The Integration Agent

We live in an era, when more and more immigrants are entering the EU. People with dreams, skills, willingness and passion to become part of the socioeconomic tissues of Members States and help the local societies, to produce, to grow and to develop - these are the new type of immigrants the EU is experiencing.

But the biggest question that EU is facing, when accepting almost 1,500,000 immigrants yearly (http://bit.ly/IGMA2) is how do we make sure that these people will be able to fit perfectly within the mechanisms of the society and have an active involvement in an early stage and also in a way that will be beneficial for both them and the societies?

The answer comes from the EU funded project igma2 – European Integration Agent 2, that through a structured methodology and an innovative approach, trains the professionals who already work in the field of labour market integration in the following different stakeholder categories: municipalities, local or regional authorities, public employment offices, educational providers, employers, adult education providers, VET providers, and other organisations (e.g. Red Cross, volunteer and non profit organizations).

Through a holistic approach and the proposed 8 step training methodology in the above-mentioned organisations the professionals working there, acquire the necessary knowledge and skills for cooperating with others in order to give better counselling and support to individuals based on their needs.

The innovative Integration Agent approach enables:

• Organising and running outreach activities to contact individuals and commit them to enter the services;
• Problem analysis and intake;
• Mapping of services available in the regional provision network as well as at the labour market;
• Mapping of possibilities and obstacles for individuals (client-centered working);
• Assuring agreement on objectives and actions with individuals and the provision network;
• Arranging and implementing the agreed actions;
• Safeguarding the implementation of the ongoing arrangements and actions;
• Securing the process in case of disturbances;
• Evaluating outcome as well as quality of the process;
• Repeating the process when necessary (gradual progression);
• Reporting in a transparent way;
• Follow-up individuals after the official program or action is finished;
• Contributing to policy and management of own organisation (learning organisation);
• Contributing to policy and arrangements of network partners (learning network);
• Contributing to own professional development (learning as a professional).

igma2- EU Integration Agent – Development of the European Professional Standard for effective counselling of the low-skilled into labour through adult education (538631-LLP-1-2013-1-SE-GRUNDTVIG-GMP) is a 30 month project funded by the Lifelong-learning program of the European Commission, implemented by five experienced organizations, representing all the different stakeholders of society. The overall objective of the IGMA-II project is to improve the culture of quality in adult education and counselling of low-skilled learners, paying special attention to the professional development of staff, as well as delivery by different providers. Moreover, the project aims at improvement of accessibility to adult education for the low-skilled, in order to help them to enter labour market and become more active members of society.  

If you are a stakeholder, a professional, an immigrant, a decision maker or generally an individual interested in finding out more about the training methodology or the project you can visit our website www.igma2.eu or you can contact directly the project Coordinator Mrs Yevgeniya Averhed, Deputy Director of the Department for International Cooperation for Folkuniversitetet Uppsala yevgeniya.averhed@folkuniversitetet.se.  Between April 2015 and January 2016 igma2 partners will carry out national pilot projects in Greece, Norway, Sweden, the Netherlands and Turkey.