Štefan Gorše from Novo mesto

Proposer: Novo Mesto School Centre, headmaster

Štefan Gorše began his professional career at the Jesenice ironworks. His path then took him to Dolenjska, where he made his home and became involved in adult education. Since 1971 he has been the head of adult education programmes at the Novo Mesto School Centre. For three decades he has been striving for the quality implementation, development and openness of secondary education programmes and other education programmes for adults. He is constantly supplementing the range of education available with new programmes that he plans in collaboration with the employment office and the region's major companies. He constantly monitors the personnel requirements of Dolenjska's economy and takes these into account in his development plans for adult education. He has done a great deal in the field of recognising previously (non-formally) acquired knowledge and skills, which has helped many employees requalify at a time of restructuring of the economy, while for the unemployed it has made it easier to obtain a qualification and thus find a way into employment. Štefan Gorše, who has enjoyed the understanding and support of the director of the School Centre, has further accelerated the development of the sphere by setting up a special adult education unit which currently employs ten adult educators/education organisers. The unit works at three levels: it runs programmes leading to educational qualifications, offers vocational training programmes and acts as a driving school offering training to drivers from professional categories. Today, thanks to him, adults in the Dolenjska region can train for more than 40 professions. With an ear to the needs of the commercial sector, and programmes leading to formal educational qualifications, training programmes and professional developments that are adapted to these needs, he has achieved a very high rate of employability among the participants in education. In planning work in his unit he has not forgotten drop-outs nor the inhabitants of the surrounding area, to whom access to computers and thus to e-literacy is enabled on an open basis and under expert guidance. Štefan Gorše has therefore ensured that the School Centre is so firmly involved in its environment and its development that the model is surely worth copying!