P-1416 - Awareness method in truancy prevention programs: WE-STAY project

Abstract

Truancy is correlated to many aspects of adolescent daily life: physical, mental health, social and economical conditions. WE-STAY (Working in Europe to Stop Truancy Among Youth) is a prevention program designed to reduce truancy and to promote mental health among European adolescents. To evaluate the effectiveness of the awareness program, in truancy prevention . The awareness intervention aims to increase knowledge about a number of factors, including psychological ones, associated to truancy and how to get help. Gather information on truancy in European adolescents and perform three school-based health- promotion interventions for adolescents in the entire study and compare the results with a control intervention. Six European countries are participating in the WE- STAY intervention. In each country, a sample of 1600 pupils ages 14–18 will be randomized into one of four different intervention arms. Baseline evaluation of students’ lifestyle, coping styles, at-risk truancy, self-harm behaviours and mental health issues will be collected using a structured questionnaire. In the Molise region there are 58 schools, 15 vocational schools and 43 high schools, with a total of 15393 students. After the randomization, we were left with 32 schools, 6 vocational schools and 26 high schools, encompassing a total of 9.489 students, 4.166 males and 5.323 females. Truancy is often related to mental health problems and at-risk behaviours. WE-STAY will make it possible to evaluate outcomes of different preventive programs and to recommend effective culturally adjusted models for preventing truancy and promoting mental health for adolescents.