Inclusion of Migrants by Qualified Occupation in the Tourism industry

<< Background >>The tourism industry is an important and rapidly growing economic sector in the member countries. Following the recovery from the consequences of the COVID pandemic, this industry opens up significant opportunities for migrants to enter the labour market. It is therefore the sector of the economy that generally has the highest proportion of migrant employees (in Germany approx. 35%). The greater the importance of tourism in the economy, the higher the proportion of migrants. Although individual employment histories vary greatly, it can be stated that many migrant employees work in precarious conditions. At the same time, the precarious employment of migrants does not reduce the growing problem of skilled labour in the sector. The project set itself the goal of finding out how the (primarily in-service) qualification of migrant employees can contribute to improved working and payment conditions and at the same time help to reduce the shortage of skilled labour. The project focussed on improving the language skills of migrant employees, particularly in English, and the strong practical relevance and applicability of the language skills. The planned project results are assigned to this objective.<< Objectives >>The starting point of this project is the key issue of improvement of technical knowledge and skills of migrant labour force, in particular English language skills. This project considers that, by receiving practical training in in English, the job prospects in the tourism industry of the migrants will be improved.In order to achieve this, a specific training methodology will be provided. This methodology, the CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning), proposes a more effective way of learning for students, since it focuses on the development of the necessary skills to integrate functional and communicative English in day-to-day life.The concrete objectives of this project are:•Developing training materials for adult language educators based on the CLIL methodology applied to the tourism sector.•Based on the on deeper cooperation with stake holders during and after project time, developing a synergy between the tourism industry, adult training centres and migrants.•Encourage stakeholders to offer tailor made up-skilling opportunities to migrants in order to enhance their opportunities in the tourism job market and by this way facilitating the social inclusion of migrants in their host countries/societies.<< Implementation >>Numerous activities were implemented by the INCLUDMI partnership in line with the original planning and some additional measures were also carried out. For reporting purposes, these can be summarised in three categories:a) Work on the planned project outcomes;b) Public relations/dissemination work; c) Project management.a) In accordance with the project planning, two project results are planned, which build on each other in terms of content and are to be developed in chronological order. Already during the kick-off meeting (April 2022), concrete measures and tasks were decided in order to minimise the time delay in the development of Project Result 1 CLIL Methodological and Resource Guide for Adult Language Trainers and to start working on this result immediately (according to the planning, work on Project Result 2 Methodological Guide for Training Organizations and Employers of Migrants started in January 2023. Project Result 1 CLIL Methodological and Resource Guide for Adult Language Trainers Under the leadership of the Maltese partner, project result was developed involving each partner to achieve the assigned tasks. The handbook with methodological guidelines/advices and English teaching examples (related to 12 occupational fields/activities in the tourism industry with 4 lesson examples in each field), is targeted to support vocational English lessons for trainees in the hotel and catering industry with a migration or refugee biography. The methodological guidelines/advices in the handbook are translated into the languages of the project partners (French, German, Maltese, Spanish and Turkish). The entire text is made available electronically to the general public. The teaching examples used in the handbook are related to typical situations in different occupational fields in the hotel and catering industry. Twelve occupational fields were defined, each partner assuming responsibility for two occupational fields (with four English language lessons). To develop the lesson examples each partner hold meetings with stakeholders from the tourism industry or partnering businesses in order to improve practice orientation and relevance as well topicality. Simultaneously, the participants of that meetings met the challenge to select those situations in which frequently migrants will be faced with a series of potential cultural misunderstandings or uncertainties in dealing with cultural differences. In addition, the employees involved had to ensure that situations were selected that probably could occur in all partner countries. The specific selection and the didactic preparation or design of the individual teaching examples also had to take into account the fact that the trainees are very often in a situation in which they are learning English as a professional language, as a third or fourth language, more or less in parallel to learning the respective host language of the partner country.For each lesson example at least two meetings were organised. Once elaborated the lessons examples, the partner directly involved in vocational training (French, Maltese and Turkish partner) did different test of the elaborated pedagogical materials in classrooms. The leading organisation provided a template for the didactic and methodological preparation of these lesson example to elaborate, which was used by all partners. All agreed teaching examples were handed over to the Maltese partner by 15 October 2022 for further careful content control and editing. After the work on the draft of project result 1 the translation of the introduction was completed on time by February 2023. In order to train the project partners, the Maltese partner organised an LTTA on the methodological principles and application