PCTO (ex School Work Alternation)

• School Work Alternation
  • PCTO
  • Reference Standard
  • The project in our school: main features
  • Companies involved in the educational project

Transversal Skills and Orientation Projects (formerly ASL).

For the S. Freud Institute, the PCTO Project plays a role of primary importance .

The committee in charge of this activity designs, defines and coordinates the training plan.

The planning of the course starts first of all with the definition and stipulation of agreements with entities, companies and firms that will host our students in carrying out the practical internship.

The selection of host companies is very carefully taken care of, so that high standards are ensured in workplace safety and real opportunities to carry out tasks inherent to one's training project and course of study.

As per regulations, the host facility is a place of learning in which the student develops new skills, consolidates those learned at school and acquires the culture of work through experience: in fact, the collaborations have as their objective the co-design of training paths that jointly engage school and the world of work.

The PCTO project makes it possible to introduce an innovative teaching methodology that aims to broaden the teaching-learning process, an experience that gives concrete support for orientation and future choice; an opportunity that includes periods of student presence in the company.

Three figures are involved in the project: the students, the business mentor and the school mentor.

The alliance between schools and host realities takes the form of collaboration between internal tutors and external tutors aimed at the positive development of the student's alternation experience. Good collaboration is based above all on the clarity of roles, which we define here.

The functions of the internal tutor (teacher): 

• elaborates, together with the external tutor, the personalized training pathway that will be signed by the parties involved (school, host facility, student/parental guardianship); 
• assists and guides the student in the alternation paths and verifies, in collaboration with the external tutor, the proper conduct of the path; 
• manages relations with the context in which the alternation school-work experience is developed, relating with the external tutor; 
• monitors the activities and addresses any critical issues that may emerge from them; 
• evaluates, communicates and enhances the objectives achieved and the skills progressively developed by the student; 
• promotes the evaluation activity on the effectiveness and consistency of the alternation path, by the student involved; 
• informs the school bodies in charge (Didactic Coordinator, Departments, Board of Teachers, Technical Scientific Committee/Scientific Committee) and updates the Class Council on the progress of the paths, also for the purpose of any realignment of the class; 
• assists the Teaching Coordinator in drafting the evaluation form on the facilities with which agreements have been made for alternance activities, highlighting their training potential and any difficulties encountered in collaboration. 

The teacher is designated by the educational institution from among those who, having applied for it, possess documentable and certifiable qualifications.

The external tutor, selected by the host structure among individuals who may also be external to it, represents the student's reference figure within the company or institution and, in particular:

• collaborates with the internal tutor in the planning, organization and evaluation of the alternation experience; 
• promotes the student's insertion in the operational context, supports and assists him/her along the path; 
• ensures the information/training of the student(s) on specific company risks, in compliance with internal procedures; plans and organizes the activities according to the training project, also coordinating with other professional figures present in the host structure; 
• involves the student in the process of evaluating the experience; provides the educational institution with the agreed elements for evaluating the student's activities and the effectiveness of the training process. 

The interaction between the internal tutor and the external tutor aims to: 

• define the organizational and educational conditions conducive to learning both in terms of orientation and skills; 
• ensure the monitoring of the progress of the course, in itinere and in the concluding phase, in order to intervene promptly on any critical issues; 
• verify the process of attestation of the activity carried out and the skills acquired by the student; 
• collect elements that allow the reproducibility of the experiences and their capitalization.

PCTO contact person for our Institute is the teacher Luigi Santino Pulvirenti, who, thanks to a consolidated expertise also in the business field, make high contribution in the activity of project  which, thanks to expertise also established in the corporate environment, make high contribution in the design and monitoring of activities.

PURPOSE

To implement flexible and culturally and educationally equivalent learning mode, with respect to the outcomes of the second cycle paths, which systematically link classroom training with practical experience.

1.     To enrich the training acquired in school and training paths with the acquisition of spendable skills in the world of work.
2.      Foster the orientation of young people to enhance their personal vocations, interests, and individual learning styles.
3.      Realize an organic connection of educational and training institutions with the world of work and civil society.
4.      Correlate educational offerings with the cultural, social and economic development of the territory.

THE MISSION OF THE SIGMUND FREUD INSTITUTE

The Institute intends to ensure educational offerings aimed at:

• to the realization of the right to learn and the educational growth of all pupils;
• to the improvement of the teaching/learning process through the introduction of new methodologies and flexibility of curricula;
• to the personalization of educational itineraries through the school's planning and integration in the territory;
• to the responsible involvement of all school components in the processes activated with particular regard to feasibility analysis,
• to the identification of tools to achieve educational objectives, procedures of self-evaluation and internal verification, monitoring actions, design of improvement;
• to the promotion of each pupil's potential by adopting all useful initiatives to achieve educational success;
• to the training of young people fit to enter active life, with a solid general culture, basic professional preparation and specialized insights;
• to the support of continuing education through a constant link between school and the world of work;
• to the support of individuals in difficulty with the prevention and reduction of school dropout;
• to the promotion of initiatives aimed at the implementation of a quality system

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE FAMILY IN PCTO

PCTOs also involve families. 

Parents are the most valuable allies in spreading awareness that this experience enriches their children's growth path. It is always parents who become active promoters of alternation experiences for their children's peers, becoming educators in the work realities in which they work.Every parent, in fact, knows the individual value of work, one of the most incisive tools for the realization and expression of one's identity in society. A lever of social mobility and a multiplier of opportunities thanks above all to a work culture not limited to knowing how to do, but above all to knowing how to be, how to relate to others, how to organize one's time, one's life. The PCTO within the school curriculum takes on this value, recognizing in the teachers and the referents of the host realities the safe guides to deal with an experience that has united, in different capacities, different generations.The activities planned in the school-work alternation project and their respective purposes are made explicit, as well as in the Educational Offer Plan, also in the Educational Co-responsibility Pact signed by the student and the family at the time of enrollment. They are experiences that take place in safety, with insurance obligations.Families, therefore, we ask families to support this innovation with us, to encourage host organizations to offer quality pathways and, above all, to propose them, making available to students their own knowledge acquired in the course of their working and life careers.The success of any change always passes through strong responsibilities shared by all actors in the field.