(MissionNewswire) The Salesian school in Alcalá de Guadaíra, a town located approximately 17 km southeast of Seville, Spain, has launched a new initiative called the Mi Colegio 2020 project. The initiative is focused on providing the best technological and human tools available to prepare students for the workforce or an advanced education. The Mi Colegio 2020 project combines new technologies and robotics with new teaching methods.

The Salesian school of Alcalá has been educating students for 104 years and has greatly impacted many in the region. Its current goal is to advance the school’s use of technology in the fields of construction, medicine, science, space navigation and others. Computer programming, as well as the use and management of technologies, is now considered a basic competency of the 21st century. The Mi Colegio 2020 project has been launched to ensure that school educators and students have access to the latest technologies available for learning.

After the interest shown by other schools in the province of Seville as well as by national and local media, the Spanish channel, Canal Sur, took an interest in the project and sent a camera crew to the school to report on it. The project was then highlighted by the weekly program, #EnRed, which researches cutting-edge technological experiences throughout the region of Andalusia.

“With so many young people out of work and facing conditions of poverty in Spain, it is vital for Salesian education and workforce development programs to respond to market demand, especially keeping up with new technologies,” says Father Mark Hyde, director of Salesian Missions, the U.S. development arm of the Salesians of Don Bosco. “Students in these programs have a real opportunity to enter the workforce prepared both in terms of the skills they have learned and in their social development, ensuring a lifelong ability to retain livable wage employment and escape poverty.”

Salesian centers in Spain operate close to 50 vocational and technical training centers that employ 1,300 teachers and offer 17,000 students a chance to gain an education. In addition to these centers, the Pinardi Federation of Salesian Social Platforms and the Salesian Association of Technology and Innovation also offer vocational training courses. All Salesian vocational centers have the support of companies from a variety of business sectors to give students real-world work experience.

Close to 37 percent of young Spanish workers under the age of 25 are unemployed and a growing number of them can’t afford to buy enough food to live. Poor youth with few employable skills struggle the most to find and retain stable employment. Women in Spain face inequality in the workforce. They earn up to 14 percent less than men and represent only 34.5 percent of those listed as the highest earners in Spain.

Salesian missionaries have been working for many years to provide educational and workforce development opportunities for poor youth and women in Spain through residential and technical and vocational training programs.

###

Sources:

ANS Photo (usage permissions and guidelines must be requested from ANS)

ANS – Spain – “Mi Colegio 2020”: a project by Salesians of Alcalá de Guadaíra

World Bank – Spain