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Priority education areas

Title

Priority education areas

Affiliation(s)/ Institution

Institute of Educational Sciences, Bucharest

Email addresses

mihai.iacob@ise.ro

Project funded by

UNICEF

Promoter name and country

Institute of Educational Sciences, Bucharest, Romania

Type of provider

public

Area of implementation

  • urban
  • nazional

Context and motivation of the project - legislative background/obligations, institutional policy, institutional structures

The project was started 2002 in order to develop a methodology to support schools from economically disadvantaged areas to cope with the increasing phenomenon of drop out and early school leaving. The project chose a school on the outskirts of a city in southern Romania and for four years it developed methods and instruments designed to enhance the attractiveness of school and education, while improving the communication with the local community. Following the initial success, the project was expanded to several schools in a neighbouring county. In 2010 the project was expanded at national level, with yearly increases of participating schools, up to 100 in 2012. The last two years of implementation have seen a scale back, down to 35 schools, with the 2014-2015 school year being the final year of the project. The project was also meant to help policy makers in their decisions regarding actions that would enable the Romanian education system meet international benchmarks regarding E

Aims of the project

- increasing participation to education of children from economically disadvantaged areas. -reducing school dropout and ESL. - developing the capacity of schools to offer high quality educational programmes and to become a resource centre the communi

Target group

  • students
  • ESL
  • parents
  • Guidance practitioners
  • Teachers

Description of the target group

During its peak year, the project reached 100 schools, trained nearly 2000 teachers and involved around 50000 children in activities. 100 counsellors were trained and supervised to deliver group counselling sessions with parents.

Staff (selection, evaluation, training, promotion)

The project staff was made of: - Project management staff - Administrative staff - Trainers for all areas of the national curriculum, plus several trainers on non-formal education - County level facilitators The project staff was evaluated based on monthly activity reports.

Methodological approach, activities implemented

A training methodology was developed during the early years of the project that was meant to promote high quality education in areas with limited resources. Each school participating in the project had to identify at the beginning of the school year the children that were most at risk of abandoning school. They would be the main focus of all interventions. The project was designed to accompany teachers and school counsellors during the school year and to encourage them to implement activities that attract and motivate pupils to continue studying. There were two rounds of training, one in autumn (October/November) and one in spring (March/April) during which the teachers and counsellors were trained to implement different methods relevant to their domain. After the first training session the trainees were expected to carry out a set of activities and to use a Moodle platform to show their progress and to ask for feedback from trainers and their peers. Counsellors were expected to ...

Results and impact - data of program internal/ external evaluation, beneficiary satisfaction, the impact of the didactical practices at individual and institutional level

An internal report was compiled at the end of each project year and submitted to UNICEF. At key stages of the project external evaluators were contacted to survey the results and impact. The final evaluation, along with two studies regarding children’s resilience and their intent of pursuing further education are being carried out at the moment, with results due to by the end of 2015.

Conclusions, lessons learned

The project has shown that significant change can be achieved with relatively little financial investment. Counselling was a key part of the success, as it has helped empower and engage the local community.

Directions of further development/ Transferability, replicability

The first impressions after the end of the project seem to indicate that it has managed to kick start a process of profound transformation within the schools that were part of the programme for at least 3 years. We can see no factors that would prev

Type of ESL (early school leaving) practice

  • Prevention

Web references (url, social media presence)

http://www.unicef.ro/ce-facem/initiative/hai-la-scoala/despre-campanie/anul-scolar-2011-2012/

Parameters on which the practice is applicable (check those appropriate)

  • Methodologies of provision
  • Measures and profiles
  • Objectives and needs
  • Evaluation of performance and effectiveness

 

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