The project “Science around us” has been implemented by a partnership consisting of six upper secondary schools (four state and two private) from six different countries– Finland, France, Greece, Island, Malta and Poland. The direct participants were 20-80 students of age 15-20 and 4-10 teachers per school. The project was student-centered, both in terms of aims and involvement in almost all project activities at all stages – from preparation to evaluation and dissemination of its results. It was an answer to the need to form young people in a comprehensive way- to develop them as critically thinking, open–minded individuals, but also members of local communities, nations and united Europe, and conscious inhabitants of our planet, and in this way to contribute to science-literate society, the necessity of which was stressed by Europe 2020 Strategy. It addressed the problem of falling interest of students in scientific subjects, which many of whom found difficult, useless or boring, observed in schools and confirmed both in surveys conducted among students and in reports of the Ministries of Education, and manifesting itself in decreasing shares of students doing sciences on advanced level and choosing scientific subjects in final exams, as well as in unsatisfactory results in PISA tests in our countries, which only in Finland were above the average for OECD countries both in terms of mean score and the share of top performers. To ensure active involvement of the students in the activities, we used enquiry-based learning approach, hands-on method and place-based education. Observations, experiments, workshops, lessons in university labs or science museums, demonstrations, debates, lectures, seminars and visits to scientific or industrial institutions triggered and developed the curiosity of our students in the natural and technical world around them and the principles governing natural phenomena or the operation of technical devices, made them realise the importance of science and its influence on our lives, and fostered their critical thinking and innovativeness, which was our main goal, corresponding to the main problem. A chance to observe scientists or engineers at work, using modern digital equipment, showed them the significance of scientific method and a good command of ICT. Non-academic activities like photo or film-taking attracted students achieving worse results at school or marginalised at school and local community, and gave them a chance to feel important, building their initiative and self-confidence, and in some cases aroused interest in science too. Moreover, we used the full potential inherent in group work, especially in international context, and tried to form attitudes of initiative and entrepreneurship, teamwork and leadership skills as well as ability to perform well in new situations and cooperate with people from different backgrounds. International cooperation also raised awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity of Europe, increased language skills and motivation to learn them. Getting to know the culture of other nations built awareness of similarities and differences among nations, helped to fight stereotypes, form attitudes of tolerance, openness and respect for otherness. Distance cooperation and the need to use modern equipment and ICT in project work at home increased their ICT skills. Also, the enriching impact of international cooperation on teachers cannot be overestimated. Exchange of ideas, experiences and practices within the partnership developed their professional skills. Changes in attitudes, especially towards science, finding new interests and learning new skills are the most important results of our project. However, we also prepared a few joint end products, some of which we hope to be used as teaching aids in our partnership and beyond. We prepared PDF presentations on the importance of water and the problem of its purity and on the Earth as a planet, booklets containing photos of geological forms in our countries and physical phenomena in nature together with explanations of how they were formed, a video on the benefits and risks of using nuclear physics, a PPT presentation on the principles of operation of various devices explained on the grounds of science, an interactive atlas showing electricity production in our countries and a set of lesson plans. We expect the project to be a stimulating and developing experience for the students that will change their attitudes and perception of the world and influence their life choices. It will equip teachers, not only of our schools, with innovative lesson plans and teaching aids. Finally, the schools as institutions, maintaining some curricula changes, new extracurricular activities, as well as newly gained contacts or forms of cooperation, will be able to offer a chance for comprehensive development to new students and keep their position of modern, European schools.

