“E.A.S.Y. LAB. - Entrepreneurship And Self-emploYment by real experiences in LABour market” has allowed 60 young graduates residing in Basilicata Region to carry out a 4 month training period abroad in the sectors of food and wine, tourism and hotel hospitality (20 in France, 20 in Spain and 20 in the United Kingdom). The project, raising from the cooperation among the members of the National Consortium led by EuForMed Srls, aimed at promoting employment and entrepreneurship in the strongest sectors of regional economy, supporting a development model that was able to respect its economic-productive vocation.The objectives of the project regarded the beneficiaries and partners’ perspectives of development, can be considered widely achieved in consideration of the following analysis:-the greater knowledge of job opportunities coming from tourism and food and wine industry has been achieved not only by the realization of the 60 mobility programs abroad but also through the information and dissemination actions implemented by the members of the Consortium;-the increase of hard skills in the project sectors involved the 60 participants who, through their work experience abroad, were able to acquire, in accordance with the Regional Framework of Qualifications, knowledge and skills associated with specific units of expertise;-the development of interpersonal, communicative, organizational and management skills of the participants who, thanks to the mobility experience, have been able to acquire a great deal of information on the culture and economy of the host country, as well as on the modalities of interaction within a professional context;-the development of the skills recognition systems was prompted by the use of the Europass and ECVET tools. Albeit without having an operative recognition system at regional level, the need to certify the experiences abroad has allowed the Consortium members to acquire a methodology that will facilitate a wider use of the European certification and validation systems.The National Consortium and the individual members have been able to reach objectives that concerned a better knowledge of the professional figures and related competences of the tourism and food and wine sector; the strengthening of language skills; the empowerment of transnational cooperation tools necessary to increase European mobility; the enhancement of the link between school/training and productive sectors.The project has reached impacts on the beneficiaries and the organizations involved, as well as at local, national and European level. With reference to the participants, some of the impacts could be observed immediately at the end of the mobility period:-achievement of a greater awareness of their professional opportunities (100% of the participants);-acquisition of professional skills related to their field of study (88% of participants);-acquisition of soft skills related to the ability to work responsibly and professionally (100% of participants);-strengthening of foreign language skills (95% of participants).The impacts on the participants’ competences and the support action carried out by EuForMed and the partner organizations are also producing positive impacts on the participants’ employment opportunities. EuForMed has already been able to assess that the 32% of the participants received a job offer from foreign companies (against the initial expectation of 10%).Furthermore, the project action represented an important tool for consolidating collaborations within the Consortium and with foreign partners, responding to the internationalization need that was at the basis of the project action. Through the development and sharing of collaborative skills/competences within the partnership there have been impacts on the capacity of management and coordination of joint activities and projects, including future ones. Thanks to the skills acquired, the Consortium has been creating the conditions to act at regional level by proposing a training and employment strategy meeting the specifics needs of the labour market.

Background and objectivesThe Childcare and Education department (BUF) of Eskilstuna Municipality, Sweden, and its upper secondary schools have the ambition to constantly develop and improve education. Within vocational programs, there is a desire to make the programs more attractive, as Eskilstuna has a great need for qualified labor in the vocational fields. The municipality is struggling with youth unemployment, and it is important that youth complete their education at upper secondary school to be able to get a job and / or continue their studies at university. As the labor market becomes increasingly global, young people also need good language skills. Furthermore, Eskilstuna is a multicultural town. The consortium has a need to constantly work to increase tolerance and understanding for other people and cultures. During 2018-2021, the Childcare and Education department in Eskilstuna had a consortium project within Erasmus + KA1 VET, with internships and job shadowing activities. The consortium consisted of the upper secondary schools Rekarnegymnasiet, Rinmangymnasiet, S: t Eskils gymnasium and BUF's administration office which was the coordinator. Based on the needs of the municipality (above) , the consortium had the following objectives:1. Make vocational education more attractive by offering internships abroad for students2. Internships would lead to great personal development of the students, which in turn would motivate them to complete their education, make them better equipped for the labor market and make it easier for them to get a job.3. Increase the language skills of the students4. Increase students' tolerance and understanding of other people and cultures5. For the teachers doing job shadowing activities: See new influences in pedagogy and didactics, be able to discuss syllabi and lesson content with colleagues in another country to develop the program, improve their language skills and develop international cooperation.ActivitiesThe activities consisted of internships abroad for 64 students from the vocational programs Hotel / Tourism, Hairdresser, Childcare, Healthcare, Restaurant , Business / Administration, Vehicles / Transport and the introductory programs IM / Construction / Vehicles. The students did internships for 2-5 weeks at our partner organizations in Germany, France, Spain, Poland, Malta and the UK. In addition, three teachers from the Vehicle / Transport