CHOICES - Cooperation between European EQUAL projects - Results

CHOICES - Cooperation between European EQUAL projects - Results

introduction The EQUAL Initiative (promoted by the European Social Fund and implemented in and between the Member States) is a laboratory for new ideas to the European Employment Strategy and the Social inclusion process. Its mission is to promote a more inclusive work life through fighting discrimination and inequalities, specially those linked to sex, racial or ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation: http://ec.europa.eu/employment_social/equ al/index_en.cfm The European Employment Directives 2003 are established on three main objectives: full

employment, quality and productivity at work and reinforcement of cohesion and social inclusion. Taking into account these main aims, the Transnational Cooperation CHOICES was started, by a partnership having similar target groups in their national activities: groups likely to be excluded and segregated from the labour market. The four national projects that integrate the Transnational Cooperation CHOICES (CHANCES, Finland; GEG, Denmark, GE.L.S.O, Italy and CONCÍLIATE BIERZO, Spain), based on their common interests and similarities, agreed to plan several joint activities in order to share their knowledge for the development of methodologies that support the implementation of new approaches related to the educational and occupational guidance and counselling, for the inclusion of the most disadvantaged groups of the labour market. For more information about the CHOICES project, visit the Website: http://ktl.jyu.fi/ktl/hankkeet/chances/choices Next, the Transnational Activities carried out within the framework of the Transnational Cooperation CHOICES, during its two years of development, are briefly described below: 1. EXCHANGE OF EXPERTISE (Coordinating Partner: Finland) In terms of exchange of expertise, the CHOICES partners when having their transnational meetings have invited external experts to contribute with lessons on specific themes. The purpose of these lectures has been to give a better insight into areas of ongoing development in the education and employment sectors in the participating countries. The expert presentations have highlighted the following issues: Spanish women in the society as well as Spanish women s position in a rural context. Developing career guidance services for young people with special needs in Finland. Learning partnership in guidance and counselling processes and gender. CHOICES - Cooperation between European EQUAL projects - Results

Provision of guidance and counselling services in network and multiprofessional cooperation to support students at risk of social exclusion. Multiprofessional cooperation to support the integration of immigrants into working life. Non-discrimination and equal treatment. Gender mainstreaming and gender equality. These themes have been extremely relevant for the CHOICES cooperation and the lectures have provided the CHOICES partners with useful information. 2. WORLD CAFÉ - A METHOD TO FRUITFUL DEBATE (Coordinating Partner: Denmark) The one-day seminar alias World café took place at the University of Roskilde (Denmark) 28 th August 2006. The aim of this transnational workshop was to exchange experience cross-country with a spotlight on anti-discrimination. The focus areas of the four project partners in CHOICES are diverse. But we have one thing in common we want to develop new tools and methods in order to promote inclusion and combat discrimination in general. Gender and ethnicity should not be seen as a burden but as a resource. That was why we invited Ms. Mandana Zarrehparvar from The Danish Human Rights Institute to give an introduction to the Principle of Equal Treatment prior to the World Café debate. The focal points of her speech were: Where does the notion of equal treatment come from? What do the principles of equal treatment/non- discrimination mean?

Instruments to enhance equal treatment. Equal treatment bodies. The four parallel working groups (two English and two Spanish /Italian speaking) had a lively debate in two working sessions. It became clear, that gender is a backdrop to other discrimination factors being ethnicity, religion, disability, age or sexual orientation. The Spanish participants underlined the need for affirmative actions in order to include women into the labour market Italian colleagues pinpointed how gender is constantly redefined and negotiated in the everyday practices at the workplace and Finland and Denmark advocated for multicultural and gender-sensitive guidance as a tool to include minority boys and girls in the youth education system. More that 30 persons took part in the World Café and the impression was, that everybody learnt a lot while listening to each other and participating in the discussions in the rotating tables chaired by transnational steering groups members. 3. RESEARCH ON MINORITY YOUTH AND OCCUPATIONAL SEGREGATION (Coordinating Partner: Italy) One of the first common activities undertaken within the CHOICES transnational cooperation has been the joint research project. At the beginning the main aim was to analyse, with a gender approach: a) the occupational conditions of ethnic minority young people and the factors of occupational segregation they may face, b) the role that multicultural counselling plays, for young immigrants, in the transition between school and work. Seeing the heterogeneity of issues faced by different national projects and the consequent difficulty to develop a common framework for gathering data, the content of the project was altered through the working process. The result has been a joint publication, coordinated by the Italian partner, on the results of the research activities con- CHOICES - Cooperation between European EQUAL projects - Results

