End-of-visit report

Assessment tool

Group report	Group No. 02001,10		Number of participants	13
	Theme	Integrated services of Information and Professional Guidance
	Host country - City	SPAIN (Galicia) Santiago de Compostela
	Code and name of rapporteur	Marilena Beltramini 02- ITA01- S2A01-00086-1

The end-of-visit report should be regarded as a summary of the participants’ discussions and observations. Close attention will be paid to their remarks and suggestions. The template has been designed in such a way as to ensure that all reports have the same structure and are of the same length, which will facilitate comparative analysis as so assist the further dissemination of results and assessment of the programme.

The reports will be made available to those in charge of Community programmes at the national and European levels and they may also be published.

Important:

the report

í should be typewritten (preferably in electronic format);

í should be sent to Cedefop with one copy to the national liaison officer of the host country and one copy to the national liaison officer of your home country no later than three weeks after the end of the visit;

í should be written in the language of the group;

í should be drafted on the last day of the study visit by the whole group;

í should be finalised and signed by a representative member of the group (rapporteur).

Thank you

Cedefop

Programme coordinator

1
	Evaluation of the programme
1.1.		Approach to the theme (Agenda and specific content. Balance of the time spent on theoretical and practical sessions)
	The group gave an overall positive judgment of the trip organization. The agenda mostly met the interest of participants who welcomed the chance to come into contact with a panel of people that tried to create the best occasions to analyze, discuss and compare problems connected to the theme dealt with even if some more active role for participants might have been included. However the coordinator and all the staff in charge of the study visit organization tried to make the most of the experienced encouraging debate and question and answer spaces just after each report, presentation or lectures. Only in one case a presentation resulted rather difficult to follow because it mainly consisted in reading a list of subjects that were part of a master course curriculum that was illustrated without a useful contextual introduction that might have rendered the listening activity more interesting and in line with the spirit of the problems that were the object of the activities.
	1.2 Did the participants find the content as relevant as they had expected?
	The content provided by the organization mainly responded to participants’ expectations and in some cases went even beyond This was probably due to the effort of illustrating the new actions that are being implemented in Galicia that is somehow trying to make an integrated model of counseling and vocational guidance operative. The new policy following 1998 LOGSE Act represents somehow an avant-garde process because it implies changes at a systemic level that try to privilege policies that may respond to local community needs. It is without doubt that discussion of such relevant matters as comparative analysis of the different school systems requires a longer time than the one guaranteed by the visit and some people would have appreciated to discuss problems like subject organization in curricula, remedial and reinforcement work activities against drop-out and other important matters more in deep. Any how plenty of materials were exchanged between people and also provided by the Galician staff so that every participant in a future time may find the space for a deeper analyses of structures, organizations, actions and practices different from her or his ordinary ones.

1 Evaluation of the programme

1.3.		Did the study visit meet your expectations concerning the theme? How many among you are... (Fill in the number of participants for each specification)
12	Fully satisfied	1	satisfied
1.4.		Comments on the places visited (For instance how useful they were in relation to the theme, possibilities for future networking and cooperation, development and innovation aspects, best practices, etc.)
	The institutes visited were professional schools that showed high quality levels and offered examples of curricular activities where practice is juxtaposed to educational class input. The group was generally hosted by schools for lunch as in most cases, among the other professional areas, the schools were catering institutes. If on the one hand all this offered a chance for comparative analyses between the same kind of schools it would have been interesting to visit also other kinds of institutions for general secondary education. Particularly interesting and appreciated was the visit to the forum of Coruna, an excellent example of centre for informal education where actions of integration between local council, schools, territory, counseling and vocational centers are carried out. The activities implemented seemed to give answers to a multiplicity of requests and needs. Furthermore the centre was also judged by everybody as an excellent example of good exploitation of F.S.E funding. Another interest visit was the one to a centre working with the Public Employment Service in the field of attention to handicapped people that gave a very positive impression for the high standards of the practices and policies implemented to favor unemployed disable people according to models that somehow totally reduce the typical sense of isolation that such people generally experience in their particular situations. Visits also created the occasion for development of further networks and cooperation. In order to promote a more effective selection of the institutions to be visited, recommendation was made to particularly consider the kind of institutes, centers or schools the different participants come from so that concentration on specific areas of counseling and guidance can be made thus enhancing the participants’ level of motivation in the activities.

