awareness Documents
The Strategic Partnership "Slow Flower Movement" has brought together public schools and private vocational training centers from four European countries (Turkey, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands) in order to examine the various national school-to-work transition (on flower farming) settings in the participating countries and their specific vocational learning approaches. Training of vocational school students on how to adapt Slow Flower Farming to the education project was a development of innovation project through partnership among different organizations as Fatma Aliye Vocational and Technical High School (Turkey), Nordwin College (the Netherlands), IPSASR (Italy) and DEULA (Germany). All these organizations were/are well established and experienced bodies on flower farming issue and school education.The Erasmus+ project was set up to exchange expertise on vocational-based learning and training, and of course to highlight examples of good practice. Objectives The overall objective of the project was: - to train the students on education about the slow flower farming -to improve the VET within the field of sustainable farming with the goal to strengthen the skills of the affected students and give them trainngs that increase their vocational/professional development -to produce a booklet with good examples on slow flowers of the partner countries As metodology, the project supposed the sharing of knowledge and competences between students and also teachers belonging to different schools and institutions. In the 2 years of its working time the project managed to complete all the tasks, activities and products the partner consortium agreed on in the early stage of application and submission. The activities started with an extensive Kick-off meeting that took place in Turkey. Following, 6 LTT Activities were carried out. In these LTT activities 60 students and 15 teachers took place and experienced the good practies of the host countries. After each LTT Activity a questionnaire applied to the participants. The activities were accompanied by 3 transnational project meetings where the expertise and ideas were exchanged, the observation of work plan and time schedule monitored as well as the next tasks and respoinsiblities agreed. Finaly a booklet that contains the slow flower of the partner countries has been created. In order to strengthen the VET, the Slow Flower Movement project has produced a booklet with good examples on how to work with sustainable flowers/farming, which is available online and free for anyone to use. The Slow Flower Booklet is this project's one of the main result. The booklet can be found online at http://www.slowflowerproject.com/. In this way the results are available for everybody interested in using the material produced within the project. The main impact of Slow Flower Project is that the professionals (companion teachers) working in the field have gotten new tools and training materials in order to support their students at school to make sustainable choices/decisions. As it has already known the specific context of the project was the agricultural sector. It is obvious tah this is one of the most internationally oriented sector and that is one of the reason why international mobility should be encouraged in a better way in this sector. However, we can only speak from a success when we really manage to validate, recognize and transfer these learning outcomes which are gained in a context abroad. The involvement of students and staff was helped by different online tools as a website and a Instagram/Whatsapp page where students and staff could exchange their feedbacks on the project and their proposals. This network among students and staff also gave them the chance to improve their knowledge of English and to exchange information about job opportunities in Europe in the future. All the partners were involved in every step of the project. However, their role differed, depending the nature of the organisation.