guidance activities

Guidance activities and processes: quantitative findings

The GOAL intervention in the Netherlands is unique: guidance sessions can be characterised as very short relative to those in the other participating countries (average 16 minutes).

The participants come from two very different types of organisations: a social service and a prison. This distinction is clearly reflected in the goals of the clients coming into the organisation. Participants from the municipality of Emmen come to the social service for practical reasons: for support with finding a job and making a CV. They have a clear focus, which is not necessarily directed at personal development/learning. Within the penitentiary institutions, the focus is almost not at all on work; people there are indeed more interested in personal development (educational opportunities).

Guidance activities and processes: qualitative findings

In all four of the pilot organisations, administering the Literacy Screener and the discussion about the outcome are fixed parts of the work process (standard procedure). The Literacy Screener is administered immediately upon arrival, and although PI Lelystad does sometimes encounter some resistance, participants generally do cooperate. The outcome provides the organisations with relevant information for the further performance of their work process.

The different parts of the guidance process (administering the Literacy Screener and discussion about the outcome/referral to a language course) are not always performed by the same person/department. This requires good arrangements and communication between the different people involved. It is striking that three of the four pilot organisations use unpaid workers (trainees or volunteers) to administer the Literacy Screener. In chapter 7, we go further into the competences they need to have.