"This project was born from the gathering of five polyglot schools representative of the diversity of Europe, all of them with experience in conducting European projects and eager to collaborate on the same subject ""living together"". At a time, when Europe is confronted with problems involving its future, where a strong reference structure is needed in the face of global giants, it was important for us to bring together people of good will from same continent with similar but different cultures to address the issue of social inclusion and make it a horizontal priority.The main objective was to raise the awareness of young high school students about the difficulties of living together in all the partner institutions that are similar and complementary but have different backgrounds and audiences. The idea was that everyone can enrich the other through his own experience and the pooling of forces to reduce prejudice in school and to acquire sustainable values that he can transmit himself to build the world of tomorrow with a European citizen conscience based on tolerance, openness to others and favorable to employability.The idea of building a common charter laying the foundations for living together was imposed on everyone. To achieve this, each partner country has decided on the activities to be implemented leading to the identification of specific biases, and in particular that of gender, which has reached consensus. Each one was free of the various means to exploit to remedy it within the framework fixed previously. The meeting times during the learning activities made it possible to take stock of their accuracy, their relevance, to measure their progress and to project themselves.The results achieved are beyond our expectations considering the interest that young people have in this regard. The richness of their productions testifies as well as the progress made in languages, digital, speaking, relational, autonomy and state of mind. Such a journey has significantly changed their behavior, their approach to each other and their worldview.Young people who are involved in this project are now trained: their daily work shows their ability to reuse their knowledge, know-how and skills. They are capable of autonomy, of taking initiatives and even for certain responsibilities. In addition, their relationship to the teacher has changed from a wait-and-see posture to a benevolent horizontal posture. We can only welcome this progress and perhaps to have aroused future careers.For all young people and adults, this project has been punctuated by very beautiful meetings, some of which are in the process of becoming permanent. Moreover, he broke the elitist, confidential and time-consuming image that some could still have. Finally, our schools have gained visibility, recognition and influence in the minds of families, the public, municipal and local authorities. From now on we are solicited for projects with varied subjects allowing a wider opening to society and to the world."

"The main objective of the project, entitled Joint Environmental Training, is to raise awareness of young people to a responsible attitude towards environmental protection and preservation , through education for sustainable development. The partnership is made by four secondary schools which have similar needs and still different enough to help each other effectively and are able to motivate each other too.In ITE Feliciano Scarpellini they observe a high percentage of students who aren’t aware about environmental problems and where it is very important to re- think the traditional way of educating and teaching. With this project they intend to stimulate student's critical thinking and guide behaviour to reach environmental awareness in Umbria ""the green heart of Italy"". The school is a really experienced project coordinator with IT and tourism courses.The French school needs this project to make a contribution to the price of the conscience of the students of today, who are the citizens of tomorrow. In their school they have a few specific actions to save the environment but teachers feel that students still have no account and do not change their behavior. It therefore seems important to them through this project, not only to make them aware of the issue but above all to initiate postures that will lead them to adopt best practices. In addition, during the review of their school project this year, all the family partners, teachers and the students themselves highlighted the urgency and the need to address the problem.The Croatian partners want to show their students how other European countries respect the socio-cultural authenticity of host communities, conserve their built and living cultural heritage and traditional values. They think this project would contribute to inter-cultural understanding and tolerance. As a touristic school they want to emphasise the optimal use of environmental resources that constitute a key element in tourism development, maintaining essential ecological processes and helping to conserve natural heritage and biodiversity.The Hungarian school is in an average town but has commuting students from 30 villages from around the school. They live in disadvantaged villages where sustainable agriculture and tourism could be students' future. They should see good practices in other countries, that are more developed in this field, to learn how to use their natural values and knowledge in their studies and in their future life.The main topics of the project in the first year will be: 1. saving energy in school, at home and with traffic, 2. shopping with purpose, shopping in an environmentally friendly way, 3. getting to know local products, 4. preserving, cleaning, renewing school items. In the second year we will concentrate on: 1. examining the constitution and effects of computing tools, 2. flora and fauna and local products of the participating countries, 3. biomimicry. We want to show our students that the optimal use of environmental resources constitute a key element in maintaining essential ecological processes, helping to conserve natural heritage and biodiversity. We would like to deal with environmental issues in many subjects on special lessons to motivate both our students and teachers to be more active. We expect our students and teachers to use - especially their scientific - studies in really enjoyable yet very useful new ways to experience the topic of our project and to become motivated in the long run to take care of the environment.The four institutes should aim to develop in students the basic elements of their rights and duties as global citizens, with a special attention to the productive world and enterprises . We would like to focus our attention on the sustainable industrial development at a national and International level. The teams will work with the support of new technologies trying to make the acquisition of the environmental new competences more attractive and in line with the attitudes of the new generations . The students should learn to critically assess individual and collective behaviour, and thus to know and appreciate virtuous experiences from institutions, businesses, citizens, know the operational tools to contribute and acquire the basis to become the professionals of sustainable development, green economy and circular tomorrow."