program participated in job shadowing activities in France. Originally our plan was to have many more students and teachers participate, but due to the Corona situation and Brexit, among other things, it did not work out.ResultsOne of our objectives was to make vocational education more attractive. Because so many factors are involved when choosing an upper secondary program, it is difficult to say how much the internships abroad affect the choice, especially during a pandemic when nobody could travel. When comparing the numbers of 2018 with those of 2021, we see that there is no difference. Both years, 37% of the students started a vocational program and 61% started a college preparatory one. The students developed greatly on a personal level. In the evaluations, they expressed that they had gained self-confidence, courage and problem-solving ability, as well as developed their sense of responsibility and their ability to adapt to new situations. All of these abilities play a major role in completing studies and being better prepared for the labor market, having a greater opportunity to get a job and daring to take the step of looking for work elsewhere if necessary.A majority of the students also developed their language skills and thought that they had become more fluent in English. During their internship abroad, the students experienced a different culture and met people from a different background. An overwhelming majority of students expressed that they had become more tolerant of other people's values and behavior and had become better at collaborating with people from another culture.The teachers who job-shadowed colleagues in France learned a lot about what the French vocational training in vehicles / transport was like. They could compare the programs and observe how the subjects were taught. They got ideas about how they could develop their own teaching. The teachers also visited companies where students did their internships and got an insight into how internships were organized. The teachers' language skills improved and they also learned a lot about French culture. During the school year, the collaboration developed so that teachers and students from the French school came here for job shadowing and internships.During this project period, the vocational programs have expanded their international contacts overall. Collaboration regarding internships, job shadowing and teaching have begun, which is promising for our future projects.

F.O.O.D. AND. W.IN.E. – Fitting cOoking Offer and DemAND Working IN Europe”is created to help new graduates from Calabria Region to enter the labour market and and to be successful in the gourmet kitchen. The projects also aim at increasing the knowledge of food products from the Calabria region (it has 207 typical products but only a few are known abroad). A young guy, who wishes to be successful in food and beverage sector, should have these following features: practical and teorical knowledge; specialization on a specific field, quantity and quality of international experiences, flexibility in working contexts, good ability to communicate their professionalism to the end user. At the same time, the food and wine sector represents a field with very important employment opportunities. Restaurant sector needs professional figures and not only chefs or attendants but also people with a deep knowledge of digitalization that can help in the promotion of dishes also using the tecnique of storytelling describing it and producting emotions between clients also before the tasting. F.O.O.D. AND. W.IN.E. will allow the mobility to 100 new graduates from school years 2017/18 and 2018/19 from food and wine, tourism and marketing schools of Calabria Region, which will have the opportunity to carry out a period of training of 120 days (plus two traveling ones ) in United Kingdom, France, Belgium and Malta, will get trained in one of the following professional figures: kitchen attendant; restaurant operator; waiter; sommelier, and Expert in food and wine communication. The project will have a positive impact on the participants, on the National Consortium and on the European partners. The learners, at the end of the mobility, will have increased their professionalism, both in terms of language skills, in disciplinary sector (related to the food and wine, tourism and marketing sectors) and personal development. They will increase their employment potential, the project plans that the 25% of participants will find work in Italy returning from the mobility experience and 15% in the country where they will have completed the Erasmus + experience. For the Consortium, the mobility action will be an important opportunity for enhancing and improving staff skills and the ability to communicate and maintain constructive dialogue with organizations of a different nature. The international comparison, in fact, will allow the staff to know different company and association structures and to better understand global trends in the restaurant sector. All this will increase the knowledge of company needs in personnel, translating into the opportunity to develop training programs more in line with what is required by the employment market. The project will have a positive impact on companies that from medium to long term will have more qualified personnel, no longer being forced to hire certified staff, ready to change jobs in the face of better contractual conditions. The greater availability of professionals (also trained on the use of digital tools for promotional purposes), moreover, will result in a greater ability of companies to use storytelling techniques, to tell the experience of a dish even before tasting it. This will increase the online visibility of companies according to the 5% , favoring the arrival of new customers and tourists (mainly tourists interested in the food and wine sector and wishing to visit villages and little-known villages, but still linked to the culinary traditions of the past). Through F.O.O.D. AND. W.IN.E, moreover, the participants will be able to increase the knowledge abroad of some Calabrian food and wine products. Finally, at a European level, the project will contribute to consolidating the efforts undertaken in the political arena for the recognition and validation of professional qualifications, making it increasingly easier for those who want to leave their country of origin to move to a different member state in search of employment opportunities..

