In the context of transition from institutional to community based care of children, all CEE countries face the challenge of changing the institutional culture, re-training and continuing competence development of careers and foster parents who look after the children facing multiple disadvantages and being highly exposed to the risk of social inclusion. To facilitate the development of transversal (social, creative and recreational) and professional skills of the carers and foster parents, who must be able to facilitate group living, must be excellent communicators and advocates, have to know how to access a wide range of child protection and child care legislation information, and also have to be able to create a friendly and nurturing environment by mastering the domestic skills this requires, the present project addressed the following objectives:1. Development of professional competence of trainers of carers and foster parents by offering them training curriculum, training materials and best practice models to be used in their daily work.2. Development of the transversal skills of carers and foster parents by training them in fields such as: handling challenges, working with others, verbal and non-verbal communication, creative thinking, critical thinking, learning to learn, planning own work, problem-solving , etc.Besides the immanent development of project management staffs' competencies, 12 specialists (3 from each country, psychologists, social workers) have been trained in the project on how to use the Curriculum, the Training material and the Best Practice Database produced throughout the project. The transnational joint staff training facilitated not only the professional development of the participants, but will also promoted transnational cooperation and collaborative learning of specialists in child protection beyond the lifetime of the project and beyond the borders of the participating countries.Following the transnational training the specialists in each country have organised national pilot training, using (and testing) the materials developed within the project. The training took place at various locations in Romania, Hungary, Austria and Croatia, between February-April 2016. There was a huge interest in the training in each country, so instead of participants altogether (as foreseen in the project proposal) , a number of 154 carers and foster parents (30 participants in Romania, 75 participants in Hungary, 34 participants in Croatia, 15 participants in Austria) took part in the pilots, all of them appreciating and valuing the opportunity very much. Main activities to accomplish the project objectives were: 1) Needs analysis of the target group resulting in a transnational report on training and continuing development needs of carers and foster parents - The Croatian partner (Sirius) has been coordinating the process of needs analysis and provided guidelines for doing the research work. Results of research have been collected on Wiggio group and by e-mail. The guidelines - translated and used in all countries to collect comparable data and information - included a Methodology Guideline the the following annexes: 1. Questionnaire for the individual interview addressed to foster parents, 2. Questionnaire for the individual interview addressed to carers and educators, 3. Questionnaire for the individual interview addressed to other experts, 4. Desk research template, 5. Instructions for filling templates for collecting data from individual interviews, 6. Excel chart for summarizing findings. FINDINGS of desk research and 130 interviews taken in the four countries (41 foster parents, 68 carers and 21 other experts) are summarized and extensively described in the NEEDS ANALYSIS REPORT.2) Developing a CMS based website that will host not only project information and downloadable outputs but also a best practice database: The website is avaialabe at carecomp.eu , it hosts the best practice database, general information and all intellectual outputs of the project.3) Elaboration of a Curriculum and Training Material: based on the needs analysis the partners shared the tasks of developing a Curriculum and a Training Material that meets the most urgent needs of the target group. The units of the Training materials have been elaborated in national languages then translated into English for comparison, testing and peer evaluation. Pilot testing (see above) have been successfully done in each country. The training material units have been adapted and further improved based on the feedback received during the pilot training, then the final Training material has been translated into Croatian, German, Hungarian and Romanian, illustrated and graphic edited for an attractive design and printed, presented on multiplier events and other dissemination events. All language versions are made available on the project website.

The project addresses the challenges that young people leaving residential care face and it is based on the observation and real needs (as reflected in their daily practice) in the field of youth care and residential youth care of the partner organisations. Preparation for independent life and social inclusion is also essential for unaccompanied minor migrants as they lack some important socially and culturally defined knowledge for their adaptation and inclusion to the host community. The From Youth to Independent Life project has been successfully implemented, it has made important achievements, has led to improved practices in youth work by developing three intellectual outputs. This partnership tried to keep the project plan in order to respect the proposed aims and objectives, just with some minor delays as compared to project timeline, but every task has been finished by the end of implementation period.Even though IO1 didn’t get finance, the partners considered that is important to have relevant information about the needs of target group, this activity have been carried out, but the research couldn’t be done in the extent which was proposed initially.Activities performed:IO1. Gateways to integration – Report on the resources for social inclusion of youth in residential carePreparation of study instruments: development of the interview guidelines for the guided interview for young adults, and after care providers. Revision of interview guidelines and translation into the partner countries languages. Study Implementation: implementation of the interviews with 20 young adults, in total, who already had left care and 13 after care provider. Evaluation of results: Partners agreed that in general all partner countries presented similar difficulties of the young people leaving care. There is lack of support in self-esteem and self-awareness, presenting difficulties in managing finding and maintaining job, or housing conditions. In the 1st Intellectual Output it was important to access specific information for development of successful and valid training material. The investigation was used to get to know realities of those who leaved the care-system in order to widen the aftercare - preparation program and provide the young persons what they need. Based on the interviews from partner countries most relevant topics to work with were self-esteem and self-awareness and vocational guidance before leaving care. As well as on the professional awareness as young persons have difficulties in finding the right career path that is in concordance with the interests and competences.IO2: 2. Make a living – Online games for young people to get prepared for independent life was led by P2, SEC (RO). All thepartners contributed to the selection of the competencies. The software for the online platform has been developed, which is in fact a PHP based educational online multi-game system. Taking into consideration the learning outcomes, some activities are better suited for online activities, the division of skill-groups was adapted to the online games. The online games contains in total 5 units, 25 lessons and 2 games/unit.The theory part of the lessons can be read at anytime, but the games already solved successfully, can’t be playedagain.Learning time: 30-40 learning hours.It consist of 5 units:1. Self-care skills – family planning,2. money management,3. food management skills,4. housing and housekeeping,5. career and job related skills.Units structure: Intro, Definition, References, Theory, Videos, Photos.Games: True or False, General Knowledge, Quiz, Letter Pile, Choose the right answer.The game can be played in all partner country languages. Also, a Multilingual guide has been developed in all partner languages, and also a Validation Report as well. IO3. Social workout The training material is focusing on skills listed in the Children (Leaving Care) Act 2000, with practical tools addressed to young people and residential youth care workers, incorporating the use of the online games. The training programme consists of 5 modules (Interpersonal skills, Legal skills (active citizenship 1), Career and job related skills, Money management, Knowledge on active citizenship 2, it is designed in modular format, each of the modules can be used separately, and it has 180 pages. The training curriculum was jointly developed by the partners, 14 of them took part of the joint staff training, and after that they piloted locally with 120 participants. Beside the developed intellectual outputs, it is important to acknowledge the multisectorial nature of the project that facilitated opportunities to cooperation of relevant stakeholders from different backrounds: public sector, NGOs, youth organisations, schools, local governments. etc. The partnership had the opportunity to improve their competences in youth work and so they can directly exploit the project results to their target groups.