Solaris: Solutions to Age Related Issues in the Education Sector

2021-1-CZ01-KA220-VET-000033227

Erasmus+

2022 - 2022

Project Bio

The ageing of the workforce is an issue of vital importance to everyone in the European Union.

Future economic growth, competitiveness and efficiency will increasingly depend on how effectively employers can utilise their ageing workers.

This project is aimed primarily at the organisational level in the education sector; it is intended to be a practical tool to assist those with responsibility for employment, such as school managers, policy makers and social partners, as well as teachers and trainers, (continuous professional development, or CPD, trainers in particular) to ensure that the school workforce ageing is managed successfully and that age does not become a barrier to employment.

Age management is a commitment to ensure that the human resources (with whom the employers with, in this case the school staff) are capable of work - not only today, but also in some 40 years from now.

From the point of view of educators, age management presents sets of actions for the needs of people of different ages (not just for the older employees) with the aim to prepare the educators for the moment when the school will have to employ a significantly larger rate of employees aged over 50 than it does today.

This project will address the school staff, VET teachers and trainers in particular. The CPD program designed in this project will target professional teaching staff and will reflect the current needs in the ageing school environment.

Project Objectives

The main objective of the project is to develop a set of practical tools for educators of all levels (especially VET providers) that relate to age management in the education sector. The set of tools will consist of collections of best practice examples on solutions to age-related issues in schools, comparative analysis of the case studies and recommendations for the educators on the effective choice of age management measures. In addition, a curriculum for training of selected school staff in age related topics will be developed as well as a model introductory training program. The program outputs will be made available digitally to the public upon their completion.

Partnerships

The Solaris project is run by a group of 6 organisations from across Europe. The partner organisations are comprised of a mix of VET centres, university institutes, NGOs and associations which specialise in a range of competences such as vocational training, cultural expertise, consultancy and education.

Archivio della Memorial, Italy
A.S.I.E, Romania
CESUR, Spain
EIA, Portugal
ProEduca, Czech Republic
SBTC, Turkey

Main Project Outputs

All results will be available in 7 languages: English , Czech , Portuguese , Italian , Spanish , Romanian and Turkish.

Case study collection on age management in education sector: this output will be the result of a survey investigating the best practices in educational age management. The partners intend to amalgamate 24 examples of schools which have implemented successful age management practices in their institution. This output is available here!
Case study analysis: this output will be based on the examples collected and processed in the previous case study. It will consist of a set of recommendations for schools and educators in general; detailed instruction and step by step guidance on how exactly the situation described in the good practice example can or should be solved, which decisions to make and what circumstances to consider.
Training Curriculum: the training curriculum output will comprise of 4 separate packages, each with a different target group: school teachers/trainers, school managers/directors, counsellors and educational consultants and CPD trainers. The curriculum will contain all the required information necessary to design and/or provide training for the selected target group on the topic of age management. This output is available here!
Introductory Training Program for School Staff: change is constant, and in the ever-changing world we live in, it becomes almost imperative to keep progressing in our professional endeavours. The best option to keep up with this is to use continuing professional development (CPD) programs to stay ahead of the curve. The CPD training program will reflect current expectations of its users as well as future ambitions. As the trainers' needs develop, the knowledge and skills they require will also evolve. This is where CPD will come to the teachers' rescue and help them steer their career in the right direction. This training program will be built upon the results of the thorough analysis of the teaching staff needs related to the age management in schools. It will provide the introductory lessons to the age-related issues occurring in the education sector and outline the directions in which these issues
can and should be solved. This output is available here!