Due to persistently high youth unemployment, increased skills mismatches and school drop-out in many EU Member States, career guidance to secondary and vocational school students aged 16-18 has in the past years been the subject of much attention. However, effective orientation needs to start earlier to permit equal opportunities and informed decisions concerning educational and professional paths, helping all young people to find employment that suits them. In many countries, students as young as 13-14 have to choose whether they will continue in “general” studies, focus on “maths/science” or go into vocational training. So already from this young age, they have to make an important choice that will affect the career options that will be available to them as they grow older. How can they make informed decisions? And who is there to help young people make these very important, life-determining choices? Mainly parents, career guidance counsellors and teachers. Yet educational staff are often ill-equipped to provide career orientation to this age group, who at this stage in their lives would not benefit from specific career guidance services. What they require most is what we call “Life Design Skills”, i.e. the knowledge, mindset and skills they will need to make informed choices concerning their education, and thereafter to develop their professional lives in a labour market that will primarily be characterised by change. Our specific objective is thus to empower teachers, youth workers, career guidance providers (‘Educators’) to teach Life Design Skills to young people. We will work towards this objective primarily by developing a ‘Skills for Life Toolbox’ for Educators. This Toolbox will be developed cooperatively by all project partners who will pilot it with approximately 500 Educators and 10,000 students in Belgium, Germany, Italy and Romania. It will be composed of: - An on-line self-evaluation tool to help students discover their strengths, weaknesses, priorities, interests and personality types and to start considering how these may relate to different professional profiles; - A board game to help students make the link between their own personal characteristics and those of different job profiles and economic sectors; - A series of modules that Educators can implement as a function of their teaching environment, to dig deeper into the subject with their students; - A half-day training to teach Educators to deliver these activities, also available as on-line training modules; - A user-friendly Impact Assessment Methodology that will enable Educators to measure the impact and efficacy of their intervention. All of the results will be freely accessible online in five languages: Dutch, English, German, Italian and Romanian, and will be designed in such a way as to easily cross language and cultural barriers. We will also use our experience of piloting the Toolbox to develop Policy Recommendations that will highlight actions and policies that support effective early-stage career orientation and Life Design Skills for young people. The Toolbox will be mainstreamed (1) by project partners who will use the Toolbox as part of their regular activities and promote its use by local stakeholders; (2) through dissemination activities aimed at school directors, educators, counsellors, local authorities, Chambers of Commerce and other stakeholders concerned with youth employment; (3) through engagement with policy-makers especially using the Policy Recommendations. Expected impacts The Skills for Life Toolbox will: - empower teachers, youth workers, career counsellors and other career guidance and orientation providers to deliver effective pre-career guidance to young people aged 13-14, - empower young people to choose an educational pathway that will lead them into employment that suits them, - provide young people with the skills they will need as they grow older and make their way through an employment environment characterised by change. We will also raise awareness – among local, regional, national and European stakeholders – of the need to introduce career orientation to students at a younger age than is currently the case, and will promote our results as an efficient and effective means of meeting this need. In the longer term, this project will help bridge the gap between a labour market in constant evolution and an education system that struggles to remain up-to-date. As a result, young people will be better prepared to envisage their future, to seize new opportunities and be more resilient to constant change and continuous transitions. Skills for Life will contribute not only to more fulfilling careers for young people, but also to a more innovative and competitive European economy. This project has been created by Goethe-Institut (DE), Aliseo Liguria (IT), Scoala de Valori (RO), Tracé Brussel (BE) and the City of Mannheim (DE).
The specific objective of this project was to provide educators with the tools they need to equip young people with Life Design Skills, i.e., the knowledge, mindset, and skills they will need to develop their professional lives in a labour market that will primarily be characterised by change and transformation. In our project the term “educators” includes teachers, youth workers, and career counsellors. Educators are often the ones who need to provide their students with career guidance and orientation, without being properly trained for this or equipped with the right materials, which is why the Skills for Life project partners wanted to facilitate their work by providing them with a toolbox of ready to use materials and activities. Through such exercises, the consortium wanted to sharpen young peoples’ awareness of their own Life Design Skills and to provide them and their educators with the necessary tools to further strengthen these important skills, which will help them to master transitions throughout their professional lives.
The project partners from the Skills for Life-consortium have been well-established actors in their regions in the field of career guidance and orientation. They all belong to the European network of StartNet, a project by Stiftung Mercator and the Goethe-Institut working on young people’s transition from education to employment. At a network meeting it crystallised that the topic of early career guidance and orientation is important to them. Considering the positive impact early career guidance and orientation can have on young people’s lives and their education and career choices, they agreed that the topic does not receive enough attention. Being familiar with the orientation landscape in their countries, they saw the need for educators and youngsters to be supported in the field of early career guidance. Easy to use tools could enhance and democratise the access to orientation. A better and especially earlier support of young people could contribute to them staying in school on a fitting pathway rather than becoming a school dropout. For this reason, the partners also wanted to pursue a more holistic approach strengthening individuals rather than just trying to match youngsters to the current demands of the labour market.