The recession has impacted unfavourably on the employment levels of younger people in the EU; in several countries this is now over 50% and rising. Older workers who become unemployed are more likely to slip into economic inactivity, especially women and the lower-skilled. Older workers have different skills and competences compared with other generations; without their participation in working life, a shortage of professional, structural and networking capacities will arise. Their transfer of knowledge to younger workers is important; different strengths of different generations creates the strongest combination of competences in the workplace. Better work ability for older people affects their later life; with the increasing numbers of older persons in the EU, it is vital that there is investment in active ageing (active living). Fostering entrepreneurship and transversal skills, including entrepreneurial teaching and innovative methods of approaching teaching, entrepreneurial experiences for younger people, students; this project addresses these aims.The main aim of this project was to develop working partnerships between education and employment, including self-employment, entrepreneurship; local and regional economic policies include entrepreneurship as a valid alternative to unemployment. Many older people are also turning to self-employment for the first time in their lives; in some cases this is a necessity, in some cases they want to realise their 'dreams'. Mentoring is proven to help new businesses to succeed; many business fail within the first year; personal help and guidance can make a difference. The older generation who have retired but are still active; their valuable skills and wisdom can be used for volunteer mentoring, making that vital difference to the new business and also giving the older person a feeling that they remain a valuable contributor to civil society; hence intergenerational mentoring. Young unemployed are also in danger of social exclusion; they will be helped by this project.The project created a Mentoring Masterclass; this is a 'Train the Trainer' course; 59 trained mentors (36 expected). An e-learning course (included in the Intergenerational Mentoring Process) was created (open access) and 341 mentees have been trained(108 expected); the curriculum includes innovation and creativity skills, creating the entrepreneurial mindset and employability skills. This course is suitable for the target audience of unemployed, entrepreneurs, mentors, students, apprentices and a wider audience, including employers and business organisations; it can be made available to anyone in the world, providing suitable security is implementedThe partnership is mixed: 2 VET colleges, both with experience of projects involving elderly people and their needs; a University of Applied Science, with valuable knowledge of entrepreneurship skills, mentoring and coaching, and also co-creation (Living Lab) methodology; two third sector charities, who deal with older people and volunteers; a business network with older members amongst their SME membership; a private training company who is also an entrepreneur; another entrepreneur with skills dealing with accessibility for older people; a European network with access to more than 1500 institutions across Europe and beyondAll project partners participating gained knowledge of mentoring; impact on teachers and trainers was greater confidence when dealing with the business world and the world of work; learners of all kinds gained confidence and employability skills needed by employers. Mentors gained skills and confidence, feel socially included; training and mentoring could offered as part of services offered by the two charities; the VET institutions (and UAS) will have e-learning course available to use at any time, for their staff and/or students. The target groups have experienced the e-learning and the mentoring process; receiving advice and guidance in the form of mentoring has proven very useful in helping businesses succeed, so there are likely to be more successful businesses. Particularly in Spain and in Greece these outcomes are impressive, with businesses started and some winning external competitions.

In today’s society, high youth unemployment rates reflect difficulties faced by young people in finding a job. This problem is amplified in young people from disadvantaged backgrounds or with fewer opportunities, at risk of marginalisation, and suggests a hypothesis of change in systems of working, in relationship between generations and in training paths.The EvolYou project contributes to improve the level of key competences and skills, with particular regard to their relevance for labour market and their contribution to a cohesive society, in particular through strengthened cooperation between the world of education and training and the world of work. Specifically, it aims to intervene on the marginalisation and social exclusion phenomena, favoring active inclusion of disadvantaged young people aged 15-30 into labour market and consequently in society. This objective is achieved through a training path of participated involvement of senior expert volunteers in an intergenerational mentoring environment. The path contributes to upskill youngsters and bring them closer to work introduction systems, sharpening their soft and employability skills, so countering their conditions of fragility and disadvantage; furthermore it helps to develop the contribution of senior population to society.The starting point of the project is a good practice successfully applied in Germany for more than 10 years, the VerA initiative of the Senior Experten Service. Following the sharing of this initiative in a previous Erasmus+ KA202 project exchanging practices on voluntary work in the field of VET, some partners decided to transfer this good practice to their respective countries, but applying it to different targets of beneficiaries according to local needs. Thus the project realises the scaling up of the VerA initiative, bringing it in other EU countries where it still does not exist, to cater for the needs of young people in difficulties and to deal with differences in learning outcomes linked to social disparities, by cooperating with the responsible actors in the VET field of the respective Member States. This is done through a Strategic Partnership involving 6 countries and 9 partners active in the volunteering field.The partners develop a Didactic Experimentation, tested in 4 of the 6 countries on about 80-90 mentors and about 130 disadvantaged young people, specialising the target groups based on geographical area of belonging: in Italy, young migrants, asylum seekers and refugees, aged 18-30; in Spain, young people aged 16-20 undergoing Basic Vocational Training with special educational needs or with persistent economic problems and a low socio economic level; in France, apprentices and students in vocational education who have difficulties to follow their training and risk dropping out, aged 15-25 (most of whom with a profile very similar to NEETs); in Finland, migrants, low qualified apprentices and VET dropping out students, aged 18-30. The participant youngsters take part in the pilot test through training courses and Living Labs of mentoring in tandem, finding a mentor from the specific branch they are interested in.During 22 months of project, the partnership produces a Methodological Manual for implementing a new model of social inclusion by “redesigning the future in tandem”; the Didactic Experimentation in 4 European countries and the related curricula; and a Paper providing a series of Recommendations to influence the political discussion on volunteering, mentoring and the intergenerational cooperation at both national and European level. The project realises also a transnational mobility, with the goal to familiarize an interdisciplinary team of senior experts on intergenerational mentoring, starting from the experience of the VerA initiative.The main result of the project is the mentoring methodological model of social inclusion valid in Europe, which can favour the insertion of young people in difficulties into the world of work and can be maintained beyond the end of the project.The major expected impact involves enhancing the employability perspectives of target groups, by strengthening link among the youth field, senior volunteering and the labour market. Youngsters countering their conditions of fragility and disadvantage, by increasing their set of soft and employability skills and approaching themselves in a more conscious way the work introduction systems. In turn, senior experts strengthen their active contribution to society, making a service to themselves and to the community. In the long run, the project supports the alignment of the educational and training system to the needs of the labour market in terms of new skills for the future employees, closing the gap between education and businesses. In particular VET institutions can replicate or custom within their educational systems the new training path, adopting innovative approaches geared to social inclusion.