Report on Pilot Experiences in KeyRoma Partner Countries

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication [communication] reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. Project Nº 518536-LLP-1-2011-1-ES-GRUNDTVIG-GMP.

Final report on testing the learning module with the Local Learning Group in all countries in the

framework of “KEYROMA: Develop Key Competences in Social Skills for Roma Women to increase their participation in the service sector”

project

OVERALL REPORT ON PILOT EXPERIENCES IN PARTNER COUNTRIES

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication [communication] reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission

cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. Project Nº 518536-LLP-1-2011-1-ES-GRUNDTVIG-GMP


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INDEX

1. INTRODUCTION...................................................................................................... 2

2. TRAINING SCHEDULES ............................................................................................ 3

3. PARTICIPANTS ........................................................................................................ 4

4. ASSESSMENT OF THE TRAINING: THE POINT OF VIEW OF TRAINEES ...................... 7

Contents .................................................................................................................... 7

Development of training sessions ............................................................................ 12

Suggestions from trainees ....................................................................................... 14

5. ASSESSMENT OF THE TRAINING: THE POINT OF VIEW OF TRAINERS .................... 16

Organization of the course ...................................................................................... 16

Contents .................................................................................................................. 17

General assessment of the group ............................................................................ 19

6. CONCLUSIONS ..................................................................................................... 21


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1. INTRODUCTION

The KeyRoma project aims to provide support to Roma women to develop their transversal communication and social competencies in order to increase their possibilities to access the labour market, in particular the service sector. In each participating country (Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Romania and Spain), project partners carried out pilot experiences with their Local Learning Group members (15-20 Roma women who participated in the project from the beginning) or involving new beneficiaries.

The aim of the pilot experiences consisted in testing the KeyRoma Learning Module, previously elaborated by partners in close collaboration with Roma women, according to the results of the assessment of transversal social and communication competencies of Roma women and the analysis of needs of employers belonging to the service sector.

The two elaborated questionnaires, one addressed to trainees and the other one addressed to trainers, as well as the activity report of each partner country, have been taken into account for analysing the results of the pilot experiences. In the following pages, main conclusions and trainees’ and trainers’ comments have been included in order to give the reader a general overview of the carried out training activity, evaluating the main aspects, such as contents, delivering of training, trainees’ participation, and organization of the course.


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2. TRAINING SCHEDULES

According to the training course methodology, the pilot experience lasted approximately 30 hours: it was up to partners to choose the distribution of hours, as it depended on specific country and trainees’ needs. In particular:

In Spain, the course has been carried out during the period of May-June 2013 in Madrid, throughout 6 sessions of approximately 4 hours each, optimizing training time meanwhile taking advantage of the module and its contents. The total number of trainees who successfully finished the training was 13.

In Romania, meeting trainees’ needs and trying to avoid drop-out rates, it has been organized an intensive training course of 9 sessions, 3-4 hours each, in July 2013. The total number of trainees who successfully completed the training course was 18, coming from the Timisoara area.

In Bulgaria, the pilot course took place in May-June 2013 and was distributed in 14 training sessions, and adapted to touristic sector needs (due to the great demand of labour market of the region of Kameno, where Center Amalipe established a Community Development Center which supported the implementation of the pilot course). The total number of trainees who successfully completed the training course was 15.

In Czech Republic, the training course has been organized in Prague during the period of May-June 2013, distributed in 10 sessions, 3 hours each. The total number of trainees who successfully completed the training course was 20.

In Belgium, due to some technical difficulties and the search of new beneficiaries which took some time, the training course started later than the foreseen project schedule, in September-October 2013, distributed in 7 sessions, 4 hours each. The total number of trainees who successfully completed the training was 6.


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3. PARTICIPANTS

A total of 72 participants successfully completed the training sessions. In the graphic below, they are shown according to their corresponding country:

Source: Trainers’ evaluation questionnaire. Own elaboration.

From the very beginning of the project, the partnership established the Roma women’s profile criteria, who were going to participate in the Local Learning Groups and the training course. Potential participants had to: be older than 16 years and have at least primary school studies, in order to guarantee their writing and reading skills. In all partners’ countries, the abovementioned criteria were met, in particular:

Roma trainees from Spain, aged between 29 – 60 years old, had a low level of social and communication skills, a basic level of education and limited labour resources. Their only labour experience consisted in street selling. They were participating from the beginning of the project activities, but, due to some relatives’ mornings, illnesses and maternity leaves, they could not attend all foreseen training sessions.