1 Evaluation of the programme
1.5.		How would you assess the opportunities for discussion within the group?
	As a matter of fact the intensity of the program with plenty of lectures and presentations generally with multi media support took most of the time and therefore participants would have appreciated the possibility to have some more space for interaction at group level but as already said interaction was favored after lectures and the like and such opportunity made the debate fertile and interesting. Analogies between different countries as well as differences came to surface with mutual enrichment. Since the occasions to discuss within the group were rather few, owing to the intensive program and the time required to move from one institution to another, participants very often talked and discussed on an informal basis the which thing contributed to consolidate personal relationships. Some free time should be guaranteed within the program of any study visit so that if particular interests and/or professional needs might arise at group level participants can have the occasion for analysis, discussion and consequently propose different solutions to the matter discussed.
1.6.		Other comments regarding the management of the programme and the guidance/support provided for the group
	The management was professional and well-organized both before and during the visit. The staff proved kind, sociable and ready to help in any occasion and a good atmosphere could be created right from the start. All the participants appreciated the level and the quality of commitment of both coordinator and organizers. In particular everybody judged the opportunity of been given language support very positively so that a very interactive kind of communication could be created right from the start even with the adoption of different languages also on the part of the more shy or linguistically fragile people. As a result communication was always assured both in classroom activities and during the visits to schools, institutions, centers and tours in the surrounding territory and the multiple questions addressed to the different operators proved very useful to satisfy curiosity and enrich the quality of the interaction from the professional point of view.

2
		The content of the visit
		This part may be used for publication or discussion or for selecting participants for future thematic seminars
2.1.		What are the common thoughts of the group regarding the theme and the content of the visit? ( - important points discussed during the visit in the host country, - specific aspects on this field in the host country, - key points for further discussion/research, - best practice.)
The relevant points discussed during the visit were of course the illustration of the different school systems that in a certain way showed that as the time being education is undergoing a very complex moment in many countries due to the new requests of a global society where traditional approaches seem to be obsolete but implementation of innovative practices promoting effective structural and systemic changes are also difficult to select. As a matter of fact reforms are being studied or just passed in many countries and more or less all of the participants shared the idea that drop-out rates are beginning to worry school operators at all levels. Therefore integration and team process- actions are promoted to discover if integration between different centers and systems of both general and professional education may find a possible solution to contemporary situations in schools. Counseling and guidance to be conceived of as forms to promote personal and school success became therefore hot issues in the group discussions and focused the attention on the policies that are now being implemented in Galicia that seem to offer interesting ideas as for responding to needs connected to the different levels of education seen from a systemic viewpoint but always careful to consider the needs of territory. Discussion was particularly fertile when specialized fields were discussed by the district counseling team that in many cases proved to be high standard. In particular the areas of professional and vocational guidance, sensorial disabilities, motor disabilities, education for the intellectually gifted, developmental and behavioral disorders, social counseling as well as hearing and speech disabilities were taken into consideration and the group could profit of in interactive kind of communication with the panel in charge of such fields. According to most participants the Galician model is interesting due to an integrative and integrated way to deal with problems especially because it also takes into due consideration operators’ training policies also enriched by the occasions of biannual symposiums where counseling and vocational expert can meet and discuss the results and practices implemented, to be improved or reinforced. Some people in the group stated that one of the main problems that should be discussed and analyzed in further sessions dealing with the same theme is the dialogue quality to be elicited between the labor word –that of firms – and the one of general education level as well. Up to now they do not seem to have found an easy interface yet: a software of the mind to be shared and translated into operative and educational practices that might give results meeting both labor market and basic but solid educational standards needs the only ones that can guarantee a level of feasibility as the one required by that knowledge world whose requests are getting more and more demanding.
	Individual participants are invited to supplement the group’s thoughts by writing a text setting out their own personal views on the theme.

3
		The group’s suggestions to the national liaison officer of the host country for improving the organization and efficiency of future study visits
	A suggestion that has been shared by all the group for further study visits is first of all to provide a larger amount of time for group discussion so that all the countries may be guaranteed the same amount of time to present school systems and the situation of integrated services of information and professional guidance. Program design should be conceived of in a more flexible way and sub-group activities could be promoted according to the specific needs of participants which could be communicated to organizers in advance. A good way to implement this and a more interactive way to plan group activities concerned with specific matters could be that of using a case study and invite the participants of the different countries to explain how such problem is generally faced in the different systems.
4
	Suggestion of the group to Cedefop regarding general organization of the study visits programme at European level (information, composition and size of the group, grants, documentation)
	People taking part to the visit should be mixed as for roles, competencies and countries and once selection has been made they should be asked about their specific needs in advance so that organizers may take their requests into consideration in due time and plan also some group or subgroup activities according to different needs. Participants should be given part of their grant money in advance so that they are not asked to anticipate sums that they have not at their disposal.
Date			29 November 2002	Signature of the group rapporteur	Marilena Beltramini