DEVELOPING TOLERANCE AND MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING IN EUROPE

Students and teachers have been the big focal points of this project, and the key point to get our goals has been the idea of Coexistence or Teambuilding. We have been able to prove and verify that a peaceful coexistence fosters a climate of good attitude for learning. The primary target group for this project has been the students at the participating schools. Questionnaires on selected topics were given to the students .It was the starting point to work out our activities in the different meetings. These surveys showed that students often lacked motivation as far as learning for school subjects was concerned. They missed the reference to real life. This led to frustration and therefore poor achievement and increased dropout of school. From the beginning our project has wanted the students to apply their theoretical school knowledge to practical work to investigate and find new innovative solutions to the challenges concerning the issues of this project .Beside the students, the project has inspired teachers to new approaches in teaching, as well as it has included local organisations relevant to the project. We can also mention that our project has had profound effect on our community and society, implying the local and regional Institutions, trying to match the objectives of our project with the implementation of the Europe 2020 strategy for growth, jobs, social equity and inclusion.There is a crisis of European values and coherence facing internal and external challenges. The increase in number of immigrants across the borders and into Europe stresses the social and economic structures in the European countries. European laws instruct countries for differentiation in responsibility and actions concerning the immigrants, depending on their geographical location. The European community is challenged by these expectations of each country to take a proper responsibility. We have also studied in depth the immigration policies in every participating country. In this project, the causes of the increased immigration into Europe have been investigated, as well as the effects in Europe, both on a local, national and European level. This issue has been investigated by the following actions;- Historical perspectives on immigration and emigration into and out of Europe.- How has the European Union differentiated between the European countries, concerning guardian of the European borders?- Investigating which approaches the northern European countries takes, concerning the distribution of the immigrants, compared to the other European countries. –We have been able to see how the increased number of refugees has affected the local society, the teaching and the increased number of multilinguistic students in the classes. By carrying out this project as a transnational project, we have improved the level of learning and usage of foreign languages, especially English, and we have studied in depth the knowledge and respect for our different cultures placing more emphasis on what unites us rather than what separates us. Communication between students and teachers from the participating schools has been done by using the new technologies which in order to achieve our objectives we have included initiatives such as: Workshops on improving teambuilding, avoiding bullying and cyberbullying, fostering ethical values and civic behaviour. We have also used new Technologies and have considered the responsable use of ITCs. All these activities have been carried out in a suitable atmosphere of exchanging meetings and experiences among different departments, different subjects and different methodologies. Taking into account that there has been a close and long school collaboration among these six countries on international projects, we have proved that, as we expected, we have emphasized these:The students understanding of what it means to be a European citizen , and which expectations are related to this title. We wanted the students to improve their ability to pursue knowledge and solutions to difficult issues. Within the group of schools participating in this project, we will continue the effort to find sustainable solutions to the challenges that may not have disappeared after this project and we would like to go on finding new methods to tackling new challenges uncovered by this project. .- Improving TEAMBUILDING in our schools, through peer support..- Improving and increasing MOTIVATION among our students and teachers.- Overcoming and reducing the digital gap between teachers and students..- Improving our students results by improving the teaching and learning process strategies. Keeping relationship between partners through participation in more European projects.Organizations : six high schools. Main activities carried out: In the four mobilities, there has always been a number of warm up activities, because it's very important for the students to know each other very well.