The specific goal of our project was realization of professional internships abroad for as many students as possible. The first obvious target is to acquire new professional knowledge and skills by students. Short term internships primarily enabled students to get to know and get a glimpse into vets ´surgeries abroad. The participants could complete and verify their theoretial school kowledge and they enriched their practical skills by actively engaging in work. For long term internships, everything mentioned above was amplified. The participants could also compare approaches and procedures of Czech veterinary treatment to foreign ones. They broadened their horizons in the field in very different cultural and social conditions. After their return, the participants presented experiences both at school and in public. The long term internships especially contributed to increasing the level of language skills of participants. The main working language was English but given that no destination was an English speaking country, the students learnt the basics of the original language of the specific country (Italian, Spanish, Greek, Portuguese). Even the short term stays also encouraged the need to know and use a foreign language as well as motivation for further language study. This need is indirectly transmitted to other students of our school who can see the necessity of language skills in today´s world. Another no less important goal was development of personal competences of students. The students themselves stated this like their reason of signing up for the internships – to increase their independence, responsibility, to communicate and cooperate in foreign environment, to be able to react and adapt to new situations. We wanted to use the fact that young people accept new knowledge and skills naturally and at the same time their personality qualities increase including understanding their own identity, tolerance and respect for different opinions and cultures.This is very important in the environment of the contemporary world. The implementation of foreign mobility simultaneously develops the openness of the school, its abilities in cooperation with foreign partners increase the ability to communicate and cooperate with other vocational schools and companies both in the Czech Republic and abroad. Although this project was not aimed at workers´ mobility, accompanying teachers, members of the broad resolution team and other school employees also increase their abilities and competences through this activity. It is mainly about language competences, but similar to students here too it is necessary to support their motivation for futher education, work with pupils, opennes, communication with other partners out of school including foreign ones and ability of quality cooperation.
Our school has been taking part in mobility projects of Erasmus (previously Leonardo da Vinci) for many years. Our priority is to enable students to experience professional practice through internships abroad. It has a big benefit for professional, language and personal growth of our students. This encourages their motivation to further studies or work in veterinary field. They are able to share their experience with schoolmates and the general public. It affects positively teachers of professional subjects or languages who accompany the students. Thanks to these activities our school is open to other foreign projects and cooperation. Our students themselves welcome, appreciate and demand the possibility of an internship abroad. At the same time we are able to maintain and fasten our long term relationships with our foreign partners via implementation of this project. The content of the mobility programme in professional education Erasmus+ and ErasmusPro corresponds exactly and fulfills the key needs of our school. Without financial support of the grant, we would not be able to implement foreign internships on such a scale.