Obtaining an education and a diploma are valuable instruments in today’s society. It is shown that people without a secondary diploma are unemployed for a longer time than people who have acquired a secondary diploma. In 2015, 58.2 % of 18 to 24 year old early leavers from education and training were either unemployed or inactive. Still, a significant number of students drop out of secondary education before obtaining a diploma (=early school leaving). Some of them decide to go for their diploma of secondary education later on in life. Second chance education in Europe is often successful in helping young people who have failed to accomplish secondary education. But also adult education faces an increasing number of drop-outs. Combining an adult life with studies remains challenging. Adult educators have a sense of what causes adult learners to drop out but they are merely assumptions. Too little adult education providers, and secondary schools for that matter, really look into these specific causes by systematically asking their students why they are considering dropping out or have already dropped. Because of this lack of information, the prevention of drop-outs in adult education often does not tackle the real causes and therefore fails. Adult education in Europe is in need of concrete, practical measures to deal with dropout in both second chance education and adult education in general. By developing and applying specific measures, the project 'Dropping in the drop-outs' (DIDO) aims at increasing the chances of succession of adult students throughout Europe and, that way, hopes to contribute to the Europe 2020 strategy which sets out a target of reducing the share of early leavers of education and training to less than 10 % and increasing the share of the population aged 30 to 34 having completed tertiary or equivalent education to at least 40% by 2020. DIDO addresses these needs by achieving the following five objectives: 1) analysis and comparison of relevant themes and causes of dropout in adult education in Europe 2) exchange of good practices regarding dropout and student counseling between education providers in Europe, 3) the development of concrete tools regarding the detection and the approach of dropout in adult education, targeted to student counselors, teachers and students, 4) the development of a toolkit with practical, easy to use check lists, tips and tricks and good practices on the prevention of dropout of students in adult education. 5) To foster networking between student counselors and teachers in the field of adult education from different EU countries concerning the prevention of drop-out. To achieve those objectives, DIDO develops the following 2 results: - Requirements analysis report: based on the research effors of the DIDO consortium will answer the following 2 questions: a) Why do students in adult education drop-out before graduating? b) Which good practices in the field of drop-out prevention in adult education exist in the partners' organisations, the partners' countries and Europe? - Dropping in the drop-outs toolkit: after the different actions and tools to reduce dropout in adult education have been developed and tested, they will be collected in the DIDO toolkit. this toolkit will contain concrete tips and tricks and good practices, turning it into a practical instrument for adult education providers in Europe to decrease the drop-out rate in adult learning. This project focuses on students in adult education who already have commenced and even completed a part of their educational route, but drop out before they went through the entire curriculum and obtained their diploma. They leave school without acquiring a degree or diploma. More specific, the focus of this project is on younger adults under the age of 30, with a low income and without a job since research has proven that this group is especially vulnerable for drop-out. By looking at good practices in different countries, looking into the different causes for dropping out in adult education and developing and testing specific tools/actions aimed at the prevention of drop-out in adult education so that a toolkit can be developed for other educators throughout Europe to use, DIDO wants to ensure that more adult students achieve their diploma and enlarge their chances on the labour market.
Obtaining an education and a diploma are valuable instruments in today’s society. It is shown that people without a secondary diploma are unemployed for a longer time than people who have acquired a secondary diploma. In 2015, 58.2 % of 18 to 24 year old early leavers from education and training were either unemployed or inactive. Still, a significant number of students drop out of secondary education before obtaining a diploma (=early school leaving). Some of them decide to go for their diploma of secondary education later on in life. Second chance education in Europe is often successful in helping young people who have failed to accomplish secondary education. But also adult education faces an increasing number of drop-outs. Combining an adult life with studies remains challenging. Adult educators have a sense of what causes adult learners to drop out but they are merely assumptions. Because of this lack of information, the prevention of drop-outs in adult education often does not tackle the real causes and therefore fails. Adult education in Europe was in need of concrete, practical measures to deal with dropout in both second chance education and adult education in general. By developing and applying specific measures, the project 'Dropping in the drop-outs' (DIDO) aimed at increasing the chances of succession of adult students throughout Europe and, that way, hopes to contribute to the Europe 2020 strategy which sets out a target of reducing the share of early leavers of education and training to less than 10 % and increasing the share of the population aged 30 to 34 having completed tertiary or equivalent education to at least 40% by 2020. To achieve this objective, DIDO developed the following two results: 1) Requirements analysis report: based on the research efforts of the DIDO consortium the following two questions were answered: a) Why do students in adult education drop-out before graduating? b) Which good practices in the field of drop-out prevention in adult education exist in the partners' organisations, the partners' countries and Europe? 2) Dropping in the drop-outs toolkit: this toolkit contains concrete tools and tips and tricks, turning it into a practical instrument for adult education providers in Europe to decrease the dropout rate in adult learning. The tools were developed and tested within the DIDO consortium. This project focused on adult learners at risk of dropping out their educational pathway and leaving school without acquiring a diploma. More specific, the focus of this project is on younger adults under the age of 30, with a low income and without a job since research has proven that this group is especially vulnerable for dropout. The DIDO consortium consisted of the six following partners across Europe: - GO! CVO Antwerpen (Belgium): adult education provider - Axxell (Finland): VET provider offering education for e.g. adults - Curio (the Netherlands): secondary VET and adult education provider - AidLearn (Portugal): training, action-research and consulting company - HF & VUC FYN (Denmark): adult education provider - The Swiss Federation for Adult Learning (Switzerland): umbrella organisation for general and vocational adult learning (associated partner supported and financed by Movetia Switzerland) The toolkit has been a great result and is, due to its user-friendliness, currently being used by both the staff that participated in the project and others in and outside the organisation. Tackling dropout can now be done in a more holistic context by linking dropout policy to concrete tools already available. Adult learners benefit from improved career guidance and competent support in crisis situations as organisations have gained insight in their challenges and now have tools available to overcome these challenges. In the long term, the DIDO project should contribute to a reduction in the number of people dropping out of education and thus to a higher number of people graduating from adult education. This will have an impact on long-term unemployment and the employability of graduates.