According to a report published by the European Commission (EC), Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion, a strong political consensus has emerged in Europe on the importance of inclusive education, and ensuring children with Special Educational Needs (SEN) are included within mainstream education. The report goes on concluding that mutual learning and the sharing of best practice on the provision of support for children with SEN are lacking at the European level.
It is worth mentioning, that official statistics in Europe suggest that at least 15.4% of the school population have a special educational need which is defined as ‘any learning difficulty or disability that make it harder for someone to learn than most other children and young people of about the same age’. These so called ‘Barriers to learning’ range from Severe and Complex learning difficulties at the low end of the spectrum to Giftedness at the high end of the spectrum. Between these two extremes will be a range of more specific learning difficulties which include Dyslexia, Dyspraxia (DCD), Dyscalculia, ADD and ADHD; conditions nowadays common in our homes and classrooms. An ever increasing number of children and young people will have special educational needs of some kind during their education.
On the other hand, in the current economic climate of high unemployment, particularly amongst young people, National governments as well as the European Union are looking to strengthen entrepreneurial skills as a means of creating wealth and employment; the importance of entrepreneurship has been emphasized in the Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan, (2013), which identified entrepreneurial education as a key area for immediate intervention.
However, although entrepreneurship is at the stage of being embedded in the education curricula of many European countries, no comprehensive study or effort has been made in order to establish the necessary changes in methodology & learning style as well as educational aids that mainstream education should use in order to teach entrepreneurship to pupils with Special Educational Needs (SEN). That means, a school population of more than 15% may not get all the benefits of entrepreneurship being taught in a mainstream educational environment, which does not take into consideration the learning styles and process of information of young people/youths with SEN. Interestingly enough, pupils/youths with SEN often exhibit high IQ as well as specific competences & skills which are necessary for successful entrepreneurs, such as high creativity, problem solving, among others.
‘Empowering young adult learners with Special Educational Needs’ (SENpower) project aims to bridge this gap by empowering a significant and even increasing percentage of youths with Special Educational Needs (SEN) by bringing the concept of entrepreneurship closer to young adult & VET learners with SEN. In other words, SEN young adults will be empowered with new skills and competences and this, in turn, will have a significant impact when it comes to active citizenship for these young people.
The objectives of SENpower can be summarised as follows:
- ‘Extending and Developing educators’ competences’
- ‘Improving and extending the supply of high quality learning opportunities tailored to the needs of individuals’
- ‘Social inclusion’ of young adult & VET learners with SEN
- ‘Promotion of entrepreneurship education and social entrepreneurship
Six (6) important Intellectual Outputs will be developed during the implementation period of the ‘SENpower’ project, namely, the ‘Entrepreneurship Education and Development Guide for SEN pupils’ as well as a series of training manuals, covering the most important aspects of entrepreneurship, tailor made youths with SEN. ‘SENpower’ experts & professionals will employ various methods in the development of the intellectual outputs; these methods will include surveys/questionnaires, focus groups, substantial amount of research in the relevant fields of study & web analytics, among others.
The dissemination of the project will be based on a series of activities, the most important of which are the two (2) conferences and the training workshops/courses, which will be based on the training manuals developed within the ‘SENpower’ project. Moreover, a web portal and virtual support centre will be developed which aims to be the main information hub and a forum of all those stakeholders, experts, SEN youths and for all those with genuine interest to the outcomes of this important project.
‘SENpower’ project aims to have a significant impact at National & European levels by promoting/empowering specific horizontal EU/Erasmus+ priorities, such as ‘Inclusive education, training and youth’, while, at the same time, addressing specific policy priorities for youth, such as the promotion of entrepreneurship education, empowerment and active citizenship of young people.
If you have any questions regarding the project, please contact us by e-mail projects projects@inovacijubiuras.lt
