The partnership “Keys to Employability” is being submitted by a Consortium of three secondary schools located in the Province of Varese, together with the entrepreneurs' association of the Province (Univa), the Chamber of Commerce, the Regional School Board, the Region Lombardy and a Consulting Company, Noviter. the Consortium cooperates with three large multinationals (PZL-Swidnik, CKA GmbH and Bauknecht Hausgerate GmbH) and three important education and training centres in Ireland and in the UK to organize and implement : - 100 traineeships for students in initial vocational training in order to motivate young people to open up to training opportunities and professional vacancies beyond frontiers and to experience mobility in an international environment, while getting familiar with the ongoing changing of the labour market. GENERAL OBJECTIVES The project "Keys to Employability” - Contributes to the growth and improvement of education from a European perspective and for the development of occupational mobility in Europe; - Contributes to enrich the beneficiaries’ training process; - Foster the acquisition of cross skills needed for the faster and faster changes in the modern labor market; - Allows to integrate the activity of transnational traineeship as a complementary tool qualifying the educational path of the students sent by the vocational schools. SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES - To develop and acquire basic communication skills in an international working environment; - To practice and enhance the competences to acquire in the field of business and information and communication technology such as: cultural interaction, teamwork, foreign language skills in multicultural social and operating contexts, the ability to make comparisons between the National and International work systems in an intercultural perspective - To foster entrepreneurship while offering a better understanding of the advantages of mobility and job opportunities abroad; - To widen their horizons and boost their job chances in the future. MOTIVATIONS AND NEEDS "Keys to Employability” meets the need to enhance the exchanges and the mobility of the students in initial training and of their teachers and allows the participants to comply with the challenges of Lisbon aiming at developing knowledge in Europe, promote employability, social cohesion and, last but not least, personal and professional fulfillment. The project of transnational traineeship contributes to improving the quality of the teaching planning of the last two years of studies, in harmony with the activities already planned such as the work related learning, the use of virtual enterprise and the experimentation of real case study in the teaching of vocational subjects. The importance of the learning mobility abroad lies in the cooperation of different stakeholders, companies, education, associations and other boards operating in the territory and supports the development of a quality education and vocational training, necessary to strengthen the competition in Europe. The project opens up the schools’ doors to the Wider World, promotes the exchange of ideas and the culture of reflective practice and transparency by using Europass Mobility and the Common Framework for Europe Competence. The project also moves a first step to create a net of long-term collaborations , meant to innovate and to put in contact the different European education systems, in order to overcome the barriers limiting the chances of a work placement abroad and to cooperate in the acquisition of those skills and qualifications in accordance with the rapid evolution of the modern labor market. It represents a pilot experience of good practices we can transfer in the future to the other high schools of the Province of Varese which cannot boast an experience in the organization of placement activities abroad.