of Content and Language Integrated Learning - CLIL. In the period from 20 to 22 June 2022, 15 employees from Germany, France, Austria, Spain and Turkey, in addition to the Maltese colleagues present, received further training on this particularly effective method in language teaching. In the organised presentations by Maltese teachers and the lesson observations, the participants were able to see for themselves the advantages of this method, especially for teaching migrants. Over the course of the three days, there was a lively professional exchange, which noticeably fertilised the work on Project Result 1. Project Result 2 Methodological Guide for Training Organizations and Employers of MigrantsProject Result 2 aims to strengthen the networking of stakeholders and, in particular, to improve cooperation between companies and training institutions in order to ensure the practical relevance of the training and readiness to apply the language skills acquired in view of the rapidly changing working conditions in the tourism industry.The implementing partners had stipulated that at least six interviews or discussion rounds would be held with companies in the tourism industry from the local or regional environment in order to determine the specific needs with regard to the language skills of potential employees and, in particular, migrant employees. These discussions were held by all partners in spring 2023. Approximately 71% of the participants were representatives of the catering industry and 29% of the participants represented hotel businesses. Almost 65% already employed migrants in their respective companies. 30 % intend to employ migrants in the near future and only for a small group is the employment of migrants currently not an option. The interviews followed a guideline provided by the Spanish partner. Regardless of the individuality of the consultations, it can be summarised as follows: •Approximately two thirds confirm that knowledge of English is an advantage in the service sector; •the majority are in favour of practical, job-related language training and are dissatisfied with the current situation; •the majority are in favour of making greater use of the advantages of short qualification courses (including part-time courses);•the majority are in favour of closer relationships/networking with training institutions and are in favour of work immersion or job shadowing programmes.Project Result 2 is a guide to the development of networking structures between companies in the tourism sector and training institutions and their consolidation as a result of the implementation of work immersion or job shadowing programmes. All project partners were involved in the development of the text under the guidance of the Spanish partner coordinating this task. The complete text is available in German, English, French, Maltese, Spanish and Turkish. All versions are made available electronically to the general public. b) during the kick-off meeting (April 2022), the project partners decided on concrete measures to ensure effective public relations and dissemination work for the project partnership as a whole and the participating organisations. The base for these decisions was a strategy paper prepared by the coordinator and submitted for approval. The public relations and dissemination strategy provided a clear guidance during the project timeline. In line with that strategy, the dissemination activities of the project partnership were preferably based on electronic media; implementing partners were using a broader scale of dissemination channels at local, regional and national level. A discussion group called Inclusion of Migrants by Qualified Occupation in the Tourism industry was installed on the EPALE platform. It was also agreed to publish a project newsletter. The first issue of the bi-monthly newsletter was sent to the partner organisations and other institutions in September 2022 with a request to forward it. Since than every two month a new edition of INCLUDMI Newsletter was published. The partners agreed that, in addition to the public relations work of the project partnership, each individual partner institution should use its existing working contacts and networks to provide information about the objectives and progress of the project. According to the feedback from the partner organisations, this has been done extensively. Almost all of the partner organisations provide immediate information on their respective websites about the start of the INCLUDMI project and the progress of the project, for example https://www.isa-brb.de/INCLUDMI/ or https://www.sciaustria.org/2022/09/29/INCLUDMI-inclusion-of-migrants-by-qualified-occupation-in-the-tourism-industry/ (the exceptions are the French and Turkish partners, which, due to their institutional structure, do not provide any information about the project).If the partners have accounts on Facebook or Instagram, these opportunities were also used to provide information about INCLUDMI, for example https://m.facebook.com/sci.austria/posts/pfbid0qdhfFva3bRj6a8AtRLQtKGTBZM9MAmZFpRvBwiLA6JCHnsuGEN8L6HHxq6ntRqaVl The partners used other opportunities in their respective environments to provide information about the objectives and progress of INCLUDMI. For example, the INCLUDMI coordinator presented the INCLUDMI project to around 165 participants, including experts from associations and public administration, companies, state politicians and representatives of migrant self-organisations, during the Brandenburg Integration Conference, hosted by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation's state office on 8 November 2022. The Maltese partner used a certificate ceremony in May 2022, which was attended by 600 people, including the current Minister of Education and former President of the Republic of Malta, Mrs Marie Louise Coleiro Preca, to provide information about the INCLUDMI project. In addition, the partners used the discussions with stakeholders (see above) to inform them about the objectives and planned project results and to gain their further involvement, particularly with regard to Project Result 2. At the end of the project, the implementing partners performed presence and online events with the aim to present project results and findings. Also 