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La Maleta de les Famílies (The Family Suitcase )

Title

La Maleta de les Famílies (The Family Suitcase )

Affiliation(s)/ Institution

DIPUTACIÓ DE BARCELONA

Email addresses

martinezisn@diba.cat

Project funded by

DIPUTACIÓ DE BARCELONA

Promoter name and country

DIPUTACIÓ DE BARCELONA. ESPANYA

Type of provider

public

Area of implementation

  • urban
  • local

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

In Catalonia, more than 20% of young people aged 18 to 24 leave the education system without having completed post-compulsory secondary studies. In several European countries, it has been proven that an effective guidance system has a notable effect on reducing dropout rates and improving educational results. Furthermore, this guidance seems to be even more effective when it also includes the family, as seen from the project ‘La Malette des Parents’ carried out in France. For this reason, Barcelona Regional Council has made a firm commitment to promoting guidance to help students to make the transition between different stages of education, specifically between compulsory and post-compulsory secondary education. Within this setting, the ‘La Maleta de les Famílies’ project aims to help students by providing their families with guidance.

Aims of the project

Providing guidance to the families of students in their last year of compulsory secondary education (fourth year of ESO) so they can help their children choose a post-compulsory training route. By providing this support of families, the aim is to help students make more solid choices as regards which studies to pursue and thus reduce the number of students dropping out after they complete compulsory education and during the first year of post-compulsory studies.

Target group

  • students
  • ESL
  • parents

Description of the target group

Families of students in the fourth year of compulsory secondary education at risk of early school leaving. The pilot for this programme was carried out in 28 public secondary schools in eight municipalities in the province of Barcelona.

Staff (selection, evaluation, training, promotion)

The personnel involved were those responsible for giving guidance to the families, mainly psychology and education graduates, as well as technical personnel from the local municipal departments of education and teachers and head teachers from the schools.

Methodological approach, activities implemented

During the 2014-2015 academic year, a series of activities were carried out (workshops, tutorials and support) aimed at the families of students who might encounter difficulties. The goal of these guidance activities is to help families support their children in the process of choosing a post-compulsory training route, so that this choice is more in line with their personal motivations as well as their possibilities for access and success.

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

It is a pilot project that aims to ascertain the impact of the activities in reducing dropout rates. To that end, the project design includes an impact assessment. The assessment procedure has been designed by IVALUA, the benchmark institution for public policy assessment in Catalonia. At the same time, an implementation assessment procedure was carried out to evaluate the levels of participation in the activities and the participants’ satisfaction. As regards the outputs, the level of attendance for workshops and tutorials was between 60-70% of the families invited. Among the families that attended, the general level of satisfaction was very high, at over 8/10. In terms of the outcomes, we will need to wait until at least January 2016 for the preliminary results.

Conclusions, lessons learned

After completion of the guidance workshops and tutorials for the young people and their families, the evaluation given by the participants (the families) was very positive. We still need to wait for the evaluations from the rest of the people involved (technicians from the local education departments, teachers and head teachers from the schools and the professionals who led the workshops and tutorials). In any case, one of the lessons learnt is that networking and coordination between the different agents involved is essential in this area of intervention.

Directions of further development/ Transferability, replicability

In theory, the project’s design should make it easy to transfer as it can be applied to new schools and other municipalities, but we need to wait for more evaluation results in order to decide upon the appropriateness and scope of the scaling.

Type of ESL (early school leaving) practice

  • Prevention
  • Intervention

Web references (url, social media presence)

Portal Orientació-Diputació de Barcelona
www.diba.cat/web/educacio/orientacio/maleta
Mitjans de comunicació locals i nacionals
Municipis
Vilafranca http://dom.cat/kne
Vic http://dom.cat/knd
Castelldefels http://dom.cat/knf
Terrassa http://dom.cat/kng
Catalunya - Diari Ara www.ara.cat/suplements/criatures/Maletade-Families_0_1387661232.html

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

  • Governance and coordination
  • Accessibility
  • Methodologies of provision
  • Measures and profiles
  • Objectives and needs
  • Common framework and quality standards
  • Evaluation of performance and effectiveness

 

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