Secondary schools from five different countries form our project partnership: Vammalan Lukio (Sastamala, Finland), Ühisgümmnasium Lähte (Lähte, Estonia), Peebles High School (Peebless, Scotland), Istituto Statale di Instruzione Superiore F. Enriques (Castelfiorentino, Italy) and Otto-Hahn-Gymnasium Ostfildern (Ostfildern, Germany). The project "Work in progress - Students managing public relations projects in schools" explicitly focuses on the development of students' project management skills in international environments by offering them various opportunities to autonomously manage a variety of self-contained projects. Students will carry out projects revolving around public relations activities, i.e. resulting in events such as public debates and panel discussions on the one hand, and media products such as websites including documentary film clips and podcasts on the other hand. The projects will deal with topics of local and European / international relevance. An exceptionally high level of student engagement and activity will be required and upheld throughout the project. The project not only aims to equip our students with essential project management skills and competences, but by making them work in project teams composed of students from different nationalities, thereby integrating the international perspective in all respects, it also wants to improve their intercultural competence and language skills. Being able to manage their work independently, to appropriately interact in an international environment and to speak different languages, will ultimately enhance their chances of EU-wide employment in the future. The project particularly targets students of upper grades, aged ~ 15 - 17, these students entering the world of work in the near future, and therefore profiting most from the learning, teaching and training activities envisaged in this project. At the same time, teachers will get to know innovative and motivating methods and tools to implement projects inside and outside the classroom, thereby enlarging their repertoire of teaching methodology in a project-oriented learning environment. In the course of the project, students will have the possibility of carrying out different kinds of projects at five transnational meetings, one in every country. At each meeting a minimum of 5 participants (at least 3 students and 2 teachers) from each school will come together to embark on a set project. The project work in Germany will be centred around a public debate and air pollution in big cities. In Finland students will be required to stage a panel discussion revolving around political participation of young people. In Estonia, students will be provided with the opportunity to create a website with short documentary film clips, providing information on the smart and sustainable use of energy. In Italy, students will also produce a website including podcasts, focusing on the topic "Immigration and concepts of integration". The project work in Scotland is supposed to result in a panel discussion integrating Skype about young people entering the world of work. Students will work on these projects, complying with the methodology of project management. All final project products will be made available to a wider public at the end of each learning, teaching and training activity. The final products will also be documented on eTwinning. Furthermore, students will be expected to keep a record of their project management activities in form of a (online) logbook. On top, we plan to present our good-practice examples of international project work in form of a compilation of brochures, each of which will be produced by students in the course of our five transnational meetings. Teaching material to support the students carry out their projects will also be made available as OER. After each learning, teaching and training activity, the newly acquired project management techniques and tools are applied in the home schools and follow-up project activities will be documented, adding to the success of the project. Surveys at the beginning and at the end of the entire project and of each transnational learning, teaching and training activity will ensure the progress of the project. Students and teachers will enormously profit from experiencing different approaches to project work in an international environment. Both will enlarge their know-how about project management in general, and especially students will develop and boost their project management skills and competences. The project will also help them to increase their intercultural and linguistic skills, widen their horizons and make them feel a member of a wider European professional community. We want the idea of fostering project management skills and competences to form an integral part of our schools' profiles, in particular in terms of our pedagogical concepts, thereby enriching our schools.
Secondary schools from five different countries formed our project partnership: Vammalan Lukio (Sastamala, Finland), Ühisgümmnasium Lähte (Lähte, Estonia), Peebles High School (Peebless, Scotland), Istituto Statale di Instruzione Superiore F. Enriques (Castelfiorentino, Italy) and Otto-Hahn-Gymnasium Ostfildern (Ostfildern, Germany). The project "Work in progress - Students managing public relations projects in schools" explicitly focused on the development of students' project management skills in international environments by offering them various opportunities to autonomously manage a variety of self-contained projects. Students carried out projects revolving around public relations activities, i.e. resulting in events such as public debates and panel discussions on the one hand, and media products such as websites including documentary film clips and podcasts on the other hand. The projects dealt with topics of local and European / international relevance. An exceptionally high level of student engagement and activity was required and upheld throughout the project. The project not only aimed to equip our students with essential project management skills and competences, but by making them work in project teams composed of students from different nationalities, thereby integrating the international perspective in all respects, it also wanted to improve their intercultural competence and language skills. Being able to manage their work independently, to appropriately interact in an international environment and to speak different languages, will hopefully enhance their chances of EU-wide employment in the future. The project particularly targeted students of upper grades, aged ~ 15 - 18, these students entering the world of work in the near future, and therefore profiting most from the learning, teaching and training activities carried out in this project. At the same time, teachers got to know innovative and motivating methods and tools to implement projects inside and outside the classroom, thereby enlarging their repertoire of teaching methodology in a project-oriented learning environment. In the course of the project, students had the possibility of carrying out different kinds of projects at five transnational meetings, one in every country. At each meeting a minimum of 5 participants (at least 3 students and 2 teachers) from each school came together to embark on a set project. The project work in Germany was centred around a public debate and air pollution in big cities. In Finland students staged a panel discussion revolving around political participation of young people. In Estonia, students were provided with the opportunity to create a blog and photo documentaries, providing information on the smart and sustainable use of energy. In Italy, students produced podcasts, focusing on the topic "Immigration and concepts of integration". The project work in Scotland resulted in a panel discussion about young people entering the world of work. All final project products were made available to a wider public at the end of each learning, teaching and training activity. The final products were also and are still documented on eTwinning. Furthermore, students were expected to keep a record of their project management activities in form of a (online) logbook. On top, we presented our good-practice examples of international project work in form of power point presentations, each of which was produced by students in the course of our five transnational meetings. Teaching material to support the students to carry out their projects was also and is still available on our Twinspace. After each learning, teaching and training activity, the newly acquired project management techniques and tools were applied in the home schools and follow-up project activities were documented, adding to the success of the project. Surveys at the beginning and at the end of the entire project and of each transnational learning, teaching and training activity ensured the progress of the project. Students and teachers have enormously profited from experiencing different approaches to project work in an international environment. Both enlarged their know-how about project management in general, and especially students developed and boosted their project management skills and competences. The project has also helped them to increase their intercultural and linguistic skills, widen their horizons and make them feel a member of a wider European professional community.