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For those who remain on Youthreach to finish either Foundation or Progression, there
is 75 % successful placement, 80 % after progression.
Report for working group 2: Employment
Birgit Reißig
Introduction
The subject of workshop 2 was the topic of employment.
The primary question posed was: how can disadvantaged youths and youths from
disadvantaged regions be led to employment with the aid of programmes?
Representatives from Hungary and Ireland presented appropriate measures. The focal
point of the Hungarian presentation was the programme “START” and the regional
employment market project “New Services – Employment of Youth”. The Irish
representatives presented their programme “YOUTHREACH“.
Similarities
The programmes of both countries are aimed at disadvantaged youths and young adults;
the Irish programme “YOUTHREACH” directly targets youths with individual
disadvantages whereas the Hungarian programme is based in one of the most undeveloped
regions of the country and therefore reacts primarily to regional disadvantages.
Both programmes aim to target the skills of youths and young adults and encourage and
develop these skills according to employment market requirements, for example the
development of so-called key qualifications.
A further common factor established by the working group was that in both
programmes and relevant national strategies it was important to learn from mistakes in
order to develop models for the professional integration of disadvantaged persons which
can promise success.
It was also reiterated several times that disadvantage per se has many facets and that it
would be necessary to develop a variety of models to cover the broad spectrum of
disadvantages.
A visible common aspect of both countries’ programmes was the positive results which
could be discerned: both programmes “New Services – Employment of Youth” and
“YOUTHREACH” achieved a 75 % success in the placement of young persons in
educational and training systems and/or the employment sector.
Alongside the common factors described above, a series of differences in the
programmes of each country could be observed.
Differences
The fundamental difference between both countries was that in Ireland both education and
employment were seen as a central responsibility of the state with the result that regional
levels had little or no influential capability. Education and employment were therefore
under the central control of the state. In contrast, a large part of the employment market in
Hungary cannot be supervised through centralised regulation with the result that 73 % of
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