The project “BASICEDU – Development of Model for Strengthening competences of disadvantaged women through Basic Education” focuses on the integration of disadvantaged women and rural women into the labor market that is one of most essential issued of EU agenda. Disadvantaged women is considered as vulnerable because they face obstacles to be involved in the labour market because of their educational, vocational and social background (such as having with low educational attainment). In order to support their integration into employment, the main focus should be on identification, assessment and development of the required skills and competences in the labour market. However, the current review of labor market integration programmes has shown that the diversity in women’s background is not really reflected and mostly follow a one-size-fits-all approach, nor the gender aspect is considered systematically enough. Although disadvantaged women have particularly low employment and activity rates and also there hasn’t been paid special attention to this topic so far, neither at European, nor at national level. To enable disadvantaged women to integrate in the labour market in the best way possible, it requires to provide detailed information and offer orientation on different topics. The main steps of the initiatives for orientation of target group should be on identification of appropriate educational and professional opportunities in the labor markets, and accompanying, empowering and mentoring them to recognize specific needs of labor market. Moreover, it will enable disadvantaged women to embrace the EU fundamental values but also develop their potential in the society they settle. By promoting a close interaction between disadvantaged women, especially the ones living in the rural areas and the society. That will serve to ensure equality and social inclusion of disadvantaged women in more ambitious way. To fill this gap in the current integration programs, the BASICEDU project has the overall goal to enable more effective labor market integration of disadvantaged women within the EU through: - Empowering women with disadvantaged background by enhancing their further professional opportunities and facilitating their access to the labour market; - Establishing Mentoring and Empowering relationships between women from the society and disadvantaged women; - Fostering the process of skills assessment of disadvantaged women with a tailor-made methodology; In order to realize aims of the project will produce 4 main Intellectual Outputs which are to be realized by following methodologies below. 1. A tailor-made EVALUTION METHODOLOGY considering the specific needs and challenges of the labour market integration of disadvantaged women, especially women living rural areas. The existing current methodologies at EU/national level are rather general and include assessment of multiple personal and social skills acquired outside the formal educational sector and the world of work. BASICEDU will build on three qualitative methods to create a customized methodology focusing on the 5 most important skills to make accountable. Moreover, the ASSESSMENT METHODOLOGY will allow measurement of the individual progress of the participating women who will acquire a LEVEL5 certificate, showing their professional progress at 3 levels - acquired knowledge, enhanced skills and attitudes’ change. 2. The BASICEDU MENTORING AND EMPOWERMENT PROGRAMME based on the results of the assessment methodology will be aimed at two target groups; a) a primary target group –disadvantaged women through specially designed 5 training modules improving their key competences, and b) a secondary target group – women mentors through specific guidelines for mentoring and empowerment of disadvantaged women. The main aim of the women-to-women mentoring is to empower vocational growth of disadvantage women through sharing personal experience and lessons learned, as well as encouraging them to go a step further and fulfil their dreams by mentor women. 3. The BASICEDU EMPOWERMENT ACTIVITY BOOK which consists of the most impactful activities from the Mentoring and Empowerment programme. The book will also contain inspiring success stories created by the participating women, so The BASICEDU EMPOWERMENT ACTIVITY BOOK will be based on participating women experience, thus participating women will be role model in their communities. 4. Last but not least, the learning content of the BASICEDU MENTORING AND EMPOWERMENT PROGRAMME will be based on interactive methods and online gamification elements – such as thematic quizzes at the end of each topic, missions which can be achieved through fulfilling a certain task. THE BASICEDU GAMIFIED ONLINE PLATFORM will be further available after the end of the project for final beneficiaries working with disadvantaged women.
With project intellectual outputs and other activities implemented during the project process, the BasicEDU project's overall goal was to fill the gap in the current integration programs mentioned above, by enabling more effective labor market integration of disadvantaged women at local, regional, national and EU levels through empowering women with disadvantaged background by enhancing their further professional opportunities and facilitating their access to the labour market, establishing Mentoring and Empowering relationships between women from the society and disadvantaged women and fostering the process of skills assessment of disadvantaged women with a tailor-made methodology. We focused how unemployed women could be empowered through integration into the labour market, and also how to increase the active social participation of poor rural women in the project countries as a long-term objective.Beyond the aim of empowerment of the women in rural areas through the project activities, we also aimed to collect evidence generated through impact evaluation to be taken up in policy processes in the project partner countries.
The project focuses on the integration of disadvantaged women into the labor market, one of most essential issues at the EU agenda. Unemployed young women in rural areas are particularly disadvantaged, and their participation into the labour market is low as they face obstacles because of their educational, vocational and social background. Moreover, at home, women are often responsible for household chores and the main caregivers of relatives in need of care. In addition, women from rural areas can't get meaningful jobs opportunities, as they have low competences or because they often come from more unprivileged backgrounds. Despite these needs, the current review of labour market integration programs had shown that diversity in disadvantaged background were not really reflected and mostly follow a one-size-fits-all approach. There had been lack of programs focusing on these needs; all these hadn’t been paid special attention to this topic so far, neither at European, nor at national level. Overall, the specific needs addressed were identification of appropriate educational and professional opportunities, and empowering and mentoring them to recognise specific needs of labour market.