Schools can be a breeding ground for violence and the evidence on gender based discrimination and violence are accumulating. Gender inequality is a persistent social failure that continues to violate basic human rights. In the school context, it can lead to a series of harmful effects for girls taking the first steps in their lives. It can manifest as discrimination in terms of not being accepted by classmates, physical assaults, isolation, bullying and violence. Discriminated pupils tend to be less confident, often feel depressed, suffer from anxiety, have fewer friends, higher suicide and attempted suicide rates. Their school performance is affected, as they cannot concentrate or feel motivated. Given that, there are frequent cases of changing schools or dropping out. At a critical point in time for Europe and the participating countries, FREE put together a strategic partnership of 6 familiar and not so familiar with Erasmus organisation to respond to a number of HORIZONTAL and SECTORAL priorities, focusing on eliminating gender-based discrimination and violence in educational settings. The key Erasmus priority addressed by FREE is the HORIZONTAL "Social Inclusion". FREE also aims to address HORIZONTAL priority "Supporting Educators" with an emphasis on school educators. Finally it addresses SECTORAL PRIORITY SCHOOL EDUCATION "Tackling early school leaving and disadvantage". Specific project objectives include: a. Build the capacities of teachers and raise the awareness of parents on gender-based discrimination and provide the means to change school cultures that result to pupils being discriminated against b. Introduce innovative methods and tools to build the capacities of teachers and inform parents on how to react on incidents of gender-based discrimination c. Promote cooperation and joint efforts between teachers and parents and build a model of collaboration, utilizing various joint activities d. Reduce the psychological and educational impact of gender-based discrimination on pupils e. Create an incentive for educational institutes to adopt the project approach after project closure. FREE will be implemented in 4 countries (UK, Greece, Spain, North Macedonia) and involves 2 groups of primary participants: (a) school teachers of primary and secondary education and (b) parents with children at school age. It is expected that at least 80 school teachers and 80 parents will be directly involved in the piloting of the FREE outputs, which includes the following activities: - Fieldwork with teachers and parents identifying their local and real needs in terms of dealing with cases of gender based discrimination - Design and develop (a) a collaborative model for teachers and parents (b) a capacity building methodology for teachers and (c) educational material for parents - Design and develop a project web platform - Pilot testing of the collaborative model, capacity building programme and information material face-to-face and through the web platform. Moreover, open days will be implemented (1 per participating country), along with an international conference for introducing the project to a wider audience. FREE's methodological approach follows the logic model with the implementation unfolding in two phases, the Preparatory Phase (including the needs’ analysis and the definition of the specifications for the collaborative model) and the Implementation Phase (including the development of the collaborative model, the capacity building programme and the information material and its pilot implementation in all 4 countries). Main outcomes of FREE: -A tested collaborative model between teachers & parents for combatting gender-based discrimination in school settings - Improved capacities of 80 school teachers in the 4 participating countries (e.g. in terms of preventing, identifying and dealing with cases of gender-based discrimination) - Increased awareness of 80 parents in the participating countries about the importance of gender-based discrimination - An online platform for facilitating the delivery of collaborative model will be developed, containing material in all partners' languages. The tested results and pilots are expected to then have the following long term impacts: 1.Decreased early school leaving rates and cases of poor school performance due to gender-based discrimination incidents 2.An established collaboration model between teachers and parents with the purpose of applying the developed methodology for decreasing discrimination and fostering inclusion 3.Decreased level of gender-based discrimination incidents in school settings 4.Decreased psychological problems of pupils and corresponding physical manifestations (drop outs, suicide attempts, etc.) 5.Increased awareness of parents on the importance of gender-based discrimination within school settings 6.Increased capacity of school teachers in preventing, identifying and combatting gender-based discrimination incidents.
The objectives we wanted to achieve, especially in the long term, were as follows: 1. To reduce early school dropout rates and cases of low academic performance as a result of incidents of gender-based discrimination 2. To create an established model of collaboration between teachers and parents with the goal of using the defined approach to reduce discrimination and promote inclusion. 3. To decrease incidences of gender-based discrimination in schools. 4. To reduce pupil's psychological issues and physical manifestations (dropouts, suicide attempts, etc.). 5. To increase parents' understanding of the importance of gender-based discrimination in schools. 6. To improve school instructors' ability to prevent, detect, and combat gender-based discrimination situations. The results of our piloting, surveys, interviews and focus groups give us the confidence to say that we have achieved all these goals at least in the short term. However, a few mechanisms have been put into place in order to evaluate the long term impact of this project. As an example, we're putting aside part of the PMI budget to conduct a number of interviews and questionnaires 18 months after the end of the project to see if these results are maintained over time.
Schools can be a breeding ground for violence and research shows a direct correlation between gender based discrimination and violence. We applied for this project because gender inequality is a long-standing social problem that continues to affect fundamental human rights. It can have a number of negative consequences for young people, affecting young women disproportionately when they're taking their initial steps in life when they are at school. Our main goal was to lower the amount of discrimination, violence and inequality in schools, thus lowering the psychological effects that students have to endure when met with such obstacles. Additionally, we aimed at nurturing a relationship between parents and teachers – allowing for better connectedness, trust and communication when it comes to educational reforms. In terms of our partners, most of them have been working on improving the life of sexual and gender minorities since their establishment. This was an opportunity to expand their expertise and work with government institutions on improving legislature and civil servants’ knowledge and acceptance of the different aspects that affect young people.