Job coACh, supporTIng school studEnts with Autism Spectrum Disorder to acquire independency” – ACTIvE aims to promote social inclusion starting with school education through a holistic approach. Thanks to the external collaboration of the Job Coach educator profile, school systems as a whole will be empowered to support students with special needs. In particular, ACTIvE wants to:-Provide educators working in school contexts with innovative Continuous Professional Development opportunities to deal with ASD students (competences to increase social and personal autonomy of ASD adolescents using psychological and educational best practices);-Develop a long-lasting relationship among all actors in school (families, teachers, headmasters, NGOs working with autism, external stakeholders);-Promote social inclusion through talent development;-Create synergies at local and European level to develop innovative practices for inclusive Europe with a bottom-up approach.TARGET GROUPDirect TG: Educators working in school context (psychologists, professional educators) aiming to enhance their competences in relation to autism.Indirect TG: ASD students, teachers, headmasters, families.Stakeholders: local communities, employment agencies working with people with special needs, chambers of commerce, SMEs. To reach these project objectives, the consortium has designed a set of activities grouped into two innovative results (IOs) over a period of 30 months in total (start: 1st December 2019 – end: 31st May 2022). IO1 THE ACTIVE CURRICULUMThe first innovative result is represented by the curriculum to become JOB COACH, tailor made on the training needs of educators and psychologists working in a school context with ASD students (age 15-18). The curriculum includes key knowledge, skills and competences related to the educational profile of the JOB COACH. In order to reach this tangible result, project partners have foreseen three main activities:A1 Methodological Framework (M1-M2);A2 Job Coach Curriculum (M2-M5)A3 Active Validation (M5-M7).The last activity aims at creating an integrate system for the validation of competences, in full compliance with the “European Guidelines for Validating Non-Formal and Informal Learning” (CEDEFOP 2016).IO2 THE ACTIVE SOCIAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENTThe second innovative result is represented by the development of a new online learning environment, enriched with training materials for educators, a collaborative space for the users (namely, the community of practice) and an Info Desk, which will serve as a contact point among platform users and project partners. The info desk will be active for at least 3 years after the end of project funding, in order to guarantee the sustainability of the project’s results. In addition, the online collaborative space (community of practice) will be supervised by a moderator appointed by project partners on a rotation base (approximately 5 months each).The Guidelines for Educators to Implement Job Coach Strategies with ASD Students (IO2/A5.2) will be also available on the platform as an open resource, ensuring the transferability of results.These second tangible result will be achieved through:A1 Training Plan (M8-M9)A2 Development of Training Modules (M10-M18)A3 ACTIvE Social Learning Environment (M17-M21)A4 Pilot Test (M20 – M26): C1 Train the Trainer (M20) + Pilot (M22 – M26)A5 Guidelines of Educators to Implement Job Coach Strategies with ASD Students (M26 – M28)Blended Mobility of ASD Students (M26) + Report (M26-M28)A6 Fine-Tuning of Platform and training modules (M29 – M30).

CONTEXT LEAD!, specific LEArning Disorders no more! is a project aimed at increasing SOCIAL INCLUSION starting with school education and decreasing Early School Leaving (ESL) empowering students with the right competences. Indeed the project wants to identify and defeat the barriers that students with Specific Learning Disabilities meet at school when they start writing and reading. EUROPE 2020 Strategy wants to reduce ESL to less 10 % around EUROPE, and, according to EUROSTAT (Disability statistics - access to education and training), 1 out of 4 people in EUROPE who faces BASIC ACTIVITY DIFFICULTIES, leaves the school prematurely. According to EPALE (JULY 2017) there were around 35.67 million students with such disabilities, 13.88 million coming from PRIMARY SCHOOL and 21.700.000 from secondary school. OBJECTIVELEAD! wants to empower and support students (9-14 years old) in developing the right competences about the ADAPTIVE TECHNOLOGIES and their use thanks to the support of an INNOVATIVE PLATFORM, MY SKILLS. The learning material will be validated according to the EUROPEAN GUIDELINES OF THE VALIDATION OF NON-FORMAL AND INFORMAL LEARNING (CEDEFOP) and, at the end of the learning path, students will have the chance to get the EUROPEAN ADATPITVE TOOL LICENCE. TARGET GROUPThe DIRECT TARGET GROUP of the project is represented by students with SPECIFIC LEARNING DIFFICULTIES (SLD) with age range 9-14 years old. The INDIRECT TARGET GROUP is instead composed by teachers, headmasters, tutors and trainers and all the school and no school staff dealing with students with Specific Learning Disorders. In pointing out the this target group, families have to be considered as indirect beneficiaries of the project due to the fact that they will exploit project results with their children. ACTIVITIESIn order to reach its objective, LEAD! wants to promote forefront knowledge regarding the adaptive technologies (and their use) and create the EUROPEAN ADAPTIVE TOOL LICENCE targeting students with LSD (age 9-14). Students with SEN (SPECIFIC EDUCATIONAL NEEDS), which include students with Learning Specific Disorders, indeed have a higher probability to leave school prematurely compared to those students without disabilities ((Early School Leaving and Learners with Disabilities and/or Special Educational Needs, European Agency for special needs and inclusive education, 2017). To reach its objective, LEAD! will develop and adapt to distant learning a training course targeting the adaptive technologies which it will adapted to MY SKYLLS PLATFORM. At the end of the learning path, students can award the EUROPEAN ADAPTING TOOL LICENCE which it will support them to ACQUIRE the NECESSARY learning competences and, on the other side, it will be the quality LABEL that it will certify to the teachers that the students are ABLE TO USE THE ADAPTIVE TOOLS AND TECHNOLOGIES.