International project LIF-T: LANDSCAPE IN FOCUS – Tools for Small Municipalities for Sustainable Landscape, implemented under the Erasmus+ programme in the KA2 – Cooperation Partnerships in Adult Education, focuses on the sustainable planning and development of small villages by the character of the local landscape, history and with the active participation of local people. In the Czech Republic, in addition to the Institute of European Professional Studies, s.r.o., the Czech Landscape and Garden Society (Společnost pro zahradní a krajinářskou tvorbu, z.s.), which is also the coordinator of the project, is cooperating in its implementation together with other organizations from Finland, Germany and Slovakia.

LIF-T project aims to develop know-how and upskill representatives of small and medium-sized rural municipalities where there are limited personnel, competencies or resources due to community size, focus on climate-friendly municipal landscape planning and decision making, awareness of good practices to improve biodiversity and combat results and impacts of climate change, while also promoting the importance of landscape to a wider audience.

The project´s goal is to develop a digital learning environment containing educational materials on the topic of landscape protection with tools and practical information on how to apply best practices to small municipalities in order to help slow down and combat climate change. To deliver the mentioned above, all the participating organizations intend to share know-how as well as create good practice examples from municipalities from different European countries and in addition will develop a step-by-step guide to support small municipalities in making decisions about their future. Partners from the Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, and Slovak Republic will work on this issue for the next 2 years.

The project consortium consists of five partners from four European countries:

Spolecnost pro zahradni a krajinarskou tvorbu, z.s. (SZKT) – project coordinator (Czech Republic)
Institute of European Professional Studies, s.r.o. (IEPS) – partner (Czech Republic)
Suomen maisema-arkkitehtiliitto – Finlands landskapsarkitektförbund ry (MARK) – partner (Finland)
bdla Bund Deutscher Landschaftsarchitekt:innen Landesverband Sachsen e.V. (bdla) – partner (Germany)
Slovenska Polnohospodarska Universita v Nitre (SUA Nitra) – partner (Slovak Republic)

Project Duration: 2 years, (12/2023–11/2025)
Programme: Erasmus+, Key Action 2, Cooperation Partnerships in Adult Education
Project Number: 2023-1-CZ01-KA220-SCH-000157466
Project Coordinator: Spolecnost pro zahradni a krajinarskou tvorbu, z.s. (CZ)

Fostering European Values & Principles through Leadership Skills among Pupils from Disadvantaged Backgrounds

There is a long-term need to foster leadership soft skills among children from disadvantaged, migrant, and refugee backgrounds, as well as to foster European values among them. Simultaneously, there is a need to create educational resources for teachers.

The YoungLEAD project aims to address these needs by providing support for the inclusion of children aged 11-16 from disadvantaged and/or migrant backgrounds into mainstream classes through two main concepts: building their self-confidence by developing leadership skills and enhancing their understanding of the European context, common values, and solidarity to strengthen their sense of belonging to the European community.

Throughout the project, several results are planned to be developed. Firstly, a Methodic Guideline for teachers on the topics of leadership skills. Secondly, we are working on a total of 21 leadership skills games for use in classrooms with students. For example, we will focus on teamwork, communication or empathy. Eventually, a set of learning activities in the form of an interactive collection of inspiring stories of young students engaged in civic activities and participating in the EU will be produced. All of these materials will be made available to teachers through a common educational digital platform.

The project is implemented by 6 project partners – primary schools and educational organizations from 3 European countries:

Institute of European Professional Studies (IEPS) – coordinator (Czech Republic)
Primary school Zakladni skola Strossmayerovo namesti – partner (Czech Republic)
De La Salle College (Ireland)
I and F Education and Development Limited (Ireland)
Carlos v Sociedad Cooperativa de Enseñanza from Águilas (Spain)
GROWTH COOP from Granada (Spain)

Project duration: 11/2023 – 10/2025
Programme: Erasmus+, Key Action 2, Strategic Partnerships for School Education
Project Number: 2023-1-CZ01-KA220-SCH-000160143
Project Coordinator: Institute of European Professional Studies (IEPS)

International project SPECTRUM: Supporting Elementary School Teachers in Recognizing and Understanding Minors with Special Educational Needs, implemented under the Erasmus+ programme in the KA2 – Strategic Partnership for School Education, is aimed at supporting primary school teachers in identifying and understanding pupils with special educational needs. In the Czech Republic, in addition to the Institute of European Professional Studies, s.r.o., the J. Guth-Jarkovský Primary School, which is also the coordinator of the project, is cooperating in its implementation together with other schools and organisations from Cyprus and Spain.

The project aims to create an inclusive learning environment across different sectors to promote equitable learning experiences from early childhood to higher education. The intention is to support teachers who are not trained in special pedagogy, yet work with children with disabilities on a daily basis without the much-needed systemic support.

The main goal of the SPECTRUM project is to create helpful materials and practical tools that will enable teachers to quickly grasp the nature of different disabilities, provide them with tips and tricks on how to address them in classes, and prepare activity sheets to be used in classes with a high percentage of students with disabilities and impairments like autism spectrum disorders, specific learning disabilities such as dyslexia, dysgraphia, dysorthographia, dyscalculia, dyspraxia, etc., conduct disorders and hyperkinetic disorders (ADHD), and other mental disabilities. Partners from the Czech Republic, Cyprus and Spain will work on this issue for a minimum of 2 years.

