"Vocational education and training - in particular the Upper-level secondary technical and vocational schools (BHS) – is an asset of the Austrian education system, which nonetheless faces some serious challenges highlighted by a relatively high rate of dropouts. (source: OECD)Practical experiences, such as internships, can significantly increase the students’ motivation to learn by showing them how relevant the knowledge and competences acquired in school are for their professional future. Thus internships can help to better students' performances in school and can simultaneously help to reduce the rate of dropouts in the BHS. The international / European aspect is a particularly attractive component for internships.The project ""Styrian Schools GO Europe!"" combines the international / European aspect with the motivation-enhancing aspect of practical experiences.""Styrian Schools GO Europe!"" supports students and teachers of interested Styrian Upper-level secondary technical and vocational schools to find work placements abroad.""Styrian Schools GO Europe!"" has set itself the goal that as many Styrian students as possible accept the challenge of an internship abroad and make their obligatory or their voluntary internship at a company or institution abroad.""Styrian Schools GO Europe!"" supports the students of the participating Styrian BHS to receive the EU funding, provided by the EU-programme Erasmus+; and to prepare, to realise and follow up the internships in the best possible way!""Styrian Schools GO Europe!"" is convinced that internships represent a unique chance for students to gain practical work experiences which the Styrian students could not gain in Austria.Here are some strong arguments, from ""our"", the project partners, point of view, in favour of making an internship abroad:- Strengthened sense of initiative and an enhanced entrepreneurial spirit.- Acquisition of new practical and theoretical knowledge and competences.- Improvement of foreign language skills.- Acquisition of intercultural knowledge and intercultural skills.- Strengthening of social and personal skills.- Creation of personal networks (friends and employer) abroad.- Increasing the chances in the labour market: At home and abroad.And many more.Who is ""Styrian Schools GO Europe!""? Here is a list of the project partners of ""Styrian Schools GO Europe!""- The Styrian Association for Education and Economics (STVG) as project coordinator.- The Education Authority of Styria with the Service Unit for the European Union- The regional Government of Styria with the Department for European Affairs and External Relations.- LOGO youth management.And here are the 5 Upper-level secondary technical and vocational schools from Styria which participate as project partners of “Styrian Schools GO Europe!”:1. Bad Gleichenberg Tourism Schools 2. Upper Level Technical Institute Leoben3. Commercial Academy Grazbachgasse, Graz4. Commercial Academy Feldbach5. Upper Level Institute for Commercial Professions Krieglach23 students of these schools will make their internships abroad during the summer of 2015.Together, the project partners and the project schools will prepare the supporting teachers and their students for the students’ internships. There will be preparation workshops and there will be checklists and to-do lists for students, teachers, parents and for the companies and the organisations where the students will make their internships. The students will receive assistance before, during and after their internships. The project partners will take care of the companies and institutions abroad offering the internships as well. ""Styrian Schools Europe GO!"" is going to start as a pilot in 2015 and aims to become a permanent offer for Upper-level secondary technical and vocational schools in Styria, their teachers and of course their students in the coming years."