Participants from Romania, aged between 17 and 50 years old, had a varied educational background: some of them had a university degree; other participants had a secondary or primary educational level. Concerning their labour experience, most of them have some labour experience in the industry or selling sector. All Roma trainees who participated in the beginning of project activities could not attend all training sessions, due to familiar reasons, tasks or lack of interest.

In Bulgaria, Roma participants aged between 16 and 40 years old had a low educational level and most of them do not have professional experience. Few of them were employed in vegetal plantation or in kitchens, therefore they helped the rest of participants to understand and realize the importance of getting a job. Due to the prior work with the families, participants from Bulgaria did not have serious difficulties during the training, so they were able to attend all training sessions.


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Roma trainees from Czech Republic were aged between 23 and 51 years old, had a low educational level, primary and few had secondary education. Concerning their professional background, most of them have at least one work experience. In the Czech training course, training sessions were carried out in parallel with another project addressed to Roma children: this allowed Roma trainees to easily attend the training sessions meanwhile their children were looked after.

In Belgium, Roma trainees were from Romania and Macedonia, aged between 20 and 33 years old (most of them were under 30 years of age), having a low educational background, mostly primary studies. They have previous labour experience in sales, cleaning or cultural mediation fields. As mentioned above, the Belgian partner dealt with some difficulties to find Roma women interested in attending the course and to avoid drop-out rates during the training sessions.

The graphics below shows trainees’ age distribution according to the age range and partner country: most of trainees were between 30 and 40 years old (totally 35 people from all countries), followed by 27 people between 18 and 30 years old, from Romania, Bulgaria, Czech Republic and Belgium. Only 5 people were between 16 and 18 years old from Romania and Bulgaria, and only 5 people from Czech Republic were more than 40 years old.


Regarding participants’ current labour situation, the graphic below offers a general view: at the time of the course, most of participants were unemployed (81%), and only 19% were employed.


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4. ASSESSMENT OF THE TRAINING: THE POINT OF VIEW OF TRAINEES

In order to analyse trainee’s satisfaction with the training course and its contents, KeyRoma partnership elaborated a questionnaire addressed to Roma participants, in order to evaluate the following aspects: trainees’ expectations with the training course and future benefits after the training, training contents according to the module units and time duration and staff involved in this activity: local coordinators, mediators and job advisors.

In the following pages, a detailed analysis of trainees’ answers is shown per country and topic.

Contents

Concerning trainees’ satisfaction with the training course, the graphic below shows participants’ answers distributed according to the following scale of values: from 1 as not satisfied to 10 as highly satisfied. Most of participants were highly satisfied with the course, rating it as 10 out of 10, above all in Romania (92%), Bulgaria (83%), Czech Republic (87%) and Spain (31%). In other countries, such as Belgium, most of the participants rated it as 8 out of 10 (67%) as well as 31% in Spain. Few participants rated the course as 9 out of 10 in Bulgaria (17%), Belgium (17%) and Romania (8%).

Source: Trainees’ evaluation questionnaire. Own elaboration.

In conclusion, the training course corresponded to trainees’ interests, hopes and first curiosity. They positively evaluated it, in general rating it above 8 out of 10.

Participants of the training course were asked to evaluate the eventual benefits of the Learning Module for their professional future according to the scale of values: from 1 as not beneficial to 10 as highly beneficial. The graphic below shows that most of participants considered the Learning Module as highly beneficial for their professional


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future, in particular Romania (100%), Czech Republic (93%) and Bulgaria (67%). Most of trainees in Belgium considered it as beneficial (60%) whereas in Spain participants’ answers varied more.


In conclusion, the concepts of the modules were able to benefit participants’ professional future, as they generally rated it above 7 out of 10.

Concerning the Learning Module contents, trainees were asked to evaluate each didactic unit and the difficulties they faced to understand or to learn it.

The graphic below shows participants’ answers on Unit 1 “Attitudes”. All Roma women from Spain, Romania and Bulgaria considered the contents as useful (100%), whereas answers of Czech Republic and Belgium varied: respectively, 86 % and 83% of participants considered it as beneficial, and 14% and 17% affirmed the contents were not.



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Trainees underlined the importance and usefulness of Unit 1 for their daily life, professional development and career, above all the attitudes and skills related to being responsible at work.

The level of understanding Unit 1 varies according to partners’ countries:


Those participants who affirmed they faced some difficulties in order to understand/learn Unit 1 specified as main reasons the lack of awareness of that topic, it was the first time they listened about certain contents or they had some problems in understanding it.

