Halmstad
Halmstad (100.000 inhabitants) is on the Swedish west coast, 1 hour by train from Gothenburg and 2 hours from Copenhagen. The city is growing and expanding and its favourable location allows businesses to develop and tourism to thrive. Halmstad’s biggest employers are the Municipal Council and the County Council, followed by companies in trade and tourism. Sector-diverse small and mid-sized companies are prospering, too.
Halmstad has a port for freight transports and is one of Sweden’s leaders for timber exports. Its renowned University educates 12,000 students and its main faculties are Innovation (Engineering), Computing, and Health and Lifestyle. Unemployment is relatively low in the city (5,2%, 2017) and so is youth unemployment (7,8%, 2017).
The Municipal Council wants to develop Halmstad as a city of knowledge and a city of experiences: ‘…where people grow and develop with life-long learning, creativity, entrepreneurship and innovative thinking’. Knowledge, therefore, is ever present in local policies. The 150 M€ budget for Education is the highest share of the municipal expenses: remarkably, about 8.000 € per student.
Achievements
Making the most of the ON BOARD Transfer Network Project, in Halmstad we have:
- Reinforced the city’s social sustainability goals. Our Vice Mayor Jenny Axelson has put it, “Transnational collaboration projects like ON BOARD that connect public policies (education) with local business and associations provide the necessary push to work as we need to: together and thinking broadly. With schools working together with other schools, authorities and civil society, this reflects Halmstad's goal of social sustainability, since Halmstad wants to be an inclusive municipality.”
- Improved cooperation between the two municipal Education Departments (Primary and Secondary levels), and made the project and the Educational Innovation Network model visible and well understood amongst city officials.
- Increased resources from one of its educational departments, allocated to a new person for the Educational Innovation Network projects in school area North: Oskarström/Åled, with a view to a future scale-up to another one of the total 5 City District. Area North includes 10 pre-schools and 3 primary schools.
- Nurtured a forum that enables to plan, implement and evaluate joint work. There is a wider and deeper sense of the enriching benefits that networking creates in the community, out of the dialogues and exchange of experiences. “It creates a common language and a sense of belonging and pride that we can change things together” (local entrepreneur). For our teachers, this has been energizing through their-to-peer learning and co-teaching.
- Created new collaborations to develop the salutogenic perspective in Oskarströms. The "Happy Brain cell" project is where school staff, in collaboration with the university, has produced teaching material that creates awareness about how good habits are important for students´ overall well-being and success in school.
- Launched the “Stroller Walks” for good habits to engage with parents from a very early stage. It is unusual in Sweden to have parents participate in school projects, through ON BOARD we have developed a concept for pram walks to find a form of collaboration with and between parents.
Halmstad’s EducationalInnovation Network KeyCommunity Members
Ourimpact
Schools
participating
in ON BOARD
13
Teachers and principals
participating
in ON BOARD
389
Students
involved in ON BOARD projects and activities
996
Families
directly participating in activities and meetings
100
Companies
participating in ON BOARD activities and meetings
10
Universities
that have contributed to the project
2
Local entities
participating in ON BOARD activities and meetings
10
Mayors and councillors
who have participated in meetings or events of the network
2
People from the municipal staff
involved in the project
20
Pilot Projects
initiated in your city
5
ULG
meetings
40
15%
Improvement of external
regional exams results
20%
Reduction of school failure
20%
Truancy reduction
100%
Students´acquisition of digital skills in school curricula.
100%
Teachers acquire tergeted digital skills
Halmstad voices
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