Kosovo Training: how to prevent school abandonment

Project : MARIO 21 Apr 2010 | education prevention school dropout

Pristina, Kosovo: In the frame of the MARIO project, 29 school psychologists, pedagogues and psychologists working with children in several NGO’s participated in a two days training on April 19-20. This second training – a first one was held in November 2009 – focused on the phenomenon of children dropping out of school and measures of prevention in partnership with the Ministry of Education, Sciences and Technology, and the Pedagogical Institution of Kosovo.

In total, 30 school psychologists/pedagogues are working in all Kosovo, while about 1167 schools exist across the country. They face many difficulties such as the high number of children dropping out of school or the lack of recognition of their position, although their role in schools is essential to prevent, identify and refer the cases of children victims of any form of abuse.

Most school psychologists in Kosovo have been recently appointed in their position and still need to build skills and exchange good practices. Focusing on child protection issues, Tdh is the only organization in Kosovo giving trainings and workshops to school psychologists/pedagogues. The training focused on the analysis of the phenomenon of school abandonment and its causes, indicators for identifying and preventing early school abandonment, contribution of school in preventing school abandonment as well as the presentation of the national plan of action against school abandonment. “I have learned many things about the causes of children dropping out of school and the strategies to put in place to protect them” said one of the participants.

Tdh in Kosovo will organize four other trainings in 2010 to train school psychologists/pedagogues on the use of the Manual on Child Protection for Schools Psychologists and Pedagogues developed by Tdh as well as on individual counseling for children. [AK]

Visit the website of Mario Project