MONITORING AND EVALUATION

THE TOOLS

The evaluation is a dynamic synthesis of elements that were or not included in the planning stage, it is mainly based on findings

In general the monitoring and evaluation process took into account all the main workers who took part in process, gathering not only synthetic data but also the participants' opinions and spontaneous accounts.

In this specific context, the characteristics of the tools and their use had to be carefully evaluated, given the final target represented by the students of the two courses: low level of education and difficulty in written expression, poor collaboration in the gathering of data, tendency to refuse tools of investigation.

The tools used to monitor the students thus had to be modified during the process to be more adapted to their characteristics.

The data and the information gathered and processed in this report are obtained mainly from:

• formalised descriptions
• reading and interpretation of the gathered data with evaluation tools (agreed upon with the recipients)
• interviews and spontaneous accounts
• reading of the reports drawn up by the workers

• a questionnaire addressed to the Training Co-ordinator for the training staff (teachers and tutors) and the support staff;
• a questionnaire addressed to the workers attending the "training the trainers" phase;
• a questionnaire addressed to the teachers to evaluate the organisation of the project and the quality of the students' participation;
• a questionnaire addressed to the tutors to evaluate the organisation of the project;
• a questionnaire addressed to the tutors to evaluate the quality of the students' participation;
• a questionnaire addressed to the support staff (psychologist and social worker) to evaluate the organisation of the project and the quality of the students' participation;

• a single questionnaire for the modules concerning Daunia, computer technologies and tools, business and handicrafts, submitted to the entire group of users;
• a single questionnaire concerning marketing and business economics , submitted to the entire group of users;
• a questionnaire on the specific activities of the ceramics workshop and the jewellery workshop, submitted respectively to the students of the two courses.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE STUDENTS

The students selected among the candidates represent all the typologies of beneficiaries identified by the Youthstart community-based measure. The diagram here below is a summary of the different types of the students' disadvantages (excluding the cases of religious minorities):

 

Type of disadvantage	Students' conditions
Social and family problems	Loss of a parent and poor attention from the living one. Conflict with the family. Family without permanent income. Serious disagreement with one of the parents. Situation of serious conflict with the family; repeatedly run away from home. Loss of both parents; solitude. Problems fitting in the new family that one parent has formed after a divorce. Serious problems with the adoptive family, return to the family after a period in an institute. Family in complete contrast due to past behaviour. Serious conflicts with both parents, living in an institute. Irreparable conflicts with the family, episodes of physical violence, escape from home.
Origin from an urban area at risk	Pregnant major young woman unemployed   and with no educational qualification. Working experiences, but in a social environment without references. Problems living in a social group. Dropping out and expulsion from many schools in the town of origin because of an antisocial behaviour.
Indication by the Tribunale dei Minorenni (Juvenile Court)	Minor criminal offences. Theft and drug dealing, family problems. Minor criminal offences, involvement in riots. House arrest for minor criminal offences.
Living in an Institute	Advanced education, family unable to guarantee a quiet life. Immigrant from Kosovo.
Mental and Psychological problems	Problems fitting in, comes from a family without rules. Psychical problems, has a child and lives in an institute. Minor behaviour problems, parent with a small mental handicap, brothers or sisters socially at risk. Minor mental deficiency, living in an institute.

The selected candidates have initially shown, in general, a great difficulty to adapt to the daily routine required to attend the training; when it came to spending eight hours a day (for some of them 10 hours away from home) in a precise social and relational context it became a problem for them and for the entire staff of the project.

Conflicts with the authority, refusal of the rules of a civil cohabitation, conflicts often solved using verbal violence (and rarely, physical), characterised the first periods in which these young people were together for the didactic activities; only through a joint effort on behalf of the entire staff of workers it was possible, in time, to rationalise the young people's behaviour and to profit from the attendance to the course.

The first orientation phases allowed to create an atmosphere of co-operation among the students, but the effort to keep them interested and reduce manifestations of impatience was constant and continued during the entire period of the training.

For the reasons mentioned above, it would not have been logical to expect all the students to become skilled craftsmen and to find in the cooperative the goal of their endeavours. The great result was to make each of these young people regain some dignity and self-esteem, awaken their willingness to improve their position and believe in the possibility of working and becoming independent.

This rational goal was clear in the minds of the workers of the project and they have worked mainly to rehabilitate as many young people as possible, in addition to training them as craftsmen; the training became a tool and not the final aim of the intervention and it has allowed to increase the positive effects of the intervention itself.

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