EUKN - Netherlands - Collaborative care provision

Collaborative care provision

Introduction

The aim of the project is to create the conditions in which young people can reach the most achievable and suitable educational qualifications and position in the labour market.

Problem

How can the educational and labour market position of school dropouts be improved?
The aim of the project is to create the conditions in which young people can reach the most achievable and suitable educational qualifications and position in the labour market. Where they do drop out, they must be encouraged to return to school or be steered into employment combined with training.

Description

The reasons why young people leave school early are well known:

the attraction of labour market for young people who are insufficiently motivated to stay in education;
inadequate coordination between the various forms of education on offer;
inadequate coordination between care demand and care supply, and the care structure in schools in general.

The aim of the project is to create the conditions in which young people can reach the most achievable and suitable educational qualifications and position in the labour market. Where they do drop out, they must be encouraged to return to school or be steered into employment combined with training.

Approach

There are four main prongs to the approach:

coordination of care supply and demand;
strengthening the care structure;
strengthening the supply of education;
supervision and guidance in an out of school setting.

Based on the above four prongs, a system of provisions has been set up in collaboration with schools and education experts. In the case of the coordination of care supply and demand, this is the Loket Leerlingzaken (" student affairs desk"), which is unique to the Helmond approach. If school care teams are unable to match the supply of and demand for care within a school, the student affairs desk looks for a solution. Requests for assistance range from entry applications for practical training through extra tuition, mediation in a return to school or transfer to another school, to placement on a school leaver programme.

Results

The Marshalling Yard is meeting a need. Between six and seven hundred young people annually are tested for their care needs and referred on if necessary. Supervision and referral leads to reduced unemployment, better qualified young people and an almost complete elimination of the problem of young people roaming the streets. Almost all school pupils in the region are covered. A side benefit is improved collaboration within the network, with network partners collectively setting annual targets.

Learning experiences

The project has provided a number of useful learning experiences:

accept cultural and perception differences and aim for the entire target group;
invest in collaboration between teachers and youth services
central municipalities (in this case Helmond) must continue to involve neighbourhood communities in the project;
policy-based changes must lead to concrete working practices as soon as possible.

Resources used

In 2002-3 the Marshalling Yard project is estimated to have cost EUR 2.6m. For the Urban Policy period 2002-3 Helmond will receive a total of EUR 1.2m, other costs being covered by annual contributions from the partners, including Provincial funding for school social work and input from schools and youth services organisations.

Contact info

City of Helmond, tel. +31 49 2587136

Project start date

05/08/2003

Links

City of Helmond

Document type

case

Themes

Urban Policy > Social inclusion & integration > Integration of social groups

Keywords

Young people