Every year, tens of thousands of pupils arrive from their native countries in schools across Europe. This migration brings with it a wealth of cultures and backgrounds but also creates challenges to school education at all levels. To meet these challenges, education policy must remain focused on creating an inclusive learning environment and ensuring academic success for all students whatever their background.
Inclusion and Diversity in Education is run in collaboration with national and regional education authorities from nine EU Member States and aims to promote social cohesion and raise educational standards in culturally inclusive schools. The programme develops new projects and practices for managing inclusion and diversity in schools. These are based on a European Youth Charter drawn up by students to give them a voice and a stake in this critical issue. Through these activities, INDIE brings together pupils, head teachers and policymakers to respond to these challenges and build lasting networks.
High quality school leadership is essential to realising INDIE’s goals. Working alongside heads of schools and teachers, this programme has created a core group of motivated Young Leaders who involve other pupils, teachers, their families and communities in their projects. Following an on-line survey gauging prevalent views on integration in European schools, the European Youth Charter was developed. This was the result of a Europe-wide collaboration led by Young Leaders and was finalised in Brussels in February 2008. The European Youth Charter on Inclusion and Diversity was presented to policy makers from all participating countries at the European Parliament and has been the catalyst for further action:
- School-based projects developed by schools in response to the charter
- Leadership training given to 20 students from each school
- An active media awareness campaign
- Implementation of in-school projects
- Development of events giving voice to students’ views on diversity, such as visual arts and poetry projects with Levi Tafari
- Second round of Young Leader training courses to bring on board new leaders
- Networking event to bring together selected teachers and students from each school
- Project seminar for policymakers and experts
- Evaluation/refinement of in-school activities
- Continued visual arts and poetry project events on communication of diversity
- Agreement on best practice guidelines
- Visual arts and poetry project exhibition
- Conference to present best practice guidelines
- Next Generation Europe event organized by Young Leaders for young people in all participating countries
- Dissemination of best practice guidelines in all participating countries/regions and via EU
- High-level government partners and local education authorities in all participating countries
- 50 schools linked in cluster groups
- More than 850 trained Young Leaders
- 45,500 other teachers, pupils and parents in associated school communities
- INDIE website with information on events, research findings, useful links and much more
- Coverage on 59 news outlets across 7 countries with a combined audience reach of 24.6 million and a larger media campaign planned for 2009
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