Concerning the contents of Unit 2 “Skills”, participants from Bulgaria, Romania and Spain considered them as useful (100%), whereas answers varied in Belgium and Czech Republic, respectively 83% and 50%. Roma women stressed the importance to have multiple skills, to know how to communicate through verbal or non-verbal communication, to manage time and take decisions, for their personal and future professional life.



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Most of participants did not meet any difficulty in understanding or learning Unit 2. In those countries where trainees faced difficulties, the main reason indicated was the difficulty of the topics.


Answers related to Unit 3 “Knowledge” show that most of participants evaluated it as useful, in particular Spain and Romania (100%), Bulgaria (92%), Belgium (83%) and Czech Republic (50%). Participants stressed the importance of knowing how to elaborate a CV and letter of motivation, increasing their possibilities to find a job. In few cases, trainees evaluated Unit 3 as not useful: Czech Republic (50%), Belgium (17%) and Bulgaria (8%).



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Participants’ level of understanding of contents of Unit 3 was good. In the graphic below, the level is shown: most of trainees did not face any difficulty during Unit 3, due to good and clear explanations provided by trainers. Those who had some problems explained the reasons: difficulty of contents and lack of knowledge about them.


Concerning the contents of Unit 4 “Mediation/Information”, they were evaluated as useful in most countries: Spain, Romania and Bulgaria (100%), Belgium (83%) and Czech Republic (62%). Participants appreciated the importance of receiving more information for finding a job, increasing knowledge and accessing to other training courses. Few participants considered this Unit as not useful: Czech Republic (38%) and Belgium (17%).



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Participants’ level of understanding of contents of Unit 4 was good. In the graphic below, the level is shown: most of trainees did not face any difficulty during Unit 4. Those who had some problems were helped by trainers who facilitated them the understanding.


In conclusion, the best evaluated unit was Unit 1 “Attitudes”, as it received only a few bad evaluations (17% from Belgium and 14% from Czech Republic), followed by Unit 4 “Mediation/information”, which was considered as not useful only by 38% in Czech Republic and 17% in Belgium.

Development of training sessions

Concerning the way of delivering the training sessions, all the trainees answered that it was the most suitable way. They appreciated that the training was adapted to their needs and was appropriately delivered and the trainers’ were able to catch trainees’ attention. In this way, Roma women affirmed to have learnt new things about themselves and society, and have also developed new ideas.

Moreover, trainees were asked to evaluate partners’ staff working in delivering the training course: local coordinators, mediators and labour advisors, according to the following set of values: from 1 as they did not have any suitable knowledge to 10 as they had enough knowledge.

Local coordinators were positively evaluated by participants in all partners’ countries: Romania (100%), Belgium (100%), Bulgaria (92%), Czech Republic (86%) and Spain (69%).


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Social Cultural mediators were positively evaluated by trainees in all partners’ countries: Belgium (100%), Spain (92%), Romania (92%), Bulgaria (92%) and Czech Republic (86%), stressing their clarity and patience to deliver training contents.


Labour advisors also were positively evaluated in all partners’ countries: Romania (100%), Bulgaria (100%), Belgium (100%), Czech Republic (93%) and Spain (92%).



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The last question addressed to trainees consisted in evaluating the suitability of the training schedule. Most of participants positively evaluated it: Romania (100%), Bulgaria (100%), Czech Republic (100%), Belgium (50%) and Spain (8%). Those participants from Belgium and Spain, respectively 50% and 92%, who affirmed the training schedule was not suitable, explained they needed more time than 30 training hours, to know more and putting into practice what they learnt in order to reach their labour insertion.


Suggestions from trainees

Regarding suggestions received from participants, they varied according to partners’ countries:

Participants from Spain mainly suggested that the training should include more practical hours to enable going in depth through each unit. This way, trainees could take more advantage of each unit and put into practice what they learned as beneficiaries or transferring the contents to their children who currently are looking for a job.

Trainees from Romania suggested that it could be useful to have smaller groups of 6-10 women, in order to be able to talk about personal issues in a more confidential environment. Another suggestion was to start the training with job searching, showing a video or a case study in order to catch trainees’ interest and increase their motivation.

Roma women from Bulgaria did not have any important recommendation or suggestion: they simply benefited from contents, taking advantage of what they learned about job searching.


