Управување со училиштата

This example describes innovative approaches in an upper secondary school in Sweden - Beda Hallberg. The school offers a range of programmes that provide the foundation for personal development and active participation in society. The school also aims to provide continued support to learners and reduce the risk of drop-out by working hard to minimizes the closing times of the school with the view to staying open during some longer holidays. A team of health professionals are also well represented and includes social and psychological counsellors available to support the needs of young people.

Swedish education is built on respect for human rights and fundamental democratic values such as inviolability of human life, equal value of all people, respect for the individual?s personal integrity and gender equality. In accordance with these values, there is a strong emphasis that all education should be inclusive and actively prevent discrimination and harassment in all forms, which includes bullying.

Essunga, a Swedish municipality, transformed the ranking of its schools from the bottom to the top of the national school league tables between 2007 to the top in 2010. Essunga has three elementary schools and one lower secondary school (grades 6-9). With 5,500 citizens, it is one of the smallest municipalities in the country. The increase in levels of achievement is attributed to a research-based approach of inclusive education. For years, the three elementary schools in Essunga had consistently experienced low educational levels. An increasing number of students were refugees or in “family placements”. In 2007, only 76% of students were eligible for upper secondary school and 20% of these were placed in special education classes. These results compelled political and school leaders and school staff to identify targeted measures to address these challenges. The municipality focused on interventions at school and in the local community to prevent school absence and increase attendance.

To improve student success and prevent early school leaving, the Malmaskolan established a Student Health Team, comprised of a school nurse, a special education teacher, the principal, the school counselor, the leisure-time pedagogues, the study and career counselor, a social worker, the school physician and a school psychologist. Since 2005, this Health Team has been the core for the development of teaching at the school, and is a hub for both teaching and school development. They have open meetings thrice weekly where teachers can discuss issues, and where a wide range of potential measures to support students is identified.

The aim of the report Nordic Projects to Combat School Dropout is to improve and inspire new initiatives for young people, and to create enriching contacts between actors and organisations in the Nordic region.
The Nordic Web Resource on Dropout from Upper Secondary Education was a project commissioned by the Nordic Council of Ministers and run by the Nordic Welfare Centre between 2012 and 2015. The aim of the project was to compile good examples of initiatives aimed at increasing the proportion of young people in the Nordic region who complete upper secondary education.

PlugInnovation is a digital platform with an ambition to become a national resource cluster for dropout-prevention. The website will collect information, statistics, research and examples of successful actions taken by the schools with the aim of preventing early school leaving.

The toolkit developed as part of the valorisation of the findings by the Reducing Early School Leaving in Europe (RESL.eu) research project aims to support practitioners working with youth in identifying and monitoring students and schools in need of greater care and support. It is primarily focused on the situation of those young people who are at risk of school disengagement and early school leaving. The toolkit is primarily dedicated to school staff: principals, teachers, educators, pedagogical counsellors, class tutors and school psychologists. However, it might be also helpful for other educational specialists working in education policies and in alternative learning pathways.

For Arvika, Centralskolan is a big school with students coming from the city centre and surrounding areas. Students are from very mixed backgrounds, including students from disadvantaged areas. Several years ago, the school had a significant number of students whose academic achievements after the 9^th grade were not sufficient for entering an upper secondary education. One of the key issues in Centralskolan, as well as in other surrounding schools, was that the student reading comprehension skills across various subjects were poor. Subjects of maths and science have been extra prioritised by Centralskolan as student results within those subjects were especially low. Therefore, the school has started practising an explicit teaching of reading strategies within specific subjects for grades 7 – 9. These reading strategies have been implemented together with scaffolding, which means that a teacher gradually empowers students to lead a reading and text comprehension exercise.

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.