CONTEXT/BACKGROUND OF THE PROJECT The effects and consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted in the last six months require immediate action, especially for the most disadvantaged people. The lockdown made compulsory by the government's indications has very different effects depending on the income, which poses huge problems in terms on how to ensure access, equity and inclusion in the learning environment. The OECD the 19th of October 2020 in its "What is the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on immigrants and their children?" states that "The school closures and distance learning measures put in place to slow the spread of COVID‑19 put children of immigrants at a disadvantage, in several ways. Their parents tend to have fewer resources than native-born parents to help them in their homework, and 40% of native-born children of immigrants do not speak the host-country language at home. Such children are also less likely than students with native-born parents to have access to a computer and an internet connection at home or to a quiet place for study." The Eu "Digital Education Action Plan, 2021-2027", report says that from one side it is important "to increase the digital impact of the Erasmus programme" while on the other that "One of the key results of the consultation process was that while there is some indication of the wider impact of COVID-19 on education and training, it is still too early to conclude on its long-term consequences. Gathering more experience and conducting research into the lasting effects over a longer time period is therefore necessary." In light of what has been said, then, the project intends: 1. contribute to the gathering more experience of what is happening on the ground, by carrying out a research, on the effects of the pandemic on the learning and teaching process as expressed in the European Commission document to, in particular, youth with migrant background, by also paying special attention to the use of digital tools; 2. increase the skills of teachers, trainers, youth workers, associations dealing with youth with migrant background on how to deal with the effects that the pandemic has on learning and teaching to young people of migrant origin. As far as the target group is concerned, while the indirect beneficiaries are young people of foreign origin, the direct ones will be represented by members of the organizations participating in the project, i.e. teachers, trainers, researchers, youth workers and associations of migrants and their children. NUMBER-PROFILE OF PARTICIPATING ORGANISATIONS The partnership consists of 5 organisations. It consists of school (2nd Vocational High School of Katerini, Greece), one foundation (Fundacion Red Incola, Spain) and an association/research centre (ECEPAA - Belgium), one youth organization (JOINT) and one migrant and youth with migrant background association (AMECE). Each of the organizations chosen contributes to forming a strategic consortium both because, it makes its own contribution in terms of expertise and because the different needs expressed. DESCRIPTION OF UNDERTAKEN MAIN ACTIVITIES There will be 1 main activities beyond the traditional project management activity that will be the development of the DO-IT digital publication. METHODOLOGY USED The main methodology a part the traditional project cycle management activity, is the one dealing with social science action research methodology. RESULTS AND IMPACT ATTAINED a 150/180 pages of a digital publication on how to better manage the effects of the Corona virus pandemic on the learning and teaching to young people of foreign origin, by also taking in consideration the use of digital tool. LONGER-TERM BENEFITS 1. promoting the social inclusion of people coming from a migrant and low socio-economic background; 2. contributing to increasing the skills of teachers and trainers in dealing with learning and teaching to young people of foreign origin, by also taking in consideration the use of digital tool; 3. contributing to reducing early school leaving of youth with migrant background.
The project wanted to achieve 2 results: 1. contribute to the gathering a better knowledge about what was happening on the ground with respect to the COVID-19 management and the school environment by having developed a research on the effects of the pandemic on the learning and teaching process. More in depth, by better focusing on the consequences of the pandemic on youth with migrant background and the use of digital tools; 2. increase the skills of teachers, trainers, youth workers, associations dealing with young people with a migrant background on how to deal with the effects that the pandemic has on learning and teaching to young people of migrant origin. Although there were some studies on the subject, when we started this project, knowledge on the topic was barely sketched out. The two years of the project allowed us to have a clearer idea about the impact of the pandemic on foreign-born youth.
The consortium applied for this project because in October 2020, at the height of the pandemic from Covid 19, there was no in-depth knowledge of the consequences of the pandemic on school systems and in particular the effects of the pandemic on learning and teaching pathways in schools. In particular, what we were interested in was to understand such effects on the most disadvantaged and migrant-born students. The disruptive novelty of the pandemic in the global scenario had completely changed traditional teaching and learning mechanisms by opening up a world, that of remote teaching and learning, never experienced in scale and size during the days of the lockdown. From the earliest days, a number of structural weaknesses had already been identified that remote learning carried with it and that affected some of the most disadvantaged categories of students most acutely.