IRISS = International Relations Inspiring Students and Staff

1. IRISS = International Relations Inspiring Students and Staff General objectives: to foster cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue to enhance the curriculum experience of students and raise their level of achievements to improve the quality of teaching and learning across the network (best practices, innovative practices, new joint didactical units to increase the international dimension in the curriculum

2. Additional objectives IRISS: • To develop quality assurance approaches • To broaden understanding of school leaders about educational systems across the EU • To increase the number of students and staff involved in international activities

3. The project will focus on the following curriculum areas: • Languages: increasing enthusiasm and compentency in languages, using the CEF (Common European Framework for Languages) • Natural Sciences: bring students and teachers together to cooperate on scientific projects; share best practices • Social Sciences: bring students together and make them experience the different perspectives.

4. How can the objectives be met? • Develop innovative teaching and learning units • Encourage the use of the CEF • Embedding internationalism into the curriculum of the schools • Strive to increase the number of students and teachers involved. In IRISS there is a strong emphasis on the involvement of students and teachers!

5. Student activities • Subject based and cross curricular projects using ‘electronic links’ • Projects involving mobilities (seminars and master classes) • At least two conferences

6. For school leaders Teacher activities • Conferences and workshops for teachers • Short term study visits to other schools • At least two conferences

7. Organisational aspects • The project will be coordinated by the steering committee • At the heart of the project are 4 ‘SIGs’ (SIG = Special Interest Group): Languages, Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, Quality Assurance • The SIGs will meet four times • Each SIG is coordinated by a steering group

8. Special Interest Groups • Every group has a co-ordinating group with a chairperson (3 persons) • At the Cardiff Conference each SIG produces an action plan for the next 1½ years. • Every SIG makes an agenda/programme for each conference • SIGs report to the steering committee

9. Tools for communication • All materials wil be published on the IRISS website (www.irissnet.eu) • The IRISS website, e-mail, video conferencing

10. Evaluation • Focus on self evaluation • Using existing (previously developed) instruments • The evaluation process to be monitored, coordinated and supported by the Q-group

11. Evaluation IRISS (Kalamaria, May 2011) • Thanks for filling in the evaluation activity sheets! It has helped in evaluating the IRISS project as a whole! • Hopefully it has also helped you all to evaluate and improve your own projects, exhanges, master classes etc. • In recent years quality management has become a more central and stronger element of our network.

12. What were the commitments of the Q-group (steering group) at the beginning of IRISS? • Sending our self evaluation forms 2 months prior to meetings • Collating (self) evaluation reports • Ensuring that each SIG has a steering group (of 2 or 3 persons) • Ensuring accredition and certification for students • Helping schools to evaluate their readiness for internationalisation

13. What were the commitments of the Q-group (steering group) at the beginning of IRISS? • Providing guidelines for international activities • Requiring ‘reflection and internal asessment by students, teachers etc. • Producing and requiring the use of a common framework for self evaluation • Preparing, issuing and insisting on the use of pre-prepared diaries ad logs

14. Focus of IRISS activities • Almost all the exchange activities involve face-to-face contacts, and about 50% of the activities include ‘virtual contacts’ as well (e-mail, chatting, video conferencing etc.) • The majority of exchanges focussed on personal and skills development, cultural links and benefits, language development • In about 50% of the activities, the students worked on specific curriculum themes.

15. According to the students the IRISS activities in general made a positive contribution to: • An awareness about cultural and language differences • The awareness of being a European citizen • An improvement of social skills • An improvement of knowledge and skills in certain subject areas • An improved knowledge and awareness with regard to one’s individual future • Practicing a foreign language in communicating with other people

16. According to the teachers the IRISS activities in general had the following impact on teachers: • They enhanced their ability to plan and evaluate exchanges. Teachers widened their experience with international projects. • The activities have helped teachers to improve their social skills • The activities have improved their teaching skills (through the cooperation with foreign colleagues) • In 40% of the exchanges, the capacity to implement the CEFR was improved.

17. Use of languages and use of CEFR • The language component (including the CEFR levels) was monitored in about 50% of the exchange projects. • English was the most widely used language. The level of English varied considerably: between B1 and C1/C2 • French, German and Spanish were used in a few individual cases. • Mainly due to the work of the ‘SIG languages’ the monitoring and practice of languages (on the basis of the CEFR) has become more common during the IRISS period.

18. General and overall conclusions • Most schools are actively using the (IRISS) activity evaluation sheets = the basis for quality management and improvement! • The evaluation forms also help the Q-group in making an overall analysis and summary. • An increasing number (the majority!) of activities has a direct link to the curriculums of the schools. Students are brought together to study and learn together

19. General and overall conclusions (continued) • Every year, there is an impressive amount of activities within our network!! 31 were reported and the list is not complete yet! • Almost all IRISS activities were evaluated (very) positively. Most of the activities are expected to be repeated in future! • The IRISS activities contributed significantly to the objectives of the IRISS project.

20. General and overall conclusions (continued) • Many schools have started using the CEFR as an instrument to monitor and measure the language component of exchanges. There is scope for further improvement. • About 50% of projects involve both real and virtual contacts. About 50% of the projects involve face-to-face contacts only. • The majority of the projects (65%) are linked to the social sciences. About 20% were linked to the natural sciences. 33% of the projects had a strong language component.

21. General and overall conclusions (continued) • The number of activities involving more than two schools has increased. • In the period May 2010 – April 2011 the number of (reported) IRISS activities amounted to 33. There were 1282 student mobilities and 320 staff mobilities involved.

22. The evaluations show that: IRISS has in fact inspired the students and staff who took part in the IRISS activities between 2009 and 2011! The IRISS project was a success!