EDUCATION : NEW FRAMEWORK AIMS TO REDUCE EARLY SCHOOL LEAVING.

Reducing the number of young people who leave school without qualifications requires prevention, intervention and compensation measures. By 2012, member states should adopt comprehensive strategies to reduce early school leaving that include all three aspects. This is the message announced by the European Commission in its communication and draft Council recommendation, presented on 31 January. The two initiatives aim to create a European framework for overarching strategies on early school leaving, in keeping with the ten-year Europe 2020' strategy. They set out a number of principles to reduce this phenomenon by at least 10% by 2020 (reiterating the 2003 conclusions, whose targets have not been met).

In 2009, more than six million young people (14.4% of the 18-to-24 age group) left school after lower secondary level or less. Fifty-two percent were unemployed the same year.

THREE AREAS OF ACTION

The communication and the Council recommendation that accompanies it include three areas of action: prevention, intervention and compensation.

Prevention policies should aim to reduce the risk of early school leaving before the problem emerges. They aim to give young children a good start in education so as to develop their learning potential through high quality early childhood education and care. The idea is also to increase early childhood education and care services, to implement active desegregation policies that improve social diversity, to ensure the flexibility and permeability of education pathways and to provide support for children with a different mother tongue.

Intervention policies are meant to prevent early school leaving by improving the quality of education and training in schools and training institutions, reacting to warning signals and providing targeted support for pupils or groups of pupils in danger of dropping out of school.

In the third focus area for action identified in the communication, compensation, the Commission proposes to member states to help those who have dropped out by offering them gateways to re-enter...