G8WAY participated in ONLINE EDUCA, Berlin 2010, presenting the issue of "Carreers 2.0 - Supporting educational transitions with web 2.0 and social software". 

This pre-conference session was centered around the question on how young people can be supported in educational transitions by internet based services (e.g. career advice, information and guidance).

There is a wide recognition of the importance of providing support to young people on their way to employment and increasing interest in the potential of technology assisted learning to provide support for the challenges of transition. However, this area of learning remains in its infancy and poses a series of issues for policy makers, researchers and practitioners alike. The European project G8WAY is investigating on how social software and Web 2.0 applications can be used to support young people in transitions.

The following key issues were explored during the pre-conference:

• Which are the challenges of educational transitions – how do young people start a career in recession-hit European societies?
• What are the potentials of social software and web 2.0 tools in the context of transitions?
• Which role can careers guidance and support play in this process?
• What is the future of technology based learning regarding career education?

The second G8WAY workshop took place from 20.-21. May in Bucharest, Romania. The event was hosted by the Institute of Educational Sciences.

On Thursday the results of the first project phase were discussed: a) key issues report on educational transition from school to work / higher education to work, b) pedagogy framework for the development of web 2.0 environment, which shall support students at the acquisition of transition skills and competencies, c) analysis of case studies into transition pathways and key learning issues.

On Friday working groups were formed in order to:

• develop a shared methodology, which should allow for building an initial set of personas and scenarios from transition case studies,
• elaborate a conceptual framework for the development of a web 2.0 powered platform for the support of educational transition.

The G8WAY project in order to identify trends or patterns in user behaviours, expectations, motivations and experienced support in transitions capitalizes on the concept of personas. Personas are fictional characters created to represent the different user types within a targeted demographic, attitude and/or behaviour set that might use a site, brand or product in a similar way (Wikipedia). Personas can be seen as tool or method for design. Personas are useful in considering the goals, desires, and limitations of users in order to help to guide decisions about a service, product or interaction space for a website.

A user persona is a representation of the goals and behaviour of a real group of users. In most cases, personas are synthesised from data collected from interviews with users. They are captured in one to two page descriptions that include behaviour patterns, goals, skills, attitudes, and environment, with a few fictional personal details to make the persona a realistic character. Personas identify the user motivations, expectations and goals responsible for driving online behaviour, and bring users to life by giving them names, personalities and often a photo.

The G8WAY wiki has been launched. The wiki in the framework of the project will function as a tool, which shall allow for sharing knowledge and continously update our understanding of the key issues of the project.

The project team just got informed that the ECER programme committee has selected G8WAY for a presentation on "Managing Educational Transitions using the potential of web 2.0". The European Conference on Educational Research (ECER) 2010 will take place in Helsinki, Finland end of August 2010.

The presentation is scheduled in session 02 SES 11 B on 27/Aug/2010, 2:45pm - 4:15pm in room P723.

The kick-off meeting took place in Halle/Saale from 17th to 18th December 2009. At the meeting the partners discussed the actual situation of educational transition in their countries, main target und groups and needs associated with these target groups. Furthermore a common project strategy was agreed, and partner tasks were allocated. The workshop was organized by the German Youth Institute (Deutsches Jugendinstitut e.V.)