Held between 1-4 July 2023, and initiated by an eTwinning school 2023-2024 – Liceul Teoretic ”Radu Vlădescu”, located in Pătârlagele town, Buzău county, the second edition of the Summer School was, above all, a long-awaited opportunity to meet some of the most urgent educational needs identified within our school community.
The Summer School project, one of the main results of the organisational partnership between Liceul Teoretic „Radu Vlădescu” and Asociația Profesională Profesori pentru Comunitate, was planned and implemented with two categories of beneficiaries in mind. The first project participants were some of the most vulnerable community members (pupils with special educational needs integrated in mainstream education, children from single-parent families, children in foster care, children from poor, isolated communities or whose parents are abroad for work etc.) and faced both learning and social integration difficulties during the 2022-2023 school year, while the second group consisted of gifted pupils, capable of achieving a higher level of performance than their peers, learners with outstanding results in school competitions, olympiads and extracurricular contests, whose potential was not fully exploited during the previous school year, and who had both the willingness and the ability to get involved in mutual learning or learning through teaching activities during the summer holiday.
The 2023 edition of the Summer School was, therefore, an attractive and effective alternative for the personal development of the participants and the improvement of their future academic performance, testing and showcasing several methods of preventing and reducing absenteeism and failure through non-formal activities facilitating the processes of school inclusion and language remediation and communication, with a positive impact on the school and social integration of 18 children enrolled in lower secondary education.
The fun icebreakers and team-building games, highly collaborative communication and creativity workshops and transdisciplinary competitions contributed to the improvement of the participants’ linguistic, digital and artistic skills, developing their personal, social and learning to learn competences as well as their teamwork skills, which led to an increase in their school motivation, well-being and self-confidence and self-esteem levels. Additionally, the project facilitated the promotion of the school-community partnership and that of a culture of parental trust, involvement and collaboration for the fulfilment of common goals and mutual support for future curricular and extracurricular activities.
The main aim of the project ”Summer School 2023” was to stimulate the voluntary participation of lower secondary pupils from vulnerable categories, with learning difficulties or special educational needs, supported by their colleagues and teachers, in indoor and outdoor recreational and educational activities. The initiative was also meant to raise awareness of the importance of education and the role of the community in the personal development and the achievement of individual potential, both among pupils at risk and in the case of those capable of performance.
With the help of the personalised, student-centered activities all the initial objectives of the project were reached. What is more, some pupils succeeded in discovering their talents and abilities while others asserted themselves with optimism and confidence in their own strengths, through leadership, cooperation, critical and creative thinking, resilience etc.
The second edition of the Summer School also had a positive influence on the management, administrative and teaching staff at Liceul Teoretic „Radu Vlădescu”, the project implementation team sharing innovative pedagogical experiences and their best practices with the extended community, all these contributing to the building of institutional and organisational capacity.
The project evaluation was carried out through the participants’ daily feedback, during the student presentations and art exhibitions held at the end of the collaborative activities, with the help of a virtual portfolio of digital photos and videoclips, and the certificates and diplomas awarded for special contributions and results obtained by the pupils working both individually and in pairs or teams. The dissemination of the project results was achieved through multimedia presentations of the project activities, posts on blogs, social media etc.
As far as the sustainability of the project is concerned, the positive feedback from the participants and, hopefully, the favorable opinions of their parents and tutors will have a crucial role in the decision-making process regarding the existence of a future edition of the Summer School. We also hope that not only the teachers’ enthusiasm and professionalism, but also the volunteers’ commitment and dedication will inspire other school communities to follow our example and prove that education can happen anytime, anywhere, anyhow as long as there is a desire to learn and to grow.