Traditionally, young pupils threatened by school exclusion have been assisted by addressing individual, acute problems, directed to the goals defined by some authority. However, methods and approaches focusing on individuals ignore the role of social context in creating the problems, thus blaming the pupils themselves and alone for their problems (Colley 2003). Consideration and improvement of the social context call for versatile dialogical collaboration within the framework of learning networks (Alasoini 1999; Knight 2002). For this case study, which focuses on one particular lower secondary school, a local polytechnic was invited to help the project by the school’s initiative. In addition, the school and polytechnic asked university researchers to develop methodology that would support young pupils and also promote and facilitate multiprofessional cooperation in changing the community in terms of supporting pupils at risk of school exclusion and also their families. Learning network means that all partners learn in terms of dialogical collaboration within the network, as the network, and beyond the boundaries of the network. The partners working together in this project are pupils at the risk of exclusion, their families, teachers and school counsellors of lower secondary school, teachers and students of a polytechnic (university of applied sciences), researchers of the universities, personnel of workplaces, and voluntary organizations. A prerequisite for starting dialogical collaboration in the framework of learning network is to create interactive forums called learning spaces (Alasoini 1999). Research questions: 1. What kind of interactive forums will develop in the learning network when the aim is to support pupils at risk of school exclusion? 2. How do the various interactive forums of the learning network produce ideas and methods for developing the model for supporting pupils at risk of school exclusion? 3. How can the effects of the learning network be evaluated?

In this project, learning network and dialogical collaboration within it are conceptualized within the framework of cultural-historical activity theory and the notion of expansive learning (Engeström 2001a). It binds the development of the community within the different activity systems involved in the partnership between various organizations. Moreover, cultural-historical activity theory offers a conceptual framework for analyzing and designing collaborative activities from the viewpoint of a collective activity system model, as an entire analysis unit of human practice and development. (Daniels et al 2007; Engeström 2001b; Leadbetter et al. 2007; Huotari 2008.) The data was collected by audio taping the meetings, i.e. interactive forums, realized between the participants of this project. The data was analyzed in three stages of multiprofessional learning (Daniels et al. 2007; Engeström 2001b; Janhonen & Sarja 2000).

In the analysis two different origins of the meetings of learning network emerged: 1. Meetings organized by the lower secondary school (The large steering group meetings; Teachers’ in-service training). 2. Meetings organized by the researchers (Meetings of the small core groups; education and training of partners of this project). During the first year of the network learning project useful dialogical forums were established. From the viewpoint of dialogical collaboration, the participant-oriented core group meetings have provided the best interactive forums in developing new ideas and new tools that serve the original purpose of this project. One of the tools was the phase model of mentoring carried out by the students of health and social work.