Career counseling and development of digital skills in Plavecký Štvrtok

Roma children from excluded communities face many obstacles on their way to education or a career. The reason is, for example, that they come from a less stimulating environment, which often leads to early school leaving or lack of interest in further education. They thus fall into a vicious circle of exclusion and poverty. Our colleagues in the community centers are therefore trying to show children and young people how important education is and how it can help them find a job. That’s why we provide career counseling for children.

We provide career counseling in all our community centers and in the Elementary School in Petrovany. However, cooperation with the local school was also established by our colleagues from the community center in Plavecký Štvrtok, who in the second half of October had their first ever meeting with the pupils of the Plavecký Štvrtok Ameisenhaufen Elementary School. Some of them even visit our community center.

During the 45 minutes of class, the ninth graders took an initial test. In this way, our colleagues will find out what the students currently know, they will be able to follow their gradual development, and they will have the opportunity to find out what career counseling has brought to the lives of young people. The students should take the final test before the end of the school year. The students liked the meeting because one of our colleagues was their class teacher. They spent a pleasant time together. Our colleagues will attend elementary school on a two-week basis.

By working on a computer to develop digital skills

However, our work at Plavecký Štvrtok does not end with career counseling – we develop digital skills for children in that community center as well. Our colleague Dominika makes sure that children know how to work with computers and acquire digital skills. Initially, children were taught to recognize the keyboard. For some, the use of similar technologies is a matter of course, but children from excluded communities do not have many opportunities to learn about them and learn in this area. But thanks to the digital skills trainer Dominika, they can learn new things.

They gradually learn to work with a touchpad and a computer mouse, but also to search for information on the Internet. In addition, children learn to work in Word, Excel or Powerpoint. Dominika’s role in Plavecký Štvrtok is gradually being taken over by volunteer Dušan, based on the methodologies developed by Dominika. Thanks to their knowledge of working with a computer, children will be able to actively search for information according to their own needs, and at the same time they will acquire a skill that they will be able to use later in their job.

Project LDI03023 „Development of career counseling skills for social inclusion“ is supported by Norwegian funds and co-financed from the state budget of the Slovak Republic.