Mainstreaming activities in Portugal
Contacts
1. National mainstreaming strategy
The key elements of the National mainstreaming strategy
Portugal's EQUAL programme adopted a proactive strategy
for dissemination of results, with emphasis on incorporation or adoption of
outcomes rather than just on their passive transfer. The strategy works by
encouraging:
- Building of tangible, innovative products - DPs were provided with
guidelines for characterising technical and pedagogical resources and successful
practices
- Product validation - a product validation methodology that includes
specific criteria for assessing products' quality was made available to DPs
- Early involvement of the dissemination targets
- Dissemination partnerships:
bringing together the "producers" of innovation and those who will ultimately
incorporate and/or spread it; this means that DPs applying to Action 3 must
include new members interested in using the project outcomes
- Proactive
dissemination strategies and mechanisms (mediation activities relating to
products' incorporation process, such as training of trainers, coaching, etc.),
rather than passive dissemination strategies (e.g. seminars)
- A learning culture is strongly and permanently encouraged by M.A :
- by adopting a Communities of Practice approach in the Thematic Networks;
- by creating a postgraduate course in "Managing projects in Partnership" delivered by four Universities, financed by EQUAL Programme and geared for DP technicians;
- by encouraging DPs to develop skills auditing, to develop products pre-validation in order to improve their quality and to develop a reflexive methodology of project self-evaluation.
The mandates, members and activities of national thematic groups
During EQUAL Round
2, 11 Thematic Networks were created (February 2006):
- TN 1 - Integrated pathways
for disadvantaged groups (24 members)
- TN 2 - Migrants, refugees and ethnic
minorities' integration (18 members)
- TN 3 - Offender and ex-offender capacity
building (10 members)
- TN 4 - Business Creation (10 members)
- TN 5 - Territorial
and Sectoral Animation (16 members)
- TN 6 - Quality in the 3rd Sector (12
members)
- TN 7 - Restructuring and valuing traditional skills (14 members)
- TN 8 -
Organisational development (18 members)
- TN 9 - Social responsibility (12
members)
- TN 10 - ICT supporting social inclusion (12 members)
- TN 11 -
Reconciling work with family life (12 members)
The domain and focus of each
Thematic Network were defined on the basis of the key issues of the projects
themselves, taking into account national policy priorities.
The Thematic
Networks' objectives in Round 2 are:
- to formulate proposals for policy and
practice innovation, particularly as regards the Public Administration services,
social partners and the associative world that have responsibilities for
responses to the target groups concerned;
- to undertake the validation of project
products and practices, and engage the validation process as an opportunity for
reflection on and improvement of products before they are finalised, and as a
chance to promote their dissemination by inviting relevant specialists and
players, namely from the public sector;
- to contribute to the shaping of the
projects' dissemination strategies and mechanisms, facilitating the formation of
new strategic partnerships and alliances and involving potential dissemination
targets;
- to develop specifically TN products that will bring added value to the
participating projects' products;
- to interact with any European Thematic Events
taking place during the 2nd phase of EQUAL, i.e. participating in them and
gathering new ideas and proposals for policy and action, and contributing with
national successful cases.
Working methodology
A participative and friendly
working methodology, based on a Communities of Practice approach, was defined
for the Thematic Networks. Participants are committed to a dynamic process of
experience exchange, continuing learning, and finding new solutions to their
problems and those of their peers. Participants meet regularly (bi-monthly) and
a common identity, sense of belonging, mutual trust and confidence build up. In
between meetings, each community works on and develops its own domain using
collaborative tools (Web 2.0).
Each Network has a "facilitator", an expert on
the issue, responsible for the technical focus and high standard of discussion,
and who has the personal and relational skills to heighten the interaction and
dynamics within the group. Thematic Networks also have an executive coordinator,
who is from one of the DPs and is responsible for the logistics of the
networking process. To ensure mainstreaming, and depending on each Network's
dynamics and "production", other key actors and experts may be called upon to
take part in the network
To underpin networking, foster homogeneity in the way
the Thematic Networks function, and resolve common problems, the NSS organises a
quarterly meeting of all network facilitators and coordinators. The idea is that
they themselves become a "community of practice" that shares information,
experiences and work tools.
The methodology used for demonstrating what works and how, and what does not
The quality analysis and validation methodology
for EQUAL products was designed for:
- Supporting reflection on products
developed in the course of EQUAL projects, particularly within and between the DPs and TNs and improving their quality;
- Providing DPs with a model for product
validation - which is a compulsory requirement for application to Action 3.
