"Connection and transition from school/training to work constitute the main step for the insertion of young people, for improving their employability, and acquiring the skills adequate to the requests coming from the labour market. All the European countries are currently facing severe problems of skill gap for the young people just out of their training life. As far as the transition from school to work is concerned, a key reference at European level is presented by the “dual learning” system: many countries are rethinking / reorganizing their school schemes and training courses, moving to the direction of dual learning.At the same time, those countries where the dual system was developed are facing unexpected problems, particularly in the relationship between the school/training system and the process school/work, that often are not properly connected to each other.SWORD intends to proceed with a reflection on the model of dual learning, leading to an innovative shared European approach. Its results will allow countries that are already using the model to deal with the existing problems, while countries wishing to adopt the model will overcome the critical issues emerged from the previous tests. In addition, the project seeks to identify a model of dual learning in which the transition can also be managed in different countries, thus promoting processes of transnational mobility.The development of innovative solutions concerns the Autonomous Province of Trento, the Autonomous Province of Bolzano, Friuli Venezia Giulia and the area of Gdansk, where TNOiK participate in the ongoing process of national revision of the model of VET.Among the partners of the countries where the dual learning is already in operation, Arbeit und Leben-Hamburg, as well as BFI OOE, already started a common reflection with other local actor on the existing problems, especially in the transition from school to work (highlighted by the reduction of young people who choose this model).SWORD will proceed to identify an innovative model of transition, attentive to the balance between classroom and in-company training, with the objective to develop skills responding to the different working environments.For the implementation of the project three intellectual outputs were identified:- O1: comparative analysis of regional contexts, including two steps: collecting documents and information in partner regions, and preparation of the comparative analysis report;- O2: model, mechanism and tools for transition from school to work, where three activities are planned: i) creation of a shared ""approach"" to transition, aimed at defining a model; ii) fine tuning of the model, i.e. design and localisation of transition mechanisms in different contexts; iii) testing the model in the partner areas;- O3: manual with the ""rules of the game"", presenting recommendations and guidelines. Here two activities are planned: definition of the structure of manual, and development of the manual.The SWORD project also plans:- 5 multiplier events for disseminating the model of transition from school to work, and one final conference;- study visits to Germany and Austria for teachers/operators of educational and training system;- periods of short-term mobility in other countries for young people, who are going to come out or are just out of their educational life.The approach followed by the project provides several pathways for supporting insertion in the labour market, providing tools and support for planning and managing the activities at local level.In this way it should be possible overcome the existing problems, providing solutions at various levels:- local governance, with an impact on institutional partners, through guidelines and recommendations for policy options, able to strengthen the link between education, training and work;- vocational education systems, involving educators/teachers in the design and development of blended solutions with a close collaboration between schools, training systems and enterprises, leading to a unitary process of learning;- school system, giving students the opportunity of combining education, training and experience in an enterprise, aimed at increasing the skills needed for job insertion and provide further learning opportunities;- business system (also at the level of business associations), providing guidelines and recommendations to define learning paths between school, training and work environments, able to answer the requests of qualification expressed by companies.A further impact is given by the model of dual learning envisaged by the project, where transition among education, training and work can be managed at transnational level, thus promoting new models of transnational mobility."

