1.1. School culture and climate

The project partners designed and implemented a new anti-bullying programme in schools in five EU countries. It drew on the experiences of existing programmes and practices originated by the project partners working in different cultural contexts.  It provided further evidence of effective approaches to the reduction of bullying in schools that will inform the development of improved child centred, whole school strategies for adoption at European level.

This project is designed to support the development of Social-Emotional Learning skills (SEL) for 11-14 year olds, and to promote Peer Support to tackle and reduce bullying. SEL Programmes improve the student's social, emotional and academic skills, which include more pro-social behaviour and positive attitudes toward the self and others, and lower levels of emotional distress. Peer support systems reduce the negative impact of bullying on victims and make it more acceptable for them to report it. It follows a whole-school approach which includes young people, staff, parents and the wider community. Thus, this programme is a departure from the two-dimensional view of bullying as victim and bully, and instead looks at the social and group dynamics in a school or leisure environment to address a range of factors which contribute to bullying. ENABLE has trained a team of Ambassadors in each participating country, who are available to provide information and guidance to any school or organisation wishing to implement the programme.

The ICAM (Including Children Affected by Migration) programme is an Erasmus+ programme designed to ensure that children who have been affected by migration can access education. The programme helps schools to create a safe and secure environment for children affected by migration to enable them to take full advantage of their education.

"Our School - My Future" was an ESL project initiated within the framework of the Erasmus+ Strategic Partnerships for School Education. It aims to support cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices between schools from different countries across Europe.
Part of the problem of ESL is attributed to lack of support and guidance, disengagement from schooling, and secondary-level curricula which too often do not offer enough options for varied courses, alternative teaching pedagogies, experiential and other hands-on learning opportunities or sufficient flexibility and support.
The framework for this project was designed to focus mainly on in-school factors influencing ESL, such as teaching methods and curricular issues, positive/negative school climate, and the parents’ role as a contributing factor to ESL.
A distance education programme, “Promotion of healthy lifestyles and development of the students’ social skills through physical education and environmental activities” was offered to teachers from five partner countries. Some 65 teachers from Greece, Poland, Romania, Spain, and Turkey had the opportunity to participate in this training programme, along with six academics who are also members of the Hellenic Academy of Physical Education.

At the end of the 1990s, the first attempts to innovate at school level started with some primary classes being organised based on the ‘Step by step’ alternative pedagogy system. This meant that there were two teachers per class and that the learning process was organised around teams of students, rather than based on an individual learning. The change happened in response to requests from parents, and the school continues to offer both regular and ‘Step by step’ classes at primary level, with all students attending regular classes during lower secondary education (from 5^th to 8^th grade).

The ‘Different school’ (‘Şcoala altfel’) programme, introduced in 2011, offers an entire week of the school year dedicated to non-formal education. Partnerships with NGOs and the local community have also led to the implementation of several projects involving students in all stages, including planning and evaluation stages.

The school practices several innovative initiatives:

- The ‘Exercise company’ supports students to go through all the steps of setting up a company, from the creation of its administrative structure to its daily management, supporting students’ entrepreneurship competences. This project is regarded very positively by the whole school community and national authorities.

- The ‘Different school’ (‘Şcoala altfel’) programme significantly changed the relationship between students and teachers, thanks to its flexibility. Coupled with the participation in trainings of non-formal education by the teaching staff and practices acquired during Erasmus+ projects, it helped to reshape the educational process at the school.

- Teachers have been involved in curricular innovation dedicated to their particular field of study (tourism and economics) while members of committees set up by the Ministry of Education and the National Centre for the Development of Vocational Education (CNDIPT) contributed to the renewal of the national curriculum.