EntreeNH Provides Perspective on Working and Learning

This way, education and the labor market align better, students get more opportunities for work and further education, and perspective arises for everyone. Project leader Martijn Grosmann explains how EntreeNH works, what the successes are, and where the challenges lie. 

First of all, the target group EntreeNH focuses on: This group is growing, partly due to the arrival of many new Dutch residents such as status holders and asylum seekers. People who want to stay in the Netherlands and need education to take the step to the labor market. Although the total number of students is declining there, a school like Talland College has grown enormously in the number of classes with non-Dutch-speaking students. But, as Grosmann emphasizes, it is also about young people with low cognition or behavioral disorders. “This group, for example, has difficulty processing information or showing desired behavior. That is why they also have difficulty holding a job once they enter the labor market.”

Preliminary Trajectories

The approach of EntreeNH sometimes means thinking outside the box, such as the so-called preliminary trajectories in the technical sector. These trajectories are financially supported by the province of North Holland and ensure that people can develop through an introductory program within technology. Grosmann gives a nice example of employees who work for nature management in the dunes near Bakkum and Castricum at PWN. “Those guys learn to work in the dunes under the guidance of a green job coach. They feel comfortable because they are not bothered by the stimuli of the city.” The team looks at perspective and cognition and determines the educational and support needs per participant. “In addition to concrete work experience within a company, participants also receive lessons in basic skills and thus find out what they do or do not understand and where they have difficulties.” The result of these preliminary trajectories is that it offers tailor-made solutions for a follow-up trajectory. 

Not Competing but Building Together

“EntreeNH works together with a number of partners, for example the UWV, the municipality, education, and business, who come together and lead an agreed number of people to a certain sector for an agreed period.” Facilitating the collaboration well did bring some challenges. But that is exactly what makes working with the Manifest Working and Developing 2030 so nice, according to Grosmann. “The Manifest ensured that all the different partners were brought together. So we really had to sit around the table to better understand each other, get to know each others character, and also see where the limits to someones participation were.” 

Spreading and Exchanging Knowledge

EntreeNH is a finite project, but Grosmann and his team are fully committed to making their efforts sustainable. The campus formation with learning-work locations is a good example. In addition, the team fully focuses on knowledge sharing so that the knowledge is safeguarded when EntreeNH ends. For this, a practorate is being established, a kind of lectorate for MBO that functions as a knowledge circle. But it does not stop there, because Grosmann also founded the EntreeNH Academy. “That sounds impressive, but you should see it as a colorful collection of good training, courses, masterclasses, and meetings. In this way, we facilitate professionals to exchange knowledge among themselves.” The biggest challenge he sees is investing in the network: We must be able to trust each other and think every year whether cooperation is well on the radar.”