The
product validation methodology requires ensuring that there is input from
different sources, such as the views of independent experts and peers,
particularly in the Thematic Networks; product designers/authors are also
required to take part in the validation process, through reflection and critical
self-analysis. Policy makers and target groups (empowerment) are also involved
and their opinions listened to in relation to the usefulness of DP's
interventions. Using this type of methodology provides an opportunity to reflect
on products and ways to improve them.
Methodologies used by DPs for validating
their products and practices may differ from the one proposed by the NSS.
However, to apply to Action 3, it is mandatory to have at least an independent
expert validation and a set of seven quality dimensions that must be applied -
innovation, empowerment, suitability, usefulness, accessibility equality and
transferability. For each dimension a checklist of quality assessment criteria
has been provided.
In the product validation process producers/authors must
present the elements of proof that justify the score given to each quality
dimension and a product dissemination plan. DPs applying to Action 3 must
present a product validation dossier, describing the validation process and the
final score.
Applying for Action 3
Applying for Action 3 means using active
mechanisms that facilitate the incorporation by third parties of innovative
products and practices developed in Action 2. In this respect, the EQUAL
Programme encourages:
- the inclusion in DPs applying to Action 3 of new members
interested in using the project outcomes;
- the adaptation of products (with the
active involvement of the organisations that will be incorporating them) to the
contexts to which they are to be transferred, to facilitate their uptake and
ensure their usefulness;
- the demonstration of innovative products and
successful practices (study visits, workshops, events at which products may be
presented and observed, etc.);
- facilitation or mediation activities linked to
the product transfer/incorporation process, namely, guidance and advice
(coaching), training in skills critical to the success of incorporating new
products: training trainers, training technicians and other players from the
organisation appropriating the new products/practices, organising practice
periods for them in the designer/author organisations.
- networking or
communities of practice (involving mainstream organisations, local or sectoral
authorities, social partners, etc), to support the sustainability of new
products/practices and their spread or mainstreaming to local, regional, sectoral and/or national policies.
- activities geared to support mainstreaming
or wide-scale diffusion of innovative solutions, involving public sector
employment and training services, social partners, Education Ministry services,
and those responsible for the PNE (National Employment Plan), the PNAI (National
Plan for Inclusion), etc.
How good practice is communicated and transferred to policy makers and stakeholders
- Policy makers and stakeholders can be involved in
the thematic networks meetings, particularly on those meetings where product
demonstration and validation are being carried out - the NSS has been
encouraging the participation of stakeholders at product validation meetings,
which are envisaged as an essential step towards dissemination of innovation.
- Specific meetings of NTNs with policy makers for the purpose of presenting
project outcomes and making their appropriation possible.
- The NSS encourages
the public administration's involvement in DPs as partners - Action 3
- Each NTN
will draft a "living document" presenting the main policy messages and
conclusions of the networks' debate and outcomes of the projects, and this will
serve as an important support to dissemination.
- In the 2nd Round a Working Group
was set up in the sphere of the Programme Monitoring Committee. It comprises
representatives from the Public Administration, social partners and TNs. Group
members will work as "mediating" agents between the projects and decision and
policy makers, to ensure incorporation of EQUAL results in the policies and
practices of mainstream organisations.
2. National mainstreaming activities
The eleven Round 2 Networks were launched February 2006. Apart from
their own meetings, no other events have yet been planned.
3.
Results
As a
result of this mainstreaming strategy, 57 Round 1 partnerships are developing
Action 3 (out of a total of 102 that developed Action 2) and about 230 validated
products are currently included in the Product Directory, and therefore
available to a wider public (www.equal.pt - Menu Directórios - Produtos EQUAL):
www.equal.pt/non_acessible/sobre_os_projectos/produtos.asp
Five Living
Documents from the Round 1 Thematic Networks were published as part of the Colecção Disseminar:
- No 1 - Inovação organizacional e formação em contexto de
trabalho (Organisational innovation and on the job training) - TN4 Living
Document;
- No 2 - Empreender por novos caminhos (Enterprising along New Roads)
TN3 Living Document;
- Nº 3 - Consolidação, visibilidade e reconhecimento - para
uma economia social organizada, eficaz e sustentável (Consolidation, visibility
and recognition - for an organised, effective and sustainable social economy) -
Social Economy Thematic Group Living Document;
- Nº 4 - Percursos integrados de
formação-inserção de públicos desfavorecidos (Integrated training-integration
routes for disadvantaged groups) - TN1 Living Document
- Nº 5 - Integração Social
e Profissional de Imigrantes, Refugiados e Minorias Étnicas (Social and
Professional Integration of migrants, refugees and ethnic minorities) - TN2
Living Document
Last update March 2006
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