The European Union Education and Training strategy for 2020 has among its objectives an intention to improve the quality and efficiency of education and training lifelong for Europe’s success and to enhance employability and mobility (EU 2009). In addition to mobility and employability for the population of Europe, the purpose is to make higher education in Europe (both EU and linked states) attractive to global students. One important component of this planned improvement and increased co-operation lies in the follow-up information systems for students in the various countries.

School leavers’ surveys, research programmes which are surveying the students leaving school or graduating, can help to explore the mechanisms of knowledge societies and bring important and relevant information on the processes of lifelong learning also. The different educational organizations both in secondary and tertiary education require information on how their school leavers are performing in the next educational stage or at their work place. The guidance systems also need to distribute information on the different careers concerning the necessary skills and competences and prepare the students for the school to work transition (Cedefop 2003, OECD 2004). The sets of information acquired could be used to strengthen tuition and help the transition of students particularly those faced by apparent barriers to further participation (Gorard et al. 2007).

The aim of the current investigation is to describe and compare the different school leavers’ surveys. This information and the experiences of the different leavers’ surveys might support other countries considering to launch a research program and on the European level to ‘encourage agreement on a 'best practice' template to facilitate the partial harmonisation of existing transition surveys’. (Smyth et al. 2001: i)

Research question:

-          What is the purpose and use of different school leavers’ surveys in different European countries?

-          How are the different follow-up research programmes built up concerning research aims, designs and methodology?

At the first stage of the project the different school leaver surveys are going to be explored via the available documents. In this phase the differences in the research questions and the purpose of the leavers’ surveys are investigated along with the research design and methodological differences. From the analysis of the existing surveys I aim to make a categorization based on the purpose and the designs.

Using the typology I will select several surveys from each cluster for further analysis in the second phase. At this stage the different trajectories in the history of the research, the opinion of the stakeholders using the research are to be discovered.

At the third phase the information gained via a school leaver survey is to be followed through its path from the publication of the results to the different institutions and to put into use.

Biggart A., Deacon K., Dobbie F., Furlong A., Given L., Jones L. (2005) 24 in 2004 – Scotland’s Young People: Findings from the Scottish School Leavers Survey Webpage http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/57346/0016520.pdf Last view: 20th January, 2011 Cedefop (2003) Guidance Policies in the Knowledge Society – Trends, Challenges and Responses across Europe Webpage: http://www.crccanada.org/conference/bridging_the_gap/guidance_orientation/Toronto-EUSynthesis_sept27.pdf Cereq (2007) Quand l’école est fi nie... Premiers pas dans la vie active de la Génération 2004 (When school is over... First steps in the working lives of Generation 2004) Webpage: http://www.cereq.fr/pdf/qeesf2004.pdf Last view: 20th January, 2011 EU (2009) Council conclusions of 12 May 2009 on a strategic framework for European cooperation in education and training (‘ET 2020’) (2009/C 119/02) Webpage: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:C:2009:119:0002:0010:EN:PDF Last view: 20th January, 2011 Gorard, S., with Adnett, N., May, H., Slack, K., Smith, E. and Thomas, L. (2007) Overcoming barriers to HE, Stoke-on-Trent: Trentham Books Hartas, D (Ed) (2010) Educational Research and Inquiry: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches (9781441178718) London: Continuum Maastricht University (2008) Schoolverlaters tussen onderwijs en arbeidsmarkt, ROA Webpage: http://www.roa.unimaas.nl/pdf_publications/2009/ROA_R_2009_4.pdf Last view: 20th January, 2011 OECD (2004) Carrier Guidance and Public Policy Webpage: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/33/45/34050171.pdf Last view: 20th January, 2011 Smyth E., Gangl, M., Raffe D., Hannan D. F., McCoy S (2001) A Comparative Analysis of Transitions from Education to Work in Europe (CATEWE). Webpage: http://www.mzes.uni-mannheim.de/projekte/catewe/publ/publ_e.html Last view: 20th January, 2011 Statistics Sweden (2008) Entrance to the Labour Market Webpage: http://www.scb.se/Pages/Product____9866.aspx Last view: 20th January, 2011