"All European countries are involved in a massive arrival of migrants, and many of them are asylum seekers, victims of trafficking in human beings. Several attempts have been made in the last few years to implement reception policies, by each Member State and at the European level. However, all policies were based on a more material approach rather than social, psychological and welfare-related, focusing more on the legal condition of a person rather than on the social condition, which, indeed, is key to devising good reception and integration policies, both for the sake of incomers and local communities. In every migration, incomers carry along a psycho-emotional burden of violence and physical, sexual, psychological abuse, which needs to be dealt with, not just deciding about a person's life and condition by granting (or not) a permit to stay. It is sadly known that migrants, especially those who come from Sub-Saharan Africa, were very often tortured during their journeys. It is also well known that the towns and cities where migrants are accommodated lack suitable tools for social integration, so social conflicts, fears and fake news become increasingly common. The SIMPLE project has as its main objective the (re)conquest of the individual autonomy of the applicants for international and humanitarian protection, as their actual emancipation from the need to receive assistance; in these terms we speak of ""emancipating acceptance"". It therefore becomes essential to place the people in the center of the Protection System, who should not be mere passive beneficiaries of interventions prepared in their favor, but active protagonists of their own path of reception and social inclusion. In the SIMPLE project the concept of empowerment acquires a significant meaning, as an individual and organized process, through which individuals can reconstruct their ability to choose and design and regain the perception of their own value, their potential and opportunities.The SIMPLE project is focused on the psychological wellbeing and the social integration of migrants traumatized by the travel and the human trafficking, with specific attention for women. Activities planned in SIMPLE respond to the Community guidelines defined by the EU Directives on minimum standards in the welcoming of Asylum Seekers. This Directive recommends to EU countries the protection of the victims of tortures, rapes and other severe forms of psychological, physical or sexual violence. Five Intellectual Outputs proposed by the partnership will lead to the development of an innovative Model of Approach based on visual narrative methodology, accompanied by the guide for operators (consisting of materials and tools) and learning pathways to the socio-economic integration of migrant women that aim to maximize the level of integration in the country where their migration route took them. The project will directly influence operators who will gain a new knowledge (joint-training) and migrant women who will participate in piloting sessions testing the new methodology. Organisation of 6 Multiplier Events will help to communicate and disseminate project results and increase its visibility on the local and national level. The IO5 Guide for the Sustainability will be developed with the aim to provide the methodology and lesson learnt to the public and to share its results with all public service providers collaborating in the reception process of migrants and asylum seekers in order to provide psycho-social and health support. Hence, it will be possible to ensure that the project is sustainable in the long term and can be replicated on a larger scale, thus generating a long-term impact for a larger number of beneficiaries. Furthermore, all project partners, in particular their employees and collaborators, will receive specific training and mentoring aimed to develop the skills needed for the project. By doing this, the project actions may be replicated independently in the future, achieving just as many effective results as the original project increasing the sustainability of the SIMPLE project. The project will have a long-term impact, as it will help migrants and their new reference communities create a common future with no social conflicts and no risk of xenophobic behaviours, which have actually become quite strong and frequent in Europe in the last few months, with consequent threats to social cohesion and integration. Such an integration project might not be applicable to each and every migrant. However, data show that where such a project could be implemented, the level of social integration was considerably enhanced.Main results: 1. Ensure the protection of migrants who were victims of trafficking in human beings, exploitation, traumatic experiences, abuse and violence. 2. Enhance job opportunities for migrants; encourage integration at work and, more in general, into the society."

The Education and Training 2020 Strategy wishes for a challenging 6% rate of VET students involved in a mobility experience abroad, compared to the current 0,7%. ROI-MOB springs from the idea that quality can increase quantity. But what is quality? All people say work experiences abroad are useful, enriching, favour employability, development of one’s skills, etc.. What are such statements based upon? Are there any studies or statistics about that declared worthiness, or better indicators to describe it and methods to measure it, in order to search for it from the very inception of mobilities and assess it downstream, to improve quality of offer, attractiveness to participants and companies, and to provide data to better focus mobility policies on EU territories?The topic is relevant, considering that in 2014 Erasmus+ KA1 VET co-funded over 3000 projects, involving over 126000 students, of which over 66000 in company training, worth over 264 million Euro. The topic is also a complex one (mobility is useful…to whom? students? companies? “the economic system”? should usefulness be measured as to personal training and development? employability? career perspectives? salary? overall “system” competitiveness?) and impacts also on non-technical, rather social fields (families are involved, as well as psychology, soft- and cross-skills, etc.).Recent and accurate researches are available on the Higher Education side, especially on the Erasmus programme. However, it looks like no up-to-date study and statistics are available about the “Return on Investment” in VET mobility, nor apparently did anybody try to describe it with a single value, able to represent, with proper weights, the range of dimensions and factors affecting it.In the above-mentioned scenario, ROI-MOB partners believe that:- European mobility is a key factor for the success of VET in the present economic and social context.- The success of European VET mobility is not just a feeling, nor does it relate only to emotional factors: precise indicators demonstrate it.- Knowledge and usage of such indicators allow design, implementation and exploitation of more effective and efficient mobility experiences, better fitting to the need for personal satisfaction and employability expressed by participants, for added value expressed by companies, for cultural and social growth expressed by the wider community.ROI-MOB identified and tested indicators suitable to measure the benefits brought by EU VET mobility (especially for 19+ years old participants, and EQF levels 4 and higher), compared to the ‘investment’ made by involved players (participants, schools and training centres, companies), by investigating affecting factors and devising methods and tools for turning them into success factors, with the aim of:- increasing quality in learning mobility;- attracting more participants to EU mobilities;- attracting more companies available to host EU mobilities;- supporting policies for mobility either at institutional and at provider/intermediary organisation level.The project started collecting data from different stakeholders in partner territories: Erasmus+ VET National Agencies, VET providers, companies and associations, students, etc..Collected data set the baseline for the definition of tentative performance indicators for the measurement of the ROI of EU VET mobility. Based on such indicators, partners planned and run a broad investigation round, actively involving a sample of over 1.700 stakeholders, and tested indicators on on-going mobilities.Collected data have then been analysed, indicators weighted and conveyed into a single, composite, statistical figure, and outcomes presented as a comprehensive system of measurement. A final consultation round among stakeholders allowed for assessment and adjustment.Main products are:1. A survey, documenting factors that are perceived as drivers to EU VET mobility usefulness by stakeholders.2. A set of indicators for measurement of “return on investment” in EU VET mobility.3. An algorithm to measure the “return on investment” of EU VET mobility in partner territories and organisations.4. A book, available in 6 languages, collecting all the above and offering guidelines to replicate processes and measures on one’s own, plus recommendations for mainstreaming findings into mobility policies either at provider and at institutional level.ROI-MOB has been developed by a strong Consortium, gathering eight partners from five European Union countries.

