The project is presented with the idea of boosting the Erasmus Vocational Training projects, recently implemented, to offer selected students a very enriching training experience. The students from our school, who generally get positive assessment from their trainers during internships, and excellent results at the Canary Islands regional competitions, do not have an easy continuation of their training process in Higher Level VET programmes, since most of them are only offered in the main islands (Gran Canaria and Tenerife) or in Spain’s mainland. Accommodation, food, and travel expenses while studying away from home are making many families face economic stress, only partly supported with some scholarships. Training in workshops and companies in some European locations such as Cork, Modena or Arezzo offered our youth the opportunity to learn with better means (state-of-the-art machines) and in different environments, which has forced them to develop their linguistic competences in a foreign language (English or Italian), to be self-sufficient in the management of their economic resources, to share space with other families or with other students, and even to return home on their own.
IES Villa de Mazo is a public school for Compulsory Secondary Education, Baccalaureate and Vocational Education and Training, including Basic VET programmes in Office Computing, and in Vehicle Maintenance; Intermediate VET programmes in Vehicle Electromechanics, and in Microcomputer Systems and Networks; and the first year of the Higher VET programme in Automotive. At the time of presenting this project, out of its 402 students, 28 were enrolled in Basic VET, and 73 in Intermediate VET programmes, whom this project was aimed at. From a total number of 52 teachers, 12 of them are VET trainers, along with teachers of subjects from the social, linguistic and scientific fields. Secondary Education students come from Villa de Mazo, where the school is located, as well as nearby towns like Fuencaliente, Breña Alta and Breña Baja. For Vocational Training, they come from all over the island. Villa de Mazo is located in the southeast of the island of La Palma, belonging to the outermost region of the European Union, the Canary Islands. For an economic and social approach, the area is primarily rural, with agriculture as their main income.