Internationalization is very important for the municipality of Eskilstuna, Sweden, and its schools. For many years we have sent students abroad for vocational training with very good results and our intention is to continue this work in 2016-2018 so that more students are able to participate. The consortium, which consists of the Childcare and Education department and the schools Rekarnegymnasiet, Rinmangymnasiet and St Eskils gymnasium, currently has an Erasmus+ KA1 VET project which will end in June, 2016. We intend to continue the collaboration that we have with our partners from that project and also add some new ones. The number of participating students in our new project will be increased from 72 to 104 and they are in vocational programs within the fields of Restaurant, Trade and administration, Building, Mechanics, Childcare, Nursing and health care, Hairdressing and Hotel /Tourism. These students will do vocational training at our partner organizations in Germany, Great Britain, France, Spain, Luxemburg and Malta for 2-5 weeks. Furthermore, five teachers from the programs Hairdressing and Hotel/Tourism will do job shadowing in Great Britain and the Netherlands. The municipality of Eskilstuna, like many other municipalities in Sweden, struggles with a decreasing number of students applying for vocational programs, a high number of students who do not finish their education, high youth unemployment and also increasing problems of racism and hostility towards immigrants. The consortium needs to offer high quality vocational programs, prevent drop-outs and also increase the knowledge of languages and trade related subjects among the students. Moreover, the students’ personal development is important in terms of self-confidence, intercultural understanding and tolerance of others. Vocational training abroad and the international dimension that it offers, can contribute a lot in these areas and lead to a better future for many people. Vocational training abroad gives the students experiences out of the ordinary and makes the vocational programs more interesting and appealing. It gives the students more knowledge within the field, they get to experience different kinds of techniques and ways of doing things and also different ways of thinking. The job shadowing in the Hairdressing and Hotel/Tourism programs will add positive aspects to the programs, with new ideas and also a collaborative project between the different schools including the vocational subjects and English. This international dimension will be positive for the students and increase their knowledge in these subjects. The vocational training leads to great personal development for the students in terms of self-confidence, the ability to communicate in a different language (especially English), having more faith in their abilities and a greater courage. Being able to spend time in a foreign country without one’s family is a big step to take and contributes a lot to the students’ self-confidence and the feeling of having had the courage and succeeded. It can inspire students who are at risk of not completing their education to actually find the strength to do so. Vocational training abroad can also make it easier for student to find employment . In combination with a greater self-confidence and better knowledge of the field, the increased knowledge of foreign languages can make the students more employable. These students will be important in a job market which is becoming more and more global. We believe that these students can inspire others to find the courage and perhaps look for employment elsewhere, since unemployment is very high in Eskilstuna. During the training abroad the students get to experience a different culture than their own. They meet people of different backgrounds, and get a better understanding for intercultural differences. Since they have to speak a foreign language, they will better understand the difficulties that this can mean when somebody is trying to make him- or herself understood in a language that is not his or her own. We hope for positive effects of dissemination when students share their experiences with friends or classmates, and that this will create a better understanding for, and acceptance of, newly arrived asylum seeking students and other immigrants. This is very important to prevent segregation and racism.