PAL Enroll

The results of the 2011 survey in 11 EU Member States and the EU MIDIS 2016 FRA Survey covering 9 EU Member States, confirm that largely Roma children are behind in educational achievement and show a considerable gap between Roma and non-Roma children attending schooling. Despite the efforts to expand and improve education for Roma children over the years, as many as 50% of Roma children in Europe fail to complete primary education and only a quarter complete secondary education.
The Romani mentors, the so called “ambassadors” in terms of role models, are assessed as an important tool for the effective implementation of the integration process of Roma people. Presenting the success and the good results of the education in the personal development is essential. Mediation is one of the measures used across Europe to tackle the inequalities Roma face in terms of access to employment, health-care services, and quality education. It consists of employing people with a Roma background, from local Roma communities, or with a good knowledge of Roma issues, to act as mediators between the Roma and the public institutions.

The main goal of the “PAL ENROLL – Engagement Mentoring as a tool for supporting the positive narrative of Romani children and their enrollment in the education system” project is to introduce the techniques and stages of development of the Romani mediation process to trainers and practitioners so they can be beneficiated by it. The future mediators will be equipped with new skills such as digital literacy, inter-cultural competence, empathy and creative of positive narrative. Specifically, the project aims:

• To capitalize the existing European experience in the process of providing counselling services to marginalized people.
• To adapt the existing knowledge into an innovative training curriculum
• To introduce a reliable and effective mentoring methodology aiming at supporting Romani youth and children in the educational process and career guidance
• To upgrade the existing skills of social workers, counsellors, and trainers in the field of Romani support services