With the implementation of the project, partners wanted to achieve the following objectives: - elaborating tools and services that should improve the inclusion and active participation of those adults who are usually left behind, because they live in rural areas or in urban outskirts because they have a migrant background, or even because they don’t have enough digital skills to access services and opportunities. - supporting the work of educators and social workers in adult education. - sharing experiences and practices at European level to provide answers to local realities. - sharing know-how and methodologies on how to motivate and engage the target groups and realize tools that can be used in all partners' contexts - producing results that can be used behind partners' organisations at international level. - generating a network of organisations that stand for the same values and principles using human rights-based approaches in their daily work.
The motivation that supported the partnership to apply for STEP project, was a value-based motivation that can be represented by the convinction that "All human beings have the right to actively participate in and to enjoy benefits deriving from development without any distinction (Declaration on the Right to Development, 1986, Preamble)". The specific needs addressed by the project referred to people who live in rural areas or urban outskirts are those who have less economic resources and are generally more inclined to leave education and training early, and that lack of participation within the community undermines active citizenship and social inclusion. By the same token, the new digital reality enhanced the risk to exclude those adults. These increases inequalities endorsed by several systemic economic and social barriers, resulting in further exclusion and marginalization, which may endure for many generations. At the same time the project addressed the needs of the educators and social workers to get more tools to reach out and engage adults in their activities, addressing participation, social rights and digitalisation.