In times of high unemployment and uncertain working conditions like temporary working-contracts among young people in Europe, especially with a migration background or with learning difficulties, it is important to prepare young people better for their working lifes. In order to give our students insight in their chances to the job market, we have chosen to combine creativity and being self-employed without employees (ZZP-er). In this way one can work independently and one doesn’t have to wait for an employer to get a job. One also can start working in other countries in Europe. Schools pay less and less attention to creative subjects, but precisely by stimulating and developing creativity you get flexible, enterprising and problem-solving students. Creativity is one of the important 21st century skills. By bringing students into contact with creative entrepreneurs and with various innovative and creative disciplines, they gain insight into their own creative talent and the possibilities to make a profession out of it. All four participating schools (Germany: Neuburg, Spain: Cordoba, Italy: Assago, the Netherlands: Emmeloord) are secondary schools; with students between 14 and 16 years old. All schools believe in the added value of this project, as students -will discover their own creative talents/interests by taking part in several workshops -will learn what it means to be a self-employed person in the field of art/design -will know about the possibilities to work as a self-employed person within Europe -will learn a structured approach how to interview young entrepreneurs -will create and present a business plan and marketing concept for products they designed -will become acquainted with the culture of the visited country, as they are staying at host families and get the chance to meet a lot of different people living in those countries -will visit a cultural heritage site during their visits at the partner schools -will improve their English language skills -will improve their ICT (21st Century) skills The project will last two years and there will be two students exchanges each year. Each school will attend with 8 students and 2 teachers. The project is very well integrated in the “regular school life”. Prior to an exchange the students make presentations about themselves during an English lesson and in Art classes they will make designs for the creative workshops they will attend during the exchange. In economic classes they will be taught the basics concerning writing business plans, marketing etc. In that way other students get to know about the project too. During the exchanges the students will visit self- employed persons (art/design, music/drama), interview them and give presentations about the visit afterwards. They will take part in various innovative and creative workshops like designing with 3D-printing, making vlogs, composing music via apps like Garageband, etc. They will visit a company/ institution, involved with Art/Design or entrepreneurship. They will write a business plan based on the Art product they made and a marketing assignment. They will visit a cultural heritage place (Cordoba: Mesquita and Flamenco-centre, Milan: Theatro a la Scala, Nürnberg: Design museum, Emmeloord: Schokland and Leeuwarden (Cultural Capital of Europe 2018)), because Cultural Heritage is an important part of our European identity and can inspire young artists and designers to use traditional ideas and techniques. Afterwards, back at their own school the students will give presentations to their classmates during the economy classes about the experiences they had with Creativity@work. All activities will be communicated via our own BlogSpot, students will make vlogs before, during and after the exchange and put them on our YouTube channel. Updates of the project will be published on each schools’ website and the local media will be tuned in every time when there is an activity. From the vlogs and the presentations we can see if the students have discovered their creative talents, know what it takes to become a self -employed person and understand that, regardless of their origin or their learning difficulties, they can take initiative to become independent entrepreneurs in the creative field. With this project we want to inspire the schools to give more attention to subjects such as Art and Design, Music and Drama. Working as a self-employed person and writing a simple business plan can be included in career orientation and guidance. Because the vlogs are also viewed by other youngsters they can be inspired to develop creativity and make it their profession. Parents of students will be pleased because the students are better prepared for their future. Students perform better at school when they have a goal in mind and there are fewer drop-outs. Something the school managements will appreciate. With this project we want to help to reduce unemployment among young people in Europe in the future.
Our project Creativity@Work, which was meant to run for 2 years, lasted 3 years due to Covid-19 and the ensuing lockdowns. We were granted permission for an extra year during which we should have arranged the final exchange to Italy. However, due to the prolonged nature of the pandemic, this exchange never took place and we decided to organize a virtual-exchange instead. In these 3 years our main objective was to raise students’ awareness of the possibilities offered by being self-employed in the creative sector in the European Union, regardless of background (migrant) or learning disabilities. Creativity is one of the important 21st century skills, but, as some schools pay less and less attention to creative subjects, we wanted to emphasize the importance of these subjects. We also brought students into contact with creative entrepreneurs. Schools from 4 countries (Germany, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands) worked together on this project; all secondary schools with students aged between 13 and 16, some from a migrant background and/ or with learning disabilities. All together there were 3 student exchanges in which 4 schools participated with 8 students and 2 teachers plus one virtual exchange with approximately 25 students per country. In prior to an exchange, the students prepared presentations about themselves (PowerPoint/ Prezi/ iMovie) during English lessons. In art classes they prepared designs (3D printing/ textile printing/ printing on wood/ Flamenco choreography) for the creative workshops they were going to attend during the exchanges. In economics classes they were taught the basics concerning business plans and marketing. Thus, this project was very well integrated in the regular school life. During the exchanges, students: - took part in several creative workshops (3D printing design/ flamenco workshop/ composing music via apps/ textile printing/ creative writing) - visited art schools (Cibap, music school and the Harderbastei) and art museums (Pinakothek der Moderne, Museum for Concrete Art and a Streetart tour) - visited and interviewed self-employed creative entrepreneurs in the different countries (ICT start-ups/ Blokhuispoort Leeuwarden/ portrait drawing artist/ flamenco dancer) - visited cultural heritage sites, like Leeuwarden, the Cultural Capital of Europe 2018, the Mesquita and a Flamenco center in Cordoba. - practiced how to make a business and marketing plan for their designed products. (The school in Spain has entered into a partnership with Fundecor (University of Cordoba) to create a game about product design and marketing.) - improved their ICT skills (PowerPoint/ Prezi/ iMovie/ 3D print design/ Virtual Reality/ Music making apps/ green screen pictures) The planned activities during the exchange in Italy did not take place, instead we organized virtual activities with whole classes/ Erasmus groups (creative writing, interviewing creative entrepreneurs (by Zoom/Team meeting), vlogs, 3D printing competition (by Spain). Students have become acquainted with the visited countries as they were staying with host families and got the chance to meet a lot of different people living in those countries. Because communication was in English, students had a lot of opportunities to practise and their English has definitely improved. All activities were communicated via Facebook and our blog www.creativityatworkerasmus.blogspot.com where students uploaded their pictures, stories and vlogs. Updates and links were published on each school’s website and local media tuned in every time there was an activity. Most students have discovered their creative talents while taking part in the different workshops (see results on our Facebook and blog). Through presentations of their designed products and accompanying business plans, the students proved that they have applied the acquired knowledge in the final product. By visiting and interviewing young entrepreneurs, students became enthusiastic about working on the job market. They also discovered the possibility of working in any country within the European Union. Not only students benefited from this project, participating teachers also learned a lot about the different school systems, cultural heritage and they also discovered their creative talents, since they were taking part of all the activities. Before Covid-19 there were a lot of possibilities for self-employed people in the creative sector, for instance musicians/ DJ’s/ dancers/ photographers/ actors/ and people working in the entertainment sector in general. During Covid-19 and the ensuing lockdowns we noticed that especially self-employed people working in this sector had a hard time surviving. The impact of this project with regard to giving more attention to the creative subjects is difficult to measure at some schools due to long school closures and communication only via online meetings. Of course we will provide the deans at our schools with all the information we’ve gathered about self-employed entrepreneurship within the creative sector and writing a simple business plan, so they can include this in career orientation and guidance. We have seen that a lot of students have creative talents and we opened up to them the possibility of working in the creative sector. In this way the students are better prepared for their future. We hope more students will opt for a job as a self-employed entrepreneur in this area; whoever they are, wherever they choose to.