The project "Building equality over diversity" aims at promoting schools internationalization in terms of openness to others and to other cultures, as well as propensity to the collective and individual mobility of teachers and students. The partner schools belong to four European countries (Italy, Romania, Spain and Turkey) and have a various students' background. Students are between 16 and 18 years old, come from middle-class families and are not good at interacting with different life models. Belonging to different cultures and lower social classes often entails cases of marginalization. Their other peculiarity is having poor cultural interests and low self-esteem. The biennial project will allow students to grow as European citizens and discuss themes of integration, social inclusion, participation, work sharing and mobility. The project will also improve learners' linguistic and technical skills. The project will involve 96 students and 25 teachers. Further technical and curricular support will be available within each institute in the number of teachers of each Class Council. Local public authorities, companies and universities will contribute to the project. The participating students will work together on issues closely related to integration and inclusion that will lead them to reflect on their own preconceptions and, through the knowledge of others, involve them in a real intercultural dialogue. In particular, the following topics will be discussed: 1. Emigration: from the history of emigration of each country students will overcome the stereotypes of modern society, becoming aware of the situation of migrants and of the opportunities that migratory flows bring. 2. Solidarity as an individual responsibility: students will participate in laboratories linked to responsible consumption and solidarity-based economy. At the end of the experience they will have learned some mechanisms of the world economy and gained greater awareness of the individual consumer’s responsibility. 3. Tolerance and brotherhood: the Turkish students will present the philosophy of Mevlana, the places in which he lived and discussions on the subject of tolerance will be proposed. We expect students to overcome at least some stereotypes about countries like the Arab world. 4. Education without borders: comparing the differences among the educational systems involved in the project we will discuss the possibility of creating a European learning area, as the key to create a knowledge-based society. The topic of mobility within the "European Higher Education Area" will also be addressed. This information and reflections will stimulate the propensity towards mobility and the interest in seeking study opportunities abroad. 5. Gender inequality: students will analyse the statistics and compare the situation of women in their own countries. At the end we expect a greater awareness of gender gaps and a greater propensity of girls to study STEM disciplines. 6. Sport as a vehicle for integration: through the description of each country's national sport we will introduce the concept of health (also for people with disabilities). Reflecting on the fact that sport addresses everyone without distinction, speaks a universal language and promotes the spread of fundamental values such as integration, merit, commitment and equality, students will be encouraged to reflect on their lifestyle and on mutual aid. The teaching team will experiment innovative, flexible and inclusive teaching. The activities will be mainly based on lab experiences, role-play games, simulations, testimonies and debates. The results of these activities will be recomposed in an organic framework and returned to the territory during a final conference and other local events, and will be available in multimedia format on a dedicated website (translated into English and in the languages of the participating countries). All educational materials produced will be published as open-content (free license that explicitly allows copying and editing by others) that can be re-used to create new "learning objects". The achievement of the objectives will allow us to re-propose this type of partnership and other forms of cultural exchange in a structured way to students. The richness of these formative experiences that put students in direct contact with other worldviews, with different social contexts and with other languages will foster the social cohesion of the whole community through the enhancement of the knowledge, skills and competences of their human capital.
The project "Building equality over diversity" aims at promoting schools internationalization in terms of openness to others and to other cultures, as well as propensity to the collective and individual mobility of teachers and students. The partner schools belong to four European countries (Italy, Romania, Spain and Turkey) and have a various students' background. Students are between 16 and 18 years old, come from middle-class families and are not good at interacting with different life models. Belonging to different cultures and lower social classes often entails cases of marginalization. Their other peculiarity is having poor cultural interests and low self-esteem. The project initially planned to last three years, than increased by one year due to the COVID pandemic, encouraged students to grow as European citizens, discuss themes of integration, social inclusion, participation, work sharing and mobility. The project also improveed learners' linguistic and technical skills. The project involved 25 students and 6 teachers. Further support has been given by the internal technical staff. Local public authorities, companies and universities contributeed to the project. The participating students worked together on issues closely related to integration and inclusion. In particular, the following topics will has been discussed: 1. Emigration: from the history of emigration of each country students overcomed the stereotypes of modern society, becoming aware of the situation of migrants and of the opportunities that migratory flows bring. 2. Solidarity as an individual responsibility: students participated in laboratories linked to responsible consumption and solidarity-based economy. They learned some mechanisms of the world economy and gained greater awareness of the individual consumer’s responsibility. 3. Tolerance and brotherhood: the Turkish students presented the philosophy of Mevlana, the places in which he lived and discussions on the subject of tolerance has been proposed. Students overcomed at least some stereotypes about countries like the Arab world. 4. Education without borders: comparing the differences among the educational systems involved in the project we discussed the possibility of creating a European learning area, as the key to create a knowledge-based society. The topic of mobility within the "European Higher Education Area" has also been addressed. This information and reflections stimulated the interest in seeking study opportunities abroad. 5. Gender inequality: students analysed the statistics and compared the situation of women in their own countries. At the end they had a greater awareness of gender gaps. 6. Sport as a vehicle for integration: through the description of each country's national sport we introduced the concept of health (also for people with disabilities). Reflecting on the fact that sport addresses everyone without distinction, speaks a universal language and promotes the spread of fundamental values such as integration, merit, commitment and equality, students has been encouraged to reflect on their lifestyle and on mutual aid. The teaching team experimented innovative, flexible and inclusive teaching. The activities will be mainly based on lab experiences, role-play games, simulations, testimonies and debates. The results of these activities has benn recomposed in an organic framework and returned to the territory during a final conference and other local events, and are available in multimedia format on a dedicated website (available in English). All educational materials produced has been published as open-content (free license that explicitly allows copying and editing by others) that can be re-used to create new "learning objects". The achievement of the objectives allow us to re-propose this type of partnership and other forms of cultural exchange in a structured way to students and teachers. The richness of these formative experiences that put students in direct contact with other worldviews, with different social contexts and with other languages fostered the social cohesion of the whole community through the enhancement of the knowledge, skills and competences of their human capital.