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Trainees from Czech Republic suggested introducing more practical sessions in order to support them in the job search process. Moreover, they underlined the importance of starting the training with the topic of self-esteem, as Roma women seemed to lack self-confidence. This should be followed by lessons about job searching, by providing more information about where to find a job offer, and dedicating more time to meetings with employers.

Participants from Belgium suggested adding more time duration to the course, as 30 hours were considered as not enough. More practical sessions and an internship in a company are the main recommendations in order to start overcoming stereotypes and barriers in the labour market.


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5. ASSESSMENT OF THE TRAINING: THE POINT OF VIEW OF TRAINERS

Trainers who participated in the training pilot experience were asked to fill an evaluation questionnaire, assessing the following aspects: organization of the course, module contents and trainees’ group.

Organization of the course

Trainers were asked to assess the different aspects of the course organization: timetables, venue, number of trainees and time duration. In general, all trainers were very satisfied with the organization of the training, which helped to obtain good results.

Concerning the schedule, it has been considered as appropriate by all trainers: it has been adapted to trainees’ needs in an intensive way as the best methodology to obtain better results, especially for keeping trainees’ attention on the Learning Module. In all countries, organizing trainees in small groups ended up being the best way of putting into practice the theory learned and exchanging experiences. In the case of Belgium, the small number of participants caused some limitations to do some group exercises.

Regarding the training venue, partners choose the most appropriate venues for delivering the course, in order to create a safe and intimate atmosphere where participants could share their personal and/or professional experiences, boosting their interaction, organizing small groups of discussion, making exercises in groups and sharing personal experiences.

Moreover, the number of group of participants chosen was also considered as suitable as it allowed trainees to work with the training contents in a comfortable and supportive way, showing their willingness to participate and cooperate with the trainer, feeling free and reassured to share their own experiences.

Finally, in most of the countries, the training time duration was not considered appropriate for this type of training: trainees as well as trainers needed more time in order to go in more depth in some units – such as Unit 3 “Knowledge” -, to put into practice what they learned, accurately prepare a CV and letter of motivation and focus on particular skills. Since the main suggestion given in the evaluation questionnaires was to add more hours to the training, partners proposed to add more hours to the final version of Learning Module, in order to have a total number of 40 training hours.


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Contents

Trainers were asked to evaluate training contents, from a general point of view to the specific one (didactic units). From their evaluation questionnaires, the main conclusions are the following:

The contents of the course met trainees’ needs and hopes: in the beginning of the course, participants were not used to express their expectations, needs and future plans but, throughout the training, they realised that the training contents responded to their needs, and their self-confidence increased. Moreover, the mixture of theoretical and practical sessions helped trainees to better understand the training concepts and practice they learned. In general, trainers suggested adding more practical parts to the Learning Module in order to make more exercises and role playing games.

In general, all trainers positively assessed the usefulness and practical aspects of the Learning Module.

Concerning trainees’ increase of knowledge, trainers from all partners’ countries affirmed that participants could learn important and useful aspects for their personal and professional life. During the development of the training course, trainers noticed for instance that Roma women could understand the importance of communication and cooperation in group in identifying their roles and responsibilities, as well as managing their time, and being punctual, responsible and self-confident. Trainees showed their interest in learning new concepts in order to improve their social and labour situation, by keeping on working on what they learned. In general, all trainers positively assessed participants’ increase of knowledge.

According to the didactic materials, trainers assessed the following:

Unit 1 “Attitudes”

Trainers observed that trainees enjoyed this unit and have been involved from the beginning. Successful stories helped to catch trainees’ attention and motivate them to learn and continue the training, gaining self-esteem, knowledge and skills. Some topics of this didactic unit, such as self-esteem and work life balance were easily understood in some countries, like Bulgaria, Czech Republic, meanwhile responsibility was one of the most difficult topics to understand in countries like Spain, Romania or Czech Republic.

Unit 2 “Skills”

During the delivering of this unit, trainees showed their interest in learning new skills. Topics like time management were generally difficult for Roma women to understand, as they dedicate their time to their families and house management for cultural


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reasons, which in turn, made the concepts of time distribution and management difficult to understand. In general, communication, both verbal and non-verbal, was easily learned by trainees. Non-violent communication was also one of the most valuated aspects of this unit.

Unit 3 “Knowledge”

Although most contents of this unit were unfamiliar to trainees, the practical parts were productive and very useful for their future. Trainees seemed to be enthusiastic to learn how to make a job interview, increasing their self-confidence for a better professional future. Generally, in all countries it was difficult to teach them how to elaborate a CV and motivation letter. In some cases, more training time was needed for comprehension and elaboration of these job tools, like in Belgium and Spain. Moreover, in most countries, trainees’ lack of IT skills made more difficult the delivering of this didactic unit.