ducted by Finnish and Danish partners on gender issues in counselling and guidance practices with minority youth. The publication consists of two articles: the first one is based on interviews with young Russian girls living in Finland, the second one focuses on various aspects of the educational choices of ethnic minority youth in Denmark and has been drawn up on the basis of eight group interviews with minority young. 4. WEBSITE (Coordinating Partner: Finland) Also the internal evaluation process within the CHOICES partnership and documentation from CHOICES steering group meetings can be located there. Additionally some other information materials and handbooks on themes relevant for the CHOICES collaboration have been uploaded on the website. All information and all materials collected to the website are available only in English, which is the official language of the CHOICES partnership. The CHOICES website is available at: http://ktl.jyu.fi/ktl/hankkeet/chances/choices from where all interested users can obtain general information about the CHOICES cooperation and the partner organisations as well as jointly produced materials and publications.

5. NEWSLETTERS (Coordinating Partner: Spain) The common aim of the two Newsletters devised within the framework of the project, is the involvement of the local agents and the awareness raising on the labour discrimination issues, through the dissemination of the activities carried out and of the results obtained. Thus, the target group of this action, besides the CHOICES partners themselves and the target groups of each national project, are several types of local agents: trade unions, associations of disadvantaged collectives, equal opportunities agencies, etc. Both newsletters have been edited in Spanish and English. Their distribution has been carried out in printed format, through the different partners, and in pdf format, through the Website of the CHOICES project. Newsletter I The first newsletter is composed by an introduction on the different actions are addressed, the main objectives of the cooperation and the foreseen results. Then, a brief presentation of the CHOICES partnership is included. The main activities of the national projects of the partnership members are described. And finally, the newsletter includes different interesting events, related to the topics addressed by the transnational project CHOICES. Newsletter II The second newsletter (the present one) consists of a brief introduction regarding the Equal Initiative, its main aims and the beginning of the Transnational Cooperation CHOICES, according to these. Then, a description of every activity carried out during the transnational cooperation is included, indicating in each case: the objectives of the activity, the target group to which it is addressed, the results obtained and the format in which these results are available. Transnacional Cooperation, the target groups to which the CHOICES - Cooperation between European EQUAL projects - Results

6. GOOD PRACTICE BOOKLET ON CULTURE AND GENDER SENSITIVE GUIDANCE AND COUNSELLING (Coordinating Partner: Finland) The Good Practice Booklet on Culture and gender sensitive guidance and counselling aims at compiling case descriptions of activities in the area of culture- and gendersensitive counselling in the four participating countries (Denmark, Finland, Italy, Spain). Altogether there are 12 good practices presented in the booklet. These practices cover training programmes, handbooks, guides, publications, databases, websites and projects. In addition to the concrete good practice descriptions, the introduction chapter of the booklet approaches the themes culture and gender as well as counselling in relation to gender and ethnicity from a general perspective, yet in an integrated manner. This way the reader will be given valuable orientation into these topics and s/he will become better acquainted with the core concepts as well as contexts in which culture and gender usually are being discussed. The booklet, available in English in printed format and as a pdf-document, will be available in May 2007. 7. GOOD PRACTICE BOOKLET ON GENDER MAINSTREAMING (Coordinating Partner: Italy) The main aim of the Good Practice Booklet on Gender mainstreaming (that collect good practices from Finland, Spain, Denmark and Italy) it is the diffusion and the implementation of actions that have produced change in the culture, in the

