Skills for Life
Start date: Jun 17, 2014,
End date: Oct 16, 2014
PROJECT
FINISHED
Nowadays the world demands young people to be flexible, quick-learning, self-confident and open-minded. They are supposed to know how to make their way in the “real world” just after finishing school. But within the actual system of education young people are not taught enough the practical skills for life: how to communicate effectively, how to work in a team, set goals, present oneself or look for a job. However, many youngsters would need this knowledge even before entering the adult world since they have part-time jobs while studying in the university.
This project aims at helping young people to build self-confidence, learn their strengths and weaknesses, analyze life-experiences and learn from them and informing them about the importance of soft skills. Also they will try to look for a job on their own, write a CV or pass a job interview. They will listen to stories of success, participate in debates, and become aware of alternative solutions to finding their way in life after finishing school.
There will be 30 young participants from 6 different countries: Estonia, Bulgaria, Spain, Macedonia, Turkey, Poland. The age range is 16-19 years old, young people who are about to have their first working experiences, most of them are from the countries with high rate of youth unemployment.
The APV is foreseen on July 23-24. And the youth exchange will take place on August 25-31 in Tallinn.
Implemented activities and methods applied: team-building and communication games, conflict resolution simulations, public speaking skills trainings, psychological trainings to learn about one’s personality, strengths and weaknesses and relations with the others; presentations by successful people; goals setting and planning sessions; debates; role-plays (job interviews); country presentations; CV and Motivation letter writing workshops.
As a result, we will increase the awareness of the importance of developing soft skills on equal terms with hard skills among young people, share the experience of teaching and promoting soft skills in different countries as well as employers' expectations, produce a guide which will give tips to young people on how to acquire these skills in everyday life.
The participants of the project will have a chance to improve their own soft skills and become more confident, more competitive at the European labour market.
As well as that, cooperation with youth career consultants, youth centers and youth organisations is envisaged in order to spread the results of the project.
The planned dissemination materials: a wall calendar offering step-by-step guidance for young people how to work on their soft skill during a year; a computer game introducing the soft skills; leaflets containing useful information on the soft skills topic, which will be spread in youth centers.