"""Frieden ist nicht selbstverständlich."" These words of Jean-Claude Juncker are central for our project which is addressed to students aged 13-17 years from six European countries. In a time of increasing separatism, nationalism and latent racism also in EU countries the motivation of our project is to make our students aware that peace and international cooperation is a treasure which has to be protected actively. Our aim is to promote respect – for both persons and cultures - and responsibility – social and personal - as values for a fair and non-discriminatory society. Our students will learn about constructive and destructive moments of European history, find out about various cultural connections among our countries and detect values which connect them across times and borders to one cultural unity: Europe. Working on the project collaboratively, the participants themselves will practice constructive and respectful intercultural interaction. Objectives of our project are: - increased sense of respect and responsibility- strengthening of transversal key competences such as digital, language, learning, social and civic competences- improved creative and interdisciplinary thinking, cultural awareness and expression- a broader European dimension of learning and teaching.To reach this we plan the following activities:1. APPROACH: Our project has two starting points: near future, ancient past. One point are myths from Greek antiquity as cradle of European culture. Myths tell us about men's hopes and fears and the struggle for defining one's role in nature / kosmos. Our students show their interpretation of myths creatively as lyrics, sketches, philosophical essays and by comparing ancient thoughts to modern scientific approaches. With the same creative means they show their feelings towards “Europe 2040 – our hopes, fears and wishes”. Thus, they reflect about differences and similarities through time and regions and necessary improvements. In multilateral teams they think up small activities which contribute to improvement. Locally, they carry them out. Thus, they realize how effective, but also necessary civic engagement is. This meets the needs of a young generation who wants to speak up for their future.2. LEARNING FROM EACH OTHER (research and ICT): The students look for examples of civic engagement and moral courage in their countries' history. Another focus is on migration in history of their families, schools, regions. They present their results online and combine them with their partners' results putting historical events of all partner countries next to each other in a huge timeline on a wall in the school building. In multilateral groups they work on styles and movements in art and culture which link our countries to each other and add these cultural links to their timelines. Together they create board games whose settings the students plan online and whose equipment they design with software for a 3D printer; thus, they make their results of our first project year available to other student groups in a playful way. 3. CREATING WITH EACH OTHER: In year 2 the students continue in international groups to work on historical events and to integrate cultural and artistic expression; they combine the results into scenes for a stage play about cooperation and confrontation with focus on common values. They integrate philosophical thoughts (e.g. Arendt's “banality of evil”), learn about theatre traditions of the partners (e.g. shadow theatre), try them out together. They invent plot and scenes by collaborative writing. They visit memorials and add their reflections as scenic interpretation to the stage play. Finally they perform their play as an international team.Methods we will use are: cooperative learning such as collaborative writing, gallery walk etc.; research (library, online, interviews); product orientation; blended learning (online activities, traditional lessons in various subjects according to curricula and needs of each school, off-campus activities). Results, impacts and long-term benefits we expect of our project are: + increased quality of learning and teaching by: better integration of ICT into all sbujects; increased willingness and ability to learn and teach in interdisciplinary, intercultural, European context; better teamwork skills; growing cultural awareness; greater motivation of our students in language learning and multilinguism; increased motivation of our teachers to try new methods+ long-term integration of activities of civic engagement and responsibility in regular intervals in our school routine+ additional recognition and attractiveness of our schools due to the combination of digitization and internationalization by: presentation of our products (ebook ""Europe – our hopes, fears, wishes"", timetable, board games, stage play, TwinSpace / project website) in school, local community, online."