Not in Education, Employment or Training – a challenge for Europe

Prevention of young people in schools to become NEETs

The Strategic Framework for Education and Training (ET 2020) for Europe has at its core the important target of reducing the number of young people leaving school early that become Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET). According to the EU statistics about young people and NEETs, European countries face similar problems related to the youth’s disengagement from education, labour market and from society. In 2011, 14 million young people 18-29 years in Europe were NEET. This 3-year project aims at finding solutions in educational settings to prevent young people to become NEETs in four European countries UK/Wales, Romania, Sweden and Finland. In all four countries, the state of young people at risk of exclusion from education due to social disadvantages is a problem. A radical new approach is required to create longer-term solutions.

This project aims to look at the causes, influences and barriers to education that result in many young people becoming NEET. The many strands to this project aim strategically to explore what viable alternatives there are nationally and internationally to traditional learning models that contribute to the challenge faced by many young people in both the primary and secondary sector but also to the parenting behind these young people.

The project will focus on engagement with schools, pupils, their families and local organisations working at grass roots to support pupils and their families to explore how collaboratively we can support pupils to remain in school/educational setting. We will also work with local businesses to scope how we can support young people of work through better work experience models.

Juvenia Centre of Youth Research and Development conducts a “state of the art” report on NEET young people in Europe and the interventions to prevent their exclusion in the levels of policy and practice in European countries. Juvenia also participates in the process of designing guidelines for interventions in schools in order to support young people not to become NEETs.