The aim of the EC EUVET project was to exchange good practices within the field of innovative thinking and welfare technology (WFT) in the Social Health Care (S&H) sector as an answer to the common European paradox that we identified at the application stage; Many technology investments are neither really put to practical use nor integrated into the practical care work. We identified a need for practical inputs and experiences in order to optimize the use of technology and innovation in the sector and ultimately help to a better service for the citizens. With 8 partners from different countries we had a broad foundation to secure various strengths and experiences in the field. Therefore, the learning activities in the project focused on sharing best practice and gather all the ideas on an easily accessible platform so that as many people as possible can benefit from it.The partner countries are Finland, Germany, Spain, Sweden, Greece, Belgium, The Netherlands and Denmark. The partners represent different levels of development and use of innovative methods and WFT which has shown to be a strength as we learned a lot from each other because of the differences both in cultural approach and technical resources. As the EC EUVET project builds on the fact that although remarkable resources are invested in hardware and human competences a lot of WFT remains unused, a survey was prepared for both managers and employees at hospitals and elderly care centers in the partner countries in order to identify some of the reasons for this. The overall conclusion behind the small study shows that innovation and technology have come to stay in the H&S sector but, in addition to the already good education that young students receive, concrete inputs to translate knowledge into practice are lacking. The results of the exchange of best practice in this project serve as a tool to encounter some of these gaps. It provides relevant links to inspirational materials and specific project weeks reports that serve as catalogues with inputs to innovative methods and ideas for best use of WFT. Furthermore, we formulated a learning target focusing on WFT for VET students - it is accessible for everyone, who find it usable. As this was in fact an add-on (learning target number 8) to a former European KA2 project, it was decided to only develop one new learning target rather than creating a joint guideline for EU countries as originally planned in the application. The learning target can be found on the Facebook profile: “EC EUVET – Healthcare – welfare technology and innovation”: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1540965615959912/permalink/3051801324876326/. You can also find the corresponding assessment sheet: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1540965615959912/permalink/3051815138208278/ The target group of the project has mainly been teachers in the S&H sector, when it comes to the learning activities. In total, 73 mobilities were used for Learning and teaching activities (LTAs), and 38 mobilities for transnational project meetings (TPMs). The LTAs included lectures of innovative methods and technologies, executed by both internal and external speakers as well as many study visits to facilities, where new and/or innovative technologies were either developed or taken in to use. The participants got the opportunity to test on the spot a variety of welfare technologies, and to find a lot of inspiration that could be transferred to their own schools and finally as result of training of students, to the work places. That is, several stakeholders have taken part in the project as intermediaries of relevant topics and knowledge: representatives of management in the S&H sector, municipalities, VET innovation and research centers as well as representatives from technological development companies. The project has thus managed to reach out to other stakeholders beyond the project managers, both due to the interaction in the learning activities but also because of the survey and – not least - due to the platform that we chose to use for dissemination. The plan was originally to create a web page for sharing the results, but it was at an early stage of the project decided to create a Facebook profile instead (in the following named as FB profile), with the purpose to create a more dynamic, open source platform for sharing internationally know-how among all schools, dealing with welfare educations. For each LTA a report with summaries of each event, including presentations of materials, lectures and photos was created and uploaded under “files” https://www.facebook.com/groups/1540965615959912/files. This is the main result that we want to draw attention to as it is the essence of all project results. The FB group had at time of finalization of project 527 members from participating partners and from other schools in the health and welfare educational sector. We believe the platform will provide good opportunities for longer-term benefits.