Transition from regional labour markets to the European labour market has changed the requirements that schools nowadays have to meet. Vocational School should and wants to prepare the students for the European labour market. In order to achieve that, intercultural, language and management competences linked to the management of the EU school projects should be improved. Intercultural competences are nowadays essential because they supplement vocational competences. In order to become a school open to Europe, we should develop all these competences. Besides vocational skills and cultural preparation, language preparation of our students is also very important. We tend to motivate our students for learning foreign languages, so we think that it is crucial that innovative and interesting foreign language teaching methods are introduced to our teachers, too, through various forms of professional training. The teachers should also learn how to use contemporary digital technology, which will be applied in all school subjects, and the new knowledge will be systematically incorporated into school curriculum and educational plans and programmes in order to improve them.Project outcomes (project objectives)We attained all the project outcomes that had originally been planned. The teachers who participated in the project have already been applying innovative and interesting teaching methods in German, English, Mathematics and ICT, which has efficiently increased the motivation of our students for studying these subjects . The methods and techniques our teachers acquired in this project have raised the quality of curriculum, educational plans and programmes (syllabus), our teachers' language competences, as well as their intercultural competences, all of which resulted in enhanced students' respective competences which has provided a better access to the labour market for them. The teachers were also acquainted with contemporary digital technology, which has already been applied in all school subjects, and the new knowledge has systematically been incorporated into school curriculum and educational plans and programmes.The project also helped improve our teachers' project management competences which made them ready to manage new projects or take part in them. The number and the profile of training participants8 teachers participated in the professional development within this project. All of them improved their professional competences abroad and expanded their intercultural competences by observing classes in their respective subjects and by communicating and discussing professional issues with their mentors abroad. As they possessed sufficient language competences (English and German), they were able to follow the work at seminars, courses and demonstration classes, and to participate in discussions. They transferred the European dimension to other teachers as well as students and they have been integrating the European idea into classroom.5 teachers participated in demonstration classes/Job Shadowing (German as a foreign language, English, Mathematics (2 teachers) and ICT). 2 teachers took part in seminars and workshops on Information technologies (Web Tools) and 1 teacher participated in the international seminar for the managers of the EU school projects.Project results and outcomesThe participation of our teachers in the above mentioned types of professional training resulted in improving the curriculum and the quality of teaching by using interesting and modern methods of teaching, the introduction of modern information technology in education and the implementation of intercultural competences in teaching. Management competences of teachers associated with the European school projects allowed European projects to become part of everyday life in our school.As many of the students in our school are socially deprived, we believe this project contributed significantly in giving them an opportunity for additional and higher quality education and better employment prospects, which also granted our development plan a social dimension. Getting involved in the project was a wonderful opportunity to promote not only our school, but also our small but beautiful Međimurje County, our region and the whole of Croatia, the youngest EU member.

"In June/July 2016 and 2017, the entire 4th grade of the bilingual ""International Economics"" branch of the Grazbachgasse Business College completed a three-week work placement in England (Plymouth and London). In the first two weeks the pupils were accompanied and supervised by one or two teachers from the school. These teachers also had the opportunity to evaluate the project on site together with the partner institution. A large part of the 40 students completed the European Business Baccalaureate Diploma (EBBD) in addition to the matriculation and diploma examinations, for which a work placement abroad of at least three weeks as well as training modules for preparation and follow-up of the internship are obligatory.The jobs were arranged by the partner agency (Almond Vocational Link in Plymouth and ADC-College in London) respectively, the activities were all in line with the training of a commercial college: work in an office, in administration, project management, marketing, etc..The students were all very satisfied with their work and stay in England. They were able to get to know many of the country's cultural features, especially in contact with the host families where they stayed. Their language skills also benefited greatly from this project. In some cases, pupils had little contact with native speakers in the workplace, but generally it was reported that the pupils had very good English skills, which surprised some employers."

The goal of HAK Grazbachgasses involvement in this exchange is to improve the professional development of our language skills and language awareness for use in the classroom. During the course we wish to acquire and practice new teaching techniques in tandem with the use of new technologies. It is important to us to inspire young adults to feel confident in the use of language and improve their pronounciation skills; attending this course will enrich our resources to do so. In addition we hope to get new ideas for lesson plans and teaching material and implement these ideas in our teaching.Teachers involved in this project will develop and improve their competence in integrating international aspects of education and culture into daily life at school. We hope to improve our awareness of international communication and execute the knowledge weve gained in projects and teaching methods at our school. In addition we hope to further develop international aspects of school policy and better manage our current international projects. Seven staff memebers wll participate in our exchange : (describe them here) We expect to improve the use of technology in the classroom using internet access and social media as well as ipads. We will improve existing teaching methods in combination with the new material to influence a more positive impact on the teaching quality in our school. We expect our new cultural awareness will benefit the quality of our lessons and motivation of our students to be more open minded.Learning how to better manage international activities with our peers abroad will have a long term effect on our cooperation with other schools. In adition, English language knowledge and its use in the classroom will continue to positively influence the performances of our students.

This organisation has been awarded an Erasmus accreditation. The award of the accreditation confirms that the organisation has set up a plan to implement high quality mobility activities as part of a wider effort to internationalize its activities and to improve the quality of learning and teaching at the organisation. Accredited organisations are committed to a set of quality standards defined at the European level. By being accredited, the organisation gains continuous and easier access to funding for mobility activities of learners and staff under Key Action 1.