The project consortium consists of five partners from three European countries:

Základní škola J. Gutha-Jarkovského (ZŠGJ) – project coordinator (Czech Republic)
Center for Social Innovation Ltd (CSI) – partner (Cyprus)
Institute of European Professional Studies, s.r.o. (IEPS) – partner (Czech Republic)
Private Grammar and Modern Schools Limited (P.G.M.S.) – partner (Cyprus)
Social Enterprises S.L. (SE) – partner (Spain)

Project Duration: 2 years, (10/2023–09/2025)
Programme: Erasmus+, Key Action 2, Strategic Partnerships for School Education
Project Number: 2023-1-CZ01-KA220-SCH-000156646
Project Coordinator: Základní škola J. Gutha-Jarkovského (CZ)

The aim of the SOFARM: Supporting Social and Inclusive Farms project is to gain and exchange experience in the development of social farms and to motivate farmers to employ the socially disadvantaged in an effective and sustainable way. The project responds to the generally low awareness of social farms and the situation where these farms are not able to sustain themselves in the long term. The intention is therefore to give farmers the necessary knowledge and skills to create new social farms or to develop existing ones.

After an initial research of the situation in each country through workshops and expert interviews, the project partners from the Czech Republic, Germany, Poland, Slovakia and Italy will focus on the project outputs, working together to produce case studies, educational materials and short videos that will be used to inform farmers and the general public.

For the Czech Republic, the partners are IEPS, which oversees the quality of the educational outputs and the production of short educational videos, and SoFarm, s.r.o., which supports social farmers in various ways and is the coordinator of the whole project.

The project is implemented within the Erasmus+ programme, in the KA2 – Strategic Partnerships in Adult Education area. The project consortium consists of the following organisations from 5 European countries:

SoFarm, s.r.o. (Czech Republic) – project coordinator
Institute of European Professional Studies, s.r.o. (Czech Republic) – partner
Petrarca- European Academy for Landscape Culture (Germany) – partner
Stowarzyszenie ARID (Poland) – partner
Druživa, o.z. (Slovakia) – partner
MERIDAUNIA (Italy) – partner

Project duration: 2 years, (10/2022-09/2024)

Project Number: 2022-1-CZ01-KA220-ADU-000089092

The international project „AGEADAPT: Adapting SMEs to the ageing workforce“ aims to develop a system of training materials to support age-management activities for SMEs and educational tools for workers aged 55+. The phenomenon of an ageing workforce, although caused by different reasons, always leads to the same results – people have to adapt to it. This project produces a total of 6 deliverables in the form of user-friendly and simple training tools in the field of digitalisation.

The project is implemented within the Erasmus+ programme, under the KA2 – Strategic Partnerships in Adult Education. The project team includes 6 partners from 5 European countries, namely:

RegioVision Schwerin (Germany) – project coordinator
Association of Small and Medium Enterprises and Crafts of the Czech Republic (Czech Republic)
Institute of European Professional Studies (Czech Republic)
AZ Ljudska Univerza Velenje (Slovenia)
Diversity Hub (Poland)
GrowthCoop (Spain)

Project duration: 2 years (11/2021-10/2023)
Project Number: 2021-1-DE02-KA220-ADU-000033518

EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE FOR A NEW EUROPEAN GENERATION (EIFNEG): Emotional intelligence as a basis for the educational and personal development of the new European generation

The EIFNEG project involves the Institute of European Professional Studies in cooperation with schools and other organisations from the Czech Republic, Portugal, Romania and Spain.

The EIFNEG project aims to create a subject for adolescents aged 12-16 to strengthen their ability to deal with emotions and empathy, to cooperate with their social environment, to enhance their natural creativity and to teach them to adapt to new social, economic and work situations. This age group is transitioning from the final years of compulsory schooling to adulthood, either by entering the labour market or by starting higher education. It is thus a critical milestone when emotional intelligence emerges as a key factor for success or failure in subsequent personal and professional development.

The world we live in needs more and more students and future workers with developed emotional intelligence, because they will be the next generation of the EU workforce and the pillars of European society in a changing world. This project aims to train students in skills such as creativity, communication, stress resilience and conflict resolution. The process will also include training trainers in their resilience and ability to be innovative in teaching these new skills.

The project plans to train European students in emotional intelligence, according to the World Economic Forum as one of the core skills of the future, in a very innovative way. The main aim is to provide the target groups of students and lecturers with knowledge about emotional intelligence.

The project consortium consists of seven partners from four European countries:

Gymnasium J. GuthA-Jarkovského (GJGJ) – Project coordinator (CZ)
Centrul Pentru Promovarea Invatarii Permanente Timisoara Asociata (CPIP) – partner (Romania)
Colegio Séneca S.C.A. – partner (Spain)
GROWTH COOP – partner (Spain)
Institute of European Professional Studies – partner (Czech Republic)
Liceul Teoretic William Shakespeare – partner (Romania)

Project duration: 2 years (01/2022-12/2023)
Programme: Erasmus+, Key Action 2, Strategic Partnerships for School Education
Project number: 2021-1-CZ01-KA220-SCH-000032552