Positive actions in the labour market: the purpose of such actions is to encourage gender mainstreaming and to improve the quality of life and the work/life balance. The purpose of implementing innovative ideas on achieving a gender balance in labour market participation is to facilitate career development, to reduce vertical and horizontal gender segregation, and to introduce new forms of flexibility that enhance the work/life balance for women and men. behaviours and in the social organization, in order to remove disparity and discriminations founded on gender stereotypes. The good practices have been grouped together by considering three different areas of implementation: Ministerial and/or national level policies: the application of gender mainstreaming in national policies, in programmes, and in general projects, is a complex undertaking which concerns every phase in a policy s development: its conception, implementation, assessment, and revision. Cooperation with bodies and/or committees in promoting equal opportunities is vital if projects and initiatives are to implement a gender approach. Projects in the field of education and training: the inclusion of gender mainstreaming in training schemes, and the identification of good practices to develop a gender culture in schools and the associated institutions, are indispensable if the obstacles against equal opportunities are to be removed, and if equal participation by women and men in education, training and the labour market is to be achieved. 8. FINAL SEMINAR (Coordinating Partner: Spain) In order to accomplish all the participants interest, the Final Seminar, the international and bilingual (English Spanish) closure activity in the scope of the Transnational Cooperation CHOICES, was structured in four different sections: 1. Organisation of Study Visits so that both partners and experts of the different countries can know in situ the main actions of the Spanish national project. CHOICES - Cooperation between European EQUAL projects - Results

2. Organisation of Oral Presentations by the coordinators of the different transnational activities, to inform the experts of the different countries about the activities carried out within the framework of the CHOICES Cooperation. 3. Organisation of Discussion Groups or Workshops, so that both partners and experts, can exchange opinions regarding the main topics related to the project CHOICES. The topics selected for the three workshops will be: The double discrimination of women. Education and employment as a way for the social and personal development of the immigrant men and women. The management of immigration in the different countries. been based on the national and transnational activities developed by the different partners. The exhibition has been divided in three different sections: National DPs Area: There will be an informative poster for each national project of the partners involved in the CHOICES Cooperation. CHOICES project Area: There will be an informative poster for each activity developed within the framework of the CHOICES Cooperation. Information point: Where the Website of the project will be available to be visited and where the visitants will be able to consult brochures and other publicity information on the different activities related to the project. 4. Posters Exhibition and Information Point. The topic of the exposition has

9. INTERNAL EVALUATION (Coordinating Partner: Denmark) The internal evaluation of CHOICES has been carried out by the Danish Steering Group member Ms. Sine Lehn. The CHOICES cooperation has been a cooperation of ambition and inspiration. From the very beginning there has been a collectively shared vision to accomplish some real results. There has been a clearly formulated intention that the common sharing of experiences was to result in activities and dissemination processes reaching further than to the Steering Group members. This ambition has been meet in a convincingly manner. The ambitions have also been high in terms of the thematic contents of the project. CHOICES sat out not only to cover gender, ethnicity, horizontal and vertical segregation, exclusion and inclusion in the same project, they also intended to explore how these different themes and aspects of exclusion influence and shape one another. CHOICES have worked with these themes and questions by applying a large number of different approaches all building on the assumptions that different member states and different fields of expertise have valuable knowledge and experience that can help us solve the problems of exclusion and marginalization. The results of the CHOICES cooperation are many. Seen from the perspective of the evaluator the work has left traces in the projects carried out on the national level. Many people have been involved in concrete activities and many more will have the opportunity to benefit from the high quality products of the project. CHOICES has not solved the problem of exclusion and marginalization, but it is true to say that we have gotten a little bit closer to some of the answers needed in order to do so. The report will be published on the CHOICES website in April 2007. http://ktl.jyu.fi/ktl/hankkeet/chances/choices CHOICES - Cooperation between European EQUAL projects - Results

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