The VISIONARY and the VISIONARIES-NET Project

Abstract

The VISIONARIES-NET conferences on school bullying and violence are part of the second phase of the VISIONARY project.

The VISIONARY project is a European Commission-sponsored activity involving five European countries to create international and country-specific Internet portals on school bullying and violence prevention in schools. The VISIONARY portal - was created within the first phase of the VISIONARY project (2000-2003) - presents and structures information and facilitate discussions and networking at a national and international level. It is available in English, German, Portuguese, Danish and Finnish.

VISIONARIES-NET - the second phase of the project (2004-2006) - focuses on online conferences on school bullying and violence for selected groups of experts. Furthermore a Spanish, French and Romanian version of the portal will be created.

Background

Violence in school, juvenile violence and crime have been among the major topics in many countries. Incidents such as the massacre in Erfurt, Germany in 2002, in which 18 people were killed, and teenage suicides due to bullying in Scotland in 2002, have increased public awareness of these issues..

In many countries we have a huge and constantly growing number of approaches, materials, web sites, mailing lists etc.focusing onviolence and violence prevention. So, one large current problem is not a lack but rather an "oversupply" of approaches that makes orientation difficult and sometimes discourages practitioners.

Tasks

The broad aim of the VISIONARY project and our new VISIONARIES-NET project is to create an environment that enables our users in different countries and with different experiences to learn from one other.

In the VISIONARY project we are not developing new concepts or approaches on violence in schools. Rather, we collect and structure information that we find on the Internet and provide a platform which facilitates the search for information.

Furthermore our web site aims at networking our users – teachers, parents, pupils, experts and anyone searching for information about violence in schools – at a national and international level.

The projects

VISIONARY is an acronym for "Violence in school – intelligence on the net-applying resources for youngsters". The development of our website is supported by SOCRATES / MINERVA, a program of the European Commission.

The VISIONARY portal was created between 2000 and 2002 by a team of about 20 people from five countries – Germany (project co-ordination), Denmark, Finland, Portugal and the UK.

The VISIONARIES-NET project that has started in December 2004 builds on the VISIONARY project. The VISIONARIES-NET project is a co-operation of teams from Germany, France, Spain and Romania. The main aim of this project will be to bring together persons engaged in violence prevention in school by means of online conferences.

Perspectives

As violence in schools and violence prevention are among the major topics of concern in countries throughout Europe and all over the world, it is part of the VISIONARY concept to include other countries in the future.

According to the VISIONARY ethos/philosophy, all of us can learn and profit from approaches and experiences in other countries. Consequently, the development of an extensive international network is an essential long-term goal of our project.

Literature

Jäger, Th., Bradley, C. & Rasmussen, M. (Eds.) (2003). Violence Prevention in School Using the Internet: A European Perspective.Landau: Verlag Empirische Pädagogik.

Jäger, Th. & Amado, J. (2005). VISIONARY - a European Internet portal on violence in school. In Organization for Economic Cooperationand Development (OECD). School Safety and Security - Lessons in Danger. OECD Publishing: Paris.

The VISIONARY portal. www.violence-in-school.info