Scoala Gimnaziala "Constantin Gh. Marinescu"

Scoala Gimnaziala “Constantin Gh. Marinescu” located in the central area of Galati, was founded in the year 1973 under the name of School Nr. 2 Galati, operating under this title until 2012, when he took the name of the academician with Galatian origins, with a rich theoretical and scientific activity in the field of ecology, medicine, society. Our town, Galati, is situated in the south-east part of Romania, on the banks of the river Danube, close to the border with Republic of Moldova.
The school has 15 classrooms with computers connected to Internet and video projectors, labs for Physics-Chemistry, Biology, Geography, ICT, a library with over 21000 volumes, a gym and a sport terrain. The digital infrastructure of the school, although seemingly modern, is technically obsolete,
with an age of more than 7 years and requires modernization The school feels the need to step in with the times, through digitalisation both at the technological level and at the professional level, in order to ensure a modern and quality education.
Our school has 606 pupils aged 3 to 15 years, organized in 4 kindergarten groups, 13 primary education classes and 11 classes of gymnasium education. Kindergarten and primary classes go to school in the morning and secondary classes go to school in the afternoon.
Most of our pupils live in the city but we also have pupils who live in the residential area or in the countryside. About 15% of our pupils are exposed to social exclusion risk due to financial difficulties caused by high unemployment rate, and 30% of our pupils have one or both parents working abroad,
and their relatives take care of them. Our pupils come from various social, economic and family environments, which translates into the variety of their school results. We have students with excellent results in national evaluation, students awarded at national or international school contests,
but also students on the verge of school abandonment.
Most of the last ones end up in this situation amid emotional problems caused by the lack of parents in their lives, whether they belong to single-parent families, whether one or both parents are going to work abroad.
Our school has 45 school teachers are qualified with an average age of 43 years, 90% of them with university education, and 60% obtained the most important teaching degree in Romania. The school needs modern digital equipment and teachers trained to use it to provide education that promotes
online safety and well-being in the digital world by developing social, civic and non-violent communication skills.
The key values promoted by our school are equal opportunities for all, tolerance, respect, flexibility, responsibility and professionalism. The entire activity of our school, didactic activities, extracurricular activities and projects, is presented on its own website www.scoala2galati.ro, on blogs attached to it and in social media.

The international experience of our school debuted in the year 2002 by participating in the Ecoschool Program, a program that encourages ecological activities and rewards the most active schools. Our school has been awarded the Green Flag each year since its first participation. In 2016, our school has focused on the "Eat Responsibly" project included in the Eco-School program, which encourages the use of food purchased from local producers, healthy eating, and discouraging waste of food.
Starting from the year 2008 we run various projects on the eTwinning platform, involving both primary and secondary classes, ranging from a wide range of fields: ecology, foreign languages, arts, photography, mathematics, astronomy, inclusion.
For 4 years, between the years 2009 and 2013, our school was a partner in two multilateral Comenius projects, one dedicated to the celebration of the International year of astronomy 2009 and the other dedicated to the importance of water in everyday life.
In the first Comenius project "The same though different sky above us", we were partners along with schools from Portugal, Poland, Greece, Italy and France. The project included astronomical observations compared to participating countries and collaborations with amateur astronomers or
professionals. In the second Comenius project "Wiki Water World" we had partners from Turkey, Finland, Poland, the United Kingdom, Cyprus and Portugal. The theme of the project was water, starting from the fact that all participating schools were from localities on water and the history of the
respective towns was heavily influenced by water.
Starting September 2017, we are running the Erasmus + KA1 project "Inclusive School - a School for Everyone", a project that will end in June 2019. The project has moved away from the growing need for inclusion in the educational environment, whether we are talking social inclusion, cultural, material or inclusion of pupils with special educational needs. Thus, 10 teachers participated in the training courses, of which 5 primary school teachers and 5 secondary school teachers, and at the end of the project we will publish a good practice guide.
Also, in 2018, we became partners for two years in the Erasmus + KA229 project "STEAM Time - Solve UNESCO Crime", along with schools in Croatia, Italy, Poland and the Netherlands. The project focuses on the UNESCO heritage of each country, and its combination with mathematics, technology, arts, everything that means the STEAM area.
Our school develop multiple partnerships with local or national experts in the field of complementary education.
Our teachers participate in the last 8 years to entrepreneurship educational projects carried out by the association Junior Achievement Romania, which provide educational resources and materials for use in the classroom. This year our school has concluded a protocol with the Romanian Financial
Surveillance Authority for sessions of teaching financial education for students of all ages. Also, in the last 15 years we collaborated with the local Centre of Resources and Educational Assistance for providing career guidance for our students.
The project team of our school is made up of 4 teachers who have expertise in the management of European projects, they have been working in the previous Comenius projects, or being part of the Erasmus+ teams of the school. The coordinator is teacher of Maths and astronomy, which also
coordinates the KA1 and KA229 Erasmus+ project teams. Two of these are members of the Erasmus + project team "STEAM Time – Solve UNESCO Crime". All 4 formed the Erasmus + project team “Inclusive School – a School for Everyone", which they managed and successfully implemented
in our school and are eager to transpose the experience accumulated in this project. Any of the team members could take the lead of the team just in case.
Being a school with experience in European projects and partnerships, we will put all our expertise in achieving the goals of this project and for carrying it out alongside with our partners. The project team members are hard working and creative people, reliable and willing to learn form the others, and in he same time ready to share their experience with project partners.