14 cooperation agreements with stakeholders were signed to ensure the further exploitation of the project results.c) After signing the grant agreement (as the project could only be considered in the second selection round, signing was not possible until February 2022), the coordinating organisation invited the partners to two virtual meetings to ensure the project's start-up and agree on initial measures. On 21 April 2022, the partners held a kick-off meeting in Potsdam at the invitation of the coordinating institution and as agreed. During this meeting, the 13 participants concretised the project planning as developed in the original project application and agreed on additional measures to effectively implement the planning. This was necessary due to the delayed start of the project, to support fluid communication among partner and to monitor the project work. The planned TPMs were carried out in accordance with the updated planning. In addition, monthly virtual meetings (last Monday of the month) were arranged for coordination and exchange among partner. All online meetings were performed in the presence of all organisations (only in two occasions one partner were not able to participate). The coordination was taking minutes of each meeting and subsequently delivered to each partner. The planned LTTA was prepared and implemented on schedule by the Maltese partner. At the following three TPM as well at the monthly virtual jour fix, the partners monitor compliance with the agreements, make new arrangements, exchange experiences in the implementation of the project planning and inform each other about important events at the partner organisation.<< Results >>Over the course of the project, two formal intellectual project results were produced in English (PR1 with 160 pages and PR2 with 43 pages) and translated into the national languages of the participating organisations (German, French, Maltese, Spanish and Turkish). These results were published electronically in various places:1.CLIL Methodological and Resource Guide for Adult Language Trainers2.Methodological Guide for Training Organizations and Employers of Migrants1)CLIL Methodological and Resource Guide for Adult Language TrainersUnder the guidance of Result Leading Organisation Future Focus Ltd all implementing partner actively participate and contribute to compile this intellectual output that is aimed at adult language trainers with the objective of improving their teaching ability. This guide will provide them with a training opportunity on the CLIL methodology and its applications to the tourism sector. It will both introduce them to the methodology and to the particularities of applying it to tourism related jobs. The guide will also serve as a Resource Guide of the situations that take place in the tourism sector (48 lesson examples compiled as a result of involvement of tourism businesses and the analysis of their communication requirements in in the daily practice of contact with clients). It will assist language trainers to gain a clear understanding of the work their learners do. It will provide situations for a set of jobs in the tourism sector related to customer service. The guide is providing a description of the jobs in which the compiled situations occur and provide an angle that focuses on migrant learners. In pedagogical terms, this guide can be considered the source of real-life situations that the trainers can expect to later use in their lessons.This Project Result is electronically available in English, German, French, Maltese, Spanish and Turkish. 2)Methodological Guide for Training Organizations and Employers of MigrantsUnder the guidance of Result Leading Organisation ASOCIACIÓN DE EMPRESARIOS GALLEGOS EN ARAGÓN Y RIBERAS DEL EBRO all implementing partner actively participate and contribute to compile this intellectual output that supports the efforts to meet the need to offer a more sector specific language training, in which the contents taught were directly related to the vocabulary and the every-day tasks of the tourism industry. One of the best ways to know the tasks that language students would perform in a normal working day are work immersion or job shadowing programs. This project result is providing methodologicalguidelines for organizations of adult trainers and businesses in the tourism sector on how to organize short work immersion programs for adult language trainers, so they can improve the use of the CLIL methodology in the classroom. This result stems from the understanding that to incorporate information and work situations into their training methodology, adult language trainers must have direct access to the work environment. This Project Result is electronically available in English, German, French, Maltese, Spanish and Turkish. As an outcome of meetings during the project timeline, particularly performed multiplier events by each implementing partner as well as signed cooperation agreements a) the managerial staff of companies in the hotel and catering industry, including business associations, b) teaching staff at vocational training centres for the hotel and catering industry, including language schools serving this group of trainees, were introduced to the results and involved in their implementation. In addition, the project partnership has achieved a number of additional results:•Gaining expertise among the participating teams through the exchange of experience, knowledge transfers and joint work in the areas of oCLIL-methodologyoIntegration of migrants into the labour market, working and employment conditions in the tourism sector of the member states and Turkey oLanguage training for migrantsoWork in culturally mixed teams•Enlargement of networking between the participating organisations and companies in the tourism industry as well as language and vocational training institutions This increased expertise has led some organisations, e.g. Future Focus, ISA and SCI Austria, to develop new training courses and projects (particularly in connection with refugees from Ukraine). As a result of the closer collaboration with tourism businesses and the expansion of networking activities, clear signs of increased awareness of the need to train migrants in the hotel and catering industry were given by employers.