Unit 4 “Mediation/Information”

This unit was generally considered as one of the most interesting and useful parts of the Learning Module: all the participants had great desire and eagerness during the delivering of Unit 4. Meetings with employers were considered as very positive as they helped to give trainees a realistic picture of the requirements needed in the service sector and employers’ expectations. Moreover, information about additional vocational training courses was given with the help of labour advisors. Difficulties were met during the job searching in the Internet or newspaper, as it was something new for participants and due to their lack of IT skills, as well as trainees’ difficulty of making future plans.

Unit 5 “Specific parts”

This part of the Learning Module responds to specific training needs in partners’ countries: working with families in Bulgaria, migrants’ rights in Belgium and non-violent communication in Romania. Non-specific parts were implemented in Spain and Czech Republic.

No difficulties were met in delivering this didactic unit in the 3 partners’ countries:

- In the case of Romania, participants learnt techniques to react to violent verbal aggressions and some peaceful resources to solve some conflictive situations;

- In the case of Bulgaria, an intensive work with families was done and it was considered as useful for trainees: several visits took place in order to explain to families the importance of attending the course;

- In the case of Belgium, most of trainees were aware of their rights as migrants due to their own or relatives’ experiences. The relevance of the notion of social


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security within the migrants’ right document (used as the learning tool during the training) was somehow difficult for trainees to comprehend, as most of the participants were not aware of social security in their countries of origin.

General assessment of the group

Trainers were asked to evaluate the group of participants according to the set of valued from 1: very bad to 5: very good, in particular their level of participation both in group and individual activities, ability of fitness to group characteristics and the climate created for boosting learning and participation.

Concerning trainees’ level of participation, trainers evaluated well this aspect of participants. The graphic below shows that in most of the countries trainees’ participation was very well evaluated like in Czech Republic or well evaluated in Spain, Romania, Bulgaria and Belgium.


Concerning trainees’ personal participation, trainers evaluated it well. The participation level was high in all countries; trainees were very active and willing to keep on learning, even if they did not attend all training sessions. In countries like Spain, Romania and Belgium, it was well assessed, meanwhile in Bulgaria and Czech Republic it was very well assessed.


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Suggestions by trainers

Among the suggestions made by trainers, the most relevant and common ones in all partners’ countries are the following:

• Making the module more practical, starting with the topic of self-esteem as Roma women are not very self-confident and they should work on this aspect in order to be motivated for continuing the training course.

• Extend the training length by adding more hours for practical exercises and to go more in-depth through the training units, so trainees can benefit more from it.


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6. CONCLUSIONS

The KeyRoma training course was successfully implemented in all partners’ countries, achieving good results. Participants showed a high level of interest, motivation and participation in all training sessions. They considered the Learning Module as an effective and suitable way for searching for a job. They increased their self-esteem and motivation, feeling that they are able to achieve goals, and giving them courage to face any difficulty they could have when looking for a job. Moreover, they acquired the ability to make future plans, to make decisions in groups, to cooperate and support each other and to apply theoretical contents to their daily life.

The pilot training course has demonstrated that the used methodology, as well as the additional activities carried out by partners, trainers, mediators and labour advisors (working with families, increasing motivation to attend the course, giving individual training and labour orientation, etc.) seemed to be the most appropriate in order to develop or increase Roma women’s social and communication skills needed for their social and labour integration in the partners’ countries.

It is recommended to take into account the difficulties partners’ faced in their countries in order to complete the training process, such as technical difficulties or trainees’ drop out, when delivering this Learning Module.

The KeyRoma Learning Module can be used as an independent and single course, but can also be used as a complementary module with other training courses. That is, it can be delivered within other courses in which Roma women participate, in order to support the final aim of the vocational training: increase their access into employment. The KeyRoma learning module will boost their social and labour integration, helping to overcome stereotypes and barriers still present in the labour market.

After successfully testing the Learning Module, the KeyRoma partnership realised, that it can be used for other vulnerable groups, provided that the methodology and contents of the module have to be adapted to the specific needs of the group and country situation.

It can be concluded that the Learning Module has met the needs of the Roma women, as the pilot experiences results and the successful implementation of the training courses held in all participating countries showed.

Report on Pilot Experiences in KeyRoma Partner Countries

Education

Transcript of Report on Pilot Experiences in KeyRoma Partner Countries