The project of professional internships with Spanish employers was addressed to 64 OHP participants from WM WK OHP units, attending 1st degree Industry Schools, learning the following professions: cook, car mechanic, car electromechanic, hairdresser, salesman, electrician and bricklayer-plasterer . The aim of the project was for OHP participants to gain additional professional competences and to use in practice the theoretical knowledge acquired in the course of school education in the field of their areas of vocational education, to learn about new trends and new technologies within their industries, to support participants in the field of career counselling. Participation in the project was develop interdisciplinary competences, i.e. the ability to work under time pressure, coping with stress. The project was to contribute to the development of communicativeness and the ability to cooperate in a group, strengthen self-esteem, and also allow to raise intercultural awareness and initiate a mental change. We wanted to create in the OHP participants the need to take responsibility for their own lives, indicate the possibilities of guiding the career path, arouse the need to complete education and improve social competences.
The project „Investment in the future - Professional Start-Up” was a key tool used by the Warmian-Masurian Voivodship Headquarters of OHP (WM WK OHP) in its efforts to provide its charges with the best conditions and development opportunities. We wanted the implementation of the project to contribute to the improvement of qualifications and professional skills of the pupils and VLC staff. By enabling OHP youth to go on an internship to Spain, we wanted to increase their ability to adapt to new working conditions consistent with the specificity of a given workplace, basic skills and strengthen their cross-curricular key competences. By implementing the project, we wanted to eliminate, to some extent, dysfunctional factors affecting the social development of our charges. We wanted to give OHP charges the opportunity to obtain documents confirming the acquisition of new competences and professional and language skills, which will be an additional asset on the labor market. In addition, we wanted to give OHP units a European dimension, raise their prestige in the local environment, so that our institution would start to be perceived as an innovative organization involved in improving the quality of vocational education.