1.3. School management

In the school year 2015/16 the Schulzentrum Ybbs (a school center consisting of three vocational upper secondary schools) introduced a concept called IndY, which involves that 20% of the teaching time is intended for individualized learning. IndY aims at improving students’ expertise, motivation, self-responsibility, self-management, collaborative skills, emotional intelligence and learning methods.

The project focuses on the role of school leadership in actively structuring the educational process for learning and equity.

The project builds on the achievements of the Comenius Network “European Policy Network on School Leadership (EPNoSL, 2011-2014)”.

The project involved two intense job shadowing activities in Vienna and Berlin. Good practice and obstacles were identified though feedback forms, and solidified in collaborative analysis and evaluation.

Tools to support leadership action were developed and tested by the two school principals in everyday school life, and analysed through questionnaires/surveys and subsequently evaluated and summed up in bilateral groups.

The film produced by the partners can be found here:

https://youtu.be/UJR9Opwg4QM

The learning hub was implemented at the TGM (an upper-level secondary technical college) as a school experiment in the school year 2016/17. It has been implemented in the school’s Information Technology (IT) Department in two of the four classes in the first year (i.e. grade 9).

In the learning hub students study self-regulated 20 hours per week. Of these 20 hours, 9 hours relate to general education subjects (German, English and Mathematics) and 11 hours involve vocational education subjects (Software Engineering, Systems Engineering, Media Technology, Network Technology). The other 6 school subjects (Geography, History and Political Education, Natural Sciences, Religion, Sports, Computer Workshop), which encompass 13 hours per week, are still taught by using traditional methods of teaching.

The objective of the MiCREATE project is to encourage the inclusion of diverse groups of migrant children by adopting a child-centred approach to the integration of migrant children at educational and policy level. Stemming from the need to revisit the existing integration policies, the research project aims to comprehensively examine the contemporary integration processes of migrant children to enhance their agency, participation, and well-being.

The ‘Raising the Achievement of All Learners in Inclusive Education’ (RA) project aimed to provide evidence of effective practice in raising achievement and building the capacity of schools and communities to include and support all learners.

The European Policy Network on School Leadership- EPNoSL has developed a tool to reflect upon, identify challenges and prioritize areas for policy action to support and enhance school leadership for equity and learning. It addresses policy makers, school authorities, school actors, researchers and leadership training institutes. The School Leadership Toolkit is designed to support analyses of the ways different school leadership policies and programs interplay and influence the overall capacity of school leaders and their schools to effectively and persistently address equity and learning challenges in their schools. It contains a range of useful materials, videos, case studies and toolsets on different aspects of school leadership.

The Supporting Inclusive School Leadership (SISL) project investigated how to promote inclusive school-level leadership and provided supportive tools. The project considered that leadership for inclusive education aimed at achieving full participation in meaningful learning opportunities, high achievement and well-being for all learners, including those most vulnerable to exclusion.