We focus on young adults of 16 to 27, with the risk to drop out of school, have no appropriate minimum qualification and no prospect of work in their locality. So an educational or reintegration trajectory for these young people can only be successful if there is special physical and mental attention. This project focuses on three aspects of social and cultural exclusion: 1. Inadequate social participation: for example insufficient participation in formal and informal social networks (including leisure activities), insufficient social support, social isolation, lack of social involvement and for immigrants a lack of contact with natives. 2. Insufficient cultural/normative integration: for example insufficient compliance with core values and standards: low work ethic, readiness to undertake training, abuse of social security, delinquent behavior, different views on rights and duties of women/men 3. Lack of access to fundamental social rights: for example education, housing, social services, debt counselling, job placement, social security, inadequate security and livability of the living environment. These young adults often do not meet the requirements, due to psychological, medical or social problems, lack of (soft) skills or low IQ. So there is a need for new alternative instruments and methodologies in a safe and stimulating environment, in which the young adult is called to develop his or her capacities and potentials. We want to achieve this within the Agoramodel, a Bildungsmodel, used to ‘prepare youngsters for a world that is not yet there’ , developed by the Dutch philosopher Rene Gude in collaboration with the dutch sociologist Gerard van Stralen, the German philosopher Peter Sloterdijk and the Dutch philosopher Erno Eskens. It takes a practical stand on the fundamental question ‘Were is humankind’? The agoramodel gives us a starting point from which we can look at the roles we (can) play in life. And the places where we train ourselves to adapt and become succesful within those roles. There are four trainingspheres; the religious sphere, the philosophical (school) sphere, the arts sphere and the sport sphere. We will focus on methodologies and best practices in the field of Art and Sport. Not their recreational or sporting function but the social and educational function in the broadest sense of the word. Participation in culture or sports, whether it is to enjoy the range of cultural institutions or self-practicing art or sports, contributes to social participation. It has a personal element, because it affects you emotionally, because you can lose your passion into it, or because it increases someone’s skills, creativity, self-development, resilience and endurance. Culture and Sport move you, make you think and make you discover new worlds. At the same time, it ensures cohesion between the various groups, encourages meetings, provides solidarity, and makes issues or problems visible and debatable. Culture and sports are underused in our “education and reintegration culture." They are looked at as being places you go to in your free time, meant for fun and relaxation but we forget that they are brilliant ‘schools’ for 21 century skills competences. They can support to develop to successfully engage within society. More and over arts and sports focus on entirely different competences. We are used to train our brains and learning skills by using classical schooling and re-integration methods. Arts and sports are more flexible, have a lot of different training methods and practices and rely on different skills. Also, success, winning, doing the right thing, are being taught and measured by different standards. This project aims to develop a theoretical framework and a training for teachers, trainers, coaches using principles and tools from the field of Art and Sport to be applied within Re-integration services and Education and to describe the competences, knowledge, skills and qualifications required for this kind of training. This project therefore looks at these 2 Agora-spheres for inspiration and use elements focused on 21 century skills in the the training programs, used in sports and arts to motivate, support and engage youngsters from a different perspective. Furthermore, the findings of our previous project showed that a training is not a fact in itself, but goes together with 3 important aspects: the location (Permeability,, functionality, etc) , the organisation (support, sharing the vision, teacher skills improvement,etc) and the guidance ( relation and collaboration between teacher/ students/youngsters,etc). These 3 aspects are included within this project.
This project aims to develop a theoretical framework for a training for teachers, educators, coaches, using principles and tools from the field of Art and Sport to be applied within Re-integration services and Education and describe the competences, knowledge, skills and qualifications required for this kind of training . Re-integration (to work or school) is not only determined by hard characteristics such as age, education level or ethnicity. Soft skills are also decisive. The goal of this kind of training is to support and stimulate youngsters in finding intrinsic motivation, self-confidence, self-esteem, health, social networking skills. But also revealing hidden talents and contribute to a decrease in school dropout, more privileged in the labour market or more active social participation and lead to active inclusion of young, disenfranchised people, aged 16 to 27 years. The achievements of this project is to provide trainers/teachers/educators alternative tools to increase the motivation of youngsters in the field of education or reintegration, focusing on what they can and not on what they can't by searching and uncovering their (hidden|) skills, competences and talents.
We focus on young adults of 16 to 27, with the risk to drop out of school, have no appropriate minimum qualification and no prospect of work in their locality. So an educational or reintegration trajectory for these young people can only be successful if there is special physical and mental attention. Furthermore, our regular educational and re-integration services reinforce that feeling by forcing them sometimes to demotivating activities that do not fit their world. The pressure and the pace is too high and there is a lack of intensive and personal support. Young people say that there is not enough attention to their personal situation.These young people often do not meet the requirements, due to psychological, medical or social problems, lack of (soft) skills or low IQ. So there is a need for new alternative instruments and methodologies in a safe and stimulating environment, in which the young adult is called to develop his or her capacities and potentials.