CONTEXT The growing flow of refugees to the EU countries makes the process of their social inclusion a high priority. According to the latest figures published by the Eu Commission (March 2017), in 2015 and 2016 the EU received 2.5 million asylum applications. Knowledge of the language of host country is considered as one of the most crucial elements for successful social inclusion and as the main lever to increase the newly arrived refugees’ level of self-reliance and participation. Without a good knowledge of the host country language, it is almost impossible to integrate into the local culture, get into the labour market and socialize with members of other communities. Therefore without implementing a proper inclusion policy, it will increased the possibility of having a growing number of marginalized people, excluded from every form of social activities and labour market. Thus eliminating all forms of intercultural dialogue leads to increase in incidents of racial discrimination and intolerance. Besides, this project has been built upon some of the recommendations following the report of the Eu Parliament on "refugees: social inclusion and integration into the labour market" (2015/2321(INI)) with particular focus on "Welcomes solutions providing multilingual information on opportunities involving formal and non-formal education, vocational training, work placement and volunteering for migrants, refugees and asylum seekers; calls, therefore, for such services to be extended". OBJECTIVES Today, according to the 2015/2321(INI) 24.4 % of the total population in the EU live in risk of poverty and social exclusion, and almost 10 % are facing severe material deprivation. The overall objective of Language As a Bridge “LAB” project, then, is to contribute in reducing this data enhancing the social inclusion of the newly arrived adult refugees by improving their language knowledge. We want to help on reaching this overall objective by increasing the efficiency of 20 adult educators (specific objective) on language education of newly arrived adult refugees. The 20 adult educators will be trained with an innovative guideline on language education (main project result) that will be developed by the LAB consortium. NUMBERS AND PROFILES OF THE PARTICIPANTS At the activities of LAB project will be involved 20 adult educators during the training. These in addition to being formed through the innovative guideline, at the end of training will have to assess the real innovation of the guideline. These participants will be selected by consortium members at the local level. As a selection criteria will be the activities that they perform. If they are related to the project activities and the added value that they can give to achieve the result. In the specific case, the participants will have to satisfy at least one of the following criteria: 1. experience in the field of formal education or non-formal adult education; 2. working directly with refugees. 3. not member of consortium. Many other criteria will be agreed with members during the kick-off meeting and during the preparation phase. METHODOLOGY The methodology used will be the traditional project cycle management from one side. Then we have some social science methodoloy and finally some formal and non-formal education methods. PROJECT ACTIVITIES A part of project management activities, there will be: - a research; - a focus group; - a training; - a transnational meeting; - a publication of the guidelines. IMPACT ON THE PARTICIPANTS Participants have understood how long and sometimes complicated and frustrating could be the setting up of some guidelines that try to reconsider the current methodology. In fact, very often it seems that the actionn to "Sail Away from the Safe Harbor" needs to have the strenghts to get a new way. Finally, LAB project expect also to have an impact as for some attitudes the participants could have had during the project. We can expect then an impact of the project regarding the awareness of the participant regarding his/her emotional and relational dynamics when dealing with a transnational training project as well as his/her own limits and strength points. LAB will give the consortium organizations a new input to better integrate their activities. As already seen before, this project is the result of some former projects (SHIP and SCAYP). In fact, some of the organizations were already cooperating over those projects implementation.
CONTEXT The growing flow of refugees to the EU countries makes the process of their social inclusion a high priority. According to the latest figures published by the Eu Commission (March 2017), in 2015 and 2016 the EU received 2.5 million asylum applications. Knowledge of the language of host country is considered as one of the most crucial elements for successful social inclusion and as the main lever to increase the newly arrived refugees’ level of self-reliance and participation. Without a good knowledge of the host country language, it is almost impossible to integrate into the local culture, get into the labour market and socialize with members of other communities. Therefore without implementing a proper inclusion policy, it will increase the possibility of having a growing number of marginalized people, excluded from every form of social activities and labour market. Thus eliminating all forms of intercultural dialogue lead to increase in incidents of racial discrimination and intolerance. Besides, this project has been built upon some of the recommendations following the report of the Eu Parliament on "refugees: social inclusion and integration into the labour market" (2015/2321(INI)) with particular focus on "Welcomes solutions providing multilingual information on opportunities involving formal and non-formal education, vocational training, work placement and volunteering for migrants, refugees and asylum seekers; calls, therefore, for such services to be extended". OBJECTIVES Today, according to the 2015/2321(INI) 24.4 % of the total population in the EU live in risk of poverty and social exclusion, and almost 10 % are facing severe material deprivation. The overall objective of Language As a Bridge “LAB” project, then, was to contribute in reducing this data enhancing the social inclusion of the Newly Arrived People (NAP) by improving their language knowledge. We aimed at contributing to reaching this overall objective by increasing the skills of 20 adult educators (specific objective) on language education of NAP. The 20 adult educators was trained with an innovative guideline on language education (main project result) that has been developed by the LAB consortium. NUMBERS AND PROFILES OF THE PARTICIPANTS The project involved at different level with As said, the training involved 20 adult educators. The participants have been selected considering the following criteria: 1. experience in the field of formal education or non-formal adult education; 2. working directly with refugees and/or with migrants; 3. not consortium member; METHODOLOGY As for the methodology, the project followed a combination of methodology. As far the project implementation, the consortium used the traditional project cycle management (PCM) from one side. Then we have had some social science methodology like the one used to carry out the research. Last but not least, some formal and non-formal education methods have been used especially during the short-term training. PROJECT ACTIVITIES DONE The project has seen the development of the following activities: - a research with a questionnaire administered to 119 people; - a focus group done to 6 groups; - a short-term training in which 30 people have participated; - 1 transnational meeting held in Florence (Italy); - the publication of innovative guideline. IMPACT ON THE PARTICIPANTS The goal of LAB project was to improve the social inclusion of Newly Arrived People (NAP) while the specific objectives was to having increased the skills of 20 adult educators on language teaching to NAP. Going into detail, during the project implementation we observed that: a) participants of the sample for the research were aware about the project and its aims; b) participants of the training are now better skilled to teach language education to NAP as well as have now a wider view of the different methodologies used in different context (Norway, Spain, Greece, Italy, Belgium and Portugal). c) multiplier participants have an idea of the project and its main output, the handbook, that they can consider to use or to spread the voice about when it comes the question of NAP and language education.