“Quédate,” an experimental program aimed at preventing school dropout

“Quédate,” a program of the Department of Education of the Junta de Extremadura aimed at preventing school dropout

In March 2018, the participation and collaboration of Grupo VS was established through its innovative tool that facilitates an orienting evaluation of the student’s profile for the early detection of up to 35 indicators that hinder the child’s learning and development, dìde, in the new experimental program “Quédate” developed by the Department of Education and Employment of the Junta de Extremadura and which will be carried out in the current academic year.

The experimental program “Quédate” promotes project-based learning and key competencies, encouraging the learning of participating students through their interests, with a relevant playful component and generating their motivation to continue learning. It is a new program aimed at preventing school dropout.

This experimental program seeks two objectives:

1. Implement an innovative procedure for detecting students with learning difficulties or at risk of dropping out of school.
2. The development of a positive and motivating action strategy with these students to encourage them and promote their continuity in the educational system.

This project has arisen from the poor academic results observed in many children and young people and the tendency towards demotivation, disruptive behaviors, personal negligence… leading these children/as and young people to leave the educational world without having completed their training. Through this pilot program and with modification of methodology it is pursued to understand the needs of the students with obstacles, to stimulate them, to make them participants of their own formation with personal implication and decision making. Among the guiding principles of the dìde program are properly those of detecting the possible difficulties whether at an emotional, behavioral, educational, learning or social level, being able to act in time to support the minor once it is known where the obstacle resides.

It is desired to achieve that these students perceive the educational center as their own and positive space, which leads them to stay in the Educational System and continue training throughout their lives. The innovative tool dìde, and its capacity for early detection from two to eighteen years of 35 indicators in three fundamental areas with three respective questionnaires, “Education and Learning”, “Emotion and Behavior” and “Development and Social”, covers a wide range of difficulties and potentialities, with which to obtain an orienting evaluation of the student’s profile or pre-evaluation and help for counselors, teachers and family, favoring the work and adequate support for the students.

With dide, it will be possible to identify the real needs of children. Attention to diversity

The program “Quédate” has been carried out in a maximum of thirty-five public secondary education centers, about 1000 students, and is aimed at students in 1st, 2nd and 3rd year of ESO, at risk of dropout, school failure or with learning difficulties.

In each center, two heterogeneous groups have been formed with students from different courses, with a minimum of ten students per center and a maximum of twenty. The program has been taught, in a pleasant, stimulating and motivating way, by one or two teachers from each selected educational center who received training on project-based learning with this type of student and on the management of an evaluation tool.

With the orienting evaluation of the student’s profile that facilitates the dìde tool, it has been possible to identify adequately in these minors between twelve and sixteen years old what their real needs are in the three areas as well as their evolution at the end of the program with a post-evaluation.

With the involvement of the family and teachers, and without the intervention of the minor

Each group of participating students will be able to develop one or more projects, counting for this with the orientation and revision of a teacher as well as with the active participation of the family. The works and experiences will be disseminated through the blogs and web spaces created by themselves. In addition to the main objective of the experimental program “Quédate” of integration and motivation of the students, it is important to request the involvement of the family, valuing the totality of the minors and their biopsychosocial development. Also in this aspect the contribution of dìde is relevant since it is designed so that its questionnaires are answered in a simple, discreet way, by the adult “observers” who relate and know the minor, whether they are educators, counselors, family, specialists, even members of the community, with the advantage that the minor does not intervene and there are no added expenses.

The results obtained offer a complete and interactive perspective of the real situation of the minor. It is integrated information, and that facilitates inclusive education.

We trust that this experience of collaboration and early detection with díde is the beginning of a fruitful process that can be extrapolated to other programs, to other centers, to other communities and always with the objective that our minors are valued and sustained in their singularity and participants of an inclusive education.