The Erasmus + project “Join the European table” is a project involving 6 partner schools from France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Spain and Poland with students in the upper secondary education. Inclusive education and youth training are the main priorities of this project and declared to be the major aims in the strategic paper “Europe 2020” written down by the EU.The events of last years contributed to increasing ideological polarisation in the European society. All the countries involved in this project have been trying in recent years to face different serious problems related to refugees. In some countries the question of immigration has only been theoretical as refugees chose them to be transit to western Europe, others were more involved and can share their experiences. The goals of the project are to promote freedom, tolerance and non-discrimination through education. By means of educating young people we can ensure they acquire social, civic and intercultural competences by promoting democratic values and fundamental rights, social inclusion and non- discrimination. We would like to stop portraying migration in schools as a problem and start showing the benefits and advantages. According to this, our three year project will include the following and more specific measures: 1. Getting to know the background : Migration, refugees and their integration in society Students will be able to analyze the current situation by comparing it to the past. The construction of the “European table” giving the name to the project will take place together with refugees. This will strengthen the feeling of belonging all to one common intercultural Europe. The students will see in situ how refugees are prepared for working attending lessons for refugees and visiting refugees in vocational training in school and at companies. 2. Making experiences with refugees After having seen films and read books about immigration, students will debate about their impressions and feelings. They will learn about the importance of volunteer work by visiting charities and doing volunteering in their countries. The students will sit down at our “European table” to cook and to eat with refugees. Everybody will learn cultural codes and habits from each other. 3. Being refugees ourselves! The students will make experiences similar to refugees by going to a foreign country for 2 months having to adapt and to integrate themselves. During the long time stays the guideline developed in advance for welcoming foreign students can be tested, evaluated and improved. The students will discuss in international groups on our “European table” about dreams, future visions and expectations for one united Europe in presence of the media and politicians. All the participants in the project will gain a rewarding experience as European Union citizens that will be promoted by using the project results such as a booklet about migration, the project homepage, videoclips, exhibitions, the project flyer and other promotional material. In addition a common guided welcoming protocol for refugees and school newcomers will be written and implemented first in our schools and later presented in the corresponding Education Boards of the countries involved in the project so as other schools can take it and use it as an example of school good practice.
The Erasmus + project “Join the European table” was a project involving 6 partner schools from France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Spain and Poland with students in the upper secondary education. Inclusive education and youth training were the main priorities of this project and declared to be the major aims in the strategic paper “Europe 2020” written down by the EU.The events of last years contributed to increasing ideological polarisation in the European society. All the countries involved in this project have been trying in recent years to face different serious problems related to refugees. In some countries the question of immigration has only been theoretical as refugees chose them to be transit to western Europe, others were more involved and could share their experiences. The main goals of the project which have been already accomplished were the following : 1-To promote freedom, tolerance and non-discrimination through education. 2-To ensure that our students have acquired social, civic and intercultural competences by promoting democratic values and fundamental rights, social inclusion and non- discrimination. 3- To stop portraying migration in schools as a problem and started showing the benefits and advantages. According to this and to make sure to accomplish these main goals our three year project included the following and more specific objectives, measures and activities: 1. To get to know the background : Migration, refugees and their integration in society Students were able to analyze the current situation by comparing it to the past. The construction of the “European table” giving the name to the project took place together with refugees. This strengthened the feeling of belonging all to one common intercultural Europe. The students could see in situ how refugees are prepared for working attending lessons for refugees and visiting refugees in vocational training in school and at companies. 2. To share experiences with refugees After having seen films and read books about immigration, students had a debate about their impressions and feelings. They learned about the importance of volunteer work by visiting charities and doing volunteering in their countries. The students sat down at our “European table” to eat with refugees. Everybody learned cultural codes and habits from each other. 3. To be refugees ourselves The students had made experiences similar to refugees by going to a foreign country for 2 months having to adapt and to integrate themselves. During the long time stays the guideline developed in advance for welcoming foreign students could be tested, evaluated and improved. The students discussed in international groups on our “European table” about dreams, future visions and expectations for one united Europe in presence of the media and authorities. Regarding the difficulties encountered in the project we can say that our main difficulty was the managing of the project under the COVID19 circumstances that urged us to convert some physical mobilities into virtual ones, as well as the impossibility of three of the partners to send students for long time mobilities due to their governments' pandemia restrictions. The covid 19 situation was a real problem for us that we had to face during the two last years of the project. Thanks to the good communication among the partners and the different digital platforms such as eTwinning, Zoom, Meet, Webbex and Wonderme we could reinvent ourselves and keep the sound and good management of the project even in the lockdown. All the participants in the project have gained a rewarding experience as European Union citizens that has been promoted by using the project results such as : 1- a digital booklet about migration 2- the project homepage 3- refugee interviews videos 4- Students' volunteering PPT presentations 4- the project flyer 5- a digital booklet about eating habits 6- the project T-shirt 7- the project online and physical exhibitions. In addition and finally a common guided welcoming protocol for refugees and school newcomers has been written and implemented first in our schools and later presented in the corresponding Education Boards of the countries involved in the project so as other schools can take it and use it as an example of school good practice.