Best Practice: Strabrecht College

1. Social work experience

When carried out?
Which classes?

In our school four classes participate in the project. All together app. 120 scholars do some kind of social work experience. We divided the whole group of scholars in two groups of sixty. The first 60 scholars work in the project from October till January and the second group from February till May. Each scholar works ten weeks as a volunteer for a non-profit organisation (10 weeks x 2 hours)

Pupils are working as volunteers in non-profit organisations. They work in their spare-time. The children try to be more competent in the following areas: working together, working in a role, taking responsibility, helping other people, taking care for the environment, organising things, standing up for yourself

The project helps children to reflect on their learning process. They see where they are good at and other parts where they can grow. They work in a real-life situation and that makes it more interesting. The report they write afterwards offers a note on there diploma for Dutch language and the work experience also gets a mark on their diploma. Maybe in the future our school will work with portfolios. If a student shows that he/she is capable of something, he can show that with his/her portfolio.

The social work experience is not really related to one subject. It can be part of social studies, work experience in general, learning skills etc. As I told earlier 120 scholars are involved in this project every year and every year we look if it's possible that more scholars from other levels also can participate.

 

 

Evaluation
The scholars were not interested in the beginning, but after a while they like it. Some scholars really learn a lot of their experience. F.e. scholars who worked with patients who have epilepsy or who are disabled. The feedback on their learning from themselves and their coaches is also a good thing of the project. They see where they can improve their skills and where they are good in. It's nice as a young person to hear when you can do something well. We also involved the parents in the project by inviting them before the project started. Because it's in the scholars spare-time it is necessary to explain the goal of the project.
Things to be improved are the communication with the participating organisations. Their goals sometimes are not the same as the school's goals. And if there are 60 scholars doing a project every now and then some things go wrong. It's then good to know that a lot of other students do very well. Always try to be positive because you want to give the scholars a positive experience.

Is this best practice transferable to other schools?

Recommendations: Yes indeed. It's possible. In the Netherlands the new government wants every Dutch scholar to participate in what they call "active citizenship", and a social work experience is a great way to fill that in. What you need is enough working-spots in the neighbourhood. You also need to convince parents, organisations, scholars of the benefit you get from the project.

2. Day of sustainability

All kind of activities were carried out during school year 2006-07 and especially on the 1rst of february 2007

Participants were all the students (about 600) of grade 4, 5 and 6 (age 15 - 18)

The aims of the project:

1. Students and teachers should be conscious of the importance of sustainability;
2. To make clear that this theme has raakvlakken with many easpects of our daily life;
3. To create a large support for this theme;
4. To make clear how our school can give a big support;
5. To show how this theme can be a good start for a reform of education;
6. To give our students the possibilities for creating solutions for this worldwide problem;

On this special day of sustainability (1rst of February) the students could choose different workshops (18 workshops were offered) inside and outside the school. They could also attend a lecture and 2 different film documentaries.
It is important to know that this day is not an isolated activity only organised for our students. For teachers there was a lecture and workshops were organised on another day. The parents board organised a lecture especially for the parents and published an article. Finally: some students have chosen a subject related to sustainability for their final report; they did research on their subjects and presented them.

 

 

Workshop

Evaluation
Many of the aims mentioned above have been realised. However it is important that the attention for sustainability is not an isolated event for one year. We have to think about how to continue this project in the coming years in and outside the school.
At this moment we are creating work groups working on different aspects of sustainability, such as integration of sustainability in the lessons, sustainability in daily school life, etc.

Of course the information about our projects is transferable, but it depends on the situation if the project can be adapted to other schools.

3. Tutor system for students of the 3rd form. (also called Peer Support)

The project is carried out in the school year 2006/07 with the help from LDC, a Dutch institute that helps schools to organize projects.

The project was presented in one class of the 3rd form (Havo 3, middle course class)
The aim of the project was that students of the 3rd form support students from the 1rst form with their own knowledge and experience.
The idea behind is that school has not only to provide a diploma at the end of the school career, but is also responsible for the personnel development of the students.

Research done in several schools worldwide show that there is less bullying is schools with peer support than in schools without.
The students of one class of the 3rd form (H3d) were informed about the project by their class teacher in October 2006. The first option was to start with 10 volunteers, but more than 20 students were interested. They all got a training to coach the pupils of the 1rst form didactically and emotionally.

Not all the students had the required capacities; a problem was also that their class teacher and coach was not always available, due to personal problems.

Evaluation
Not all the aims of the tutor project were reached;

• the class teacher was not able to coach his students during all the year; some students lost their motivation for that reason;
• not all the students had the required capacities for this coaching project..

Conclusion: the project started too ambitious but it is worth to repeat it next school year.

Class teacher and students will get better information and more coaching.

Is this best practice transferable to other schools? The Peer Support project exists in many countries and is supported by educational organizations.

Peer support in Nederland

Website in Dutch