This project ACCT - Activate Creative and Critical Thinking-Read to Lead, though seemingly unlrelated, is the offspring of a project on employability, entrpreneurship, social entrepreneurship incl.

While prioritising employabilty and entrepreneurship skills we arrived at the conclusion that critical and creative thinking are crucial. Another pressing need at school is to combat aliteracy. Linking these to respond to students needs happens to meet EC priorities -HORIZONTAL: Social and educational value of European cultural heritage and Development of relevant and high-quality skills and competences; SCHOOL EDUCATION: Promoting the acquisition of skills and competences. We organised the project around 3 themes - Cultural heritage/European Year of Cultural Heritage, Entrepreneurial learning, and EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy - combined to create new perspectives.

The project sets out to enhance reading critical and creative skills. Young people today tend to ignore reading and school often fails to encourage them appropriately to do that. Our project aims to help our students become aware of the necessity to read, see that they are capable of thinking creatively and establishing themselves as confident, competent people.

Six secondary schools (Bulgaria, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Romania) will bring together skills and expertise to work towards what is today's school major task -teach students(aged 14-20) to recognise and develop their potential as individuals and teammates and build up the right set of attitudes, skills and values to the benefit of themselves and society. We bring together partners from a wide range of backgrounds to cross-fertilise experience. By working together our students will be exposed to innovative approaches young people from other countries experience and will develop a sharper insight into the way ideas shape society.

The design of project activities is based on the understanding that basic literacy is not enough. In the contemporary economy, multiple reading skills are needed. Readers must be able to navigate various sources of knowledge (we draw on from myths and legends to media)and be able to analyse, interpret and synthesise. So, we initiate a practical project which aims to deliver a real social benefit through redesigning reading.This project examines how reading, writing, debating and acting connect with critical thinking and creativity.By applying creative methodology in intensive and extensive reading, reading comprehension, writing, research, discussion, debate and drama, we will tackle aliteracy. This project also sets out to explode the myth that reading is a personal passive pursuit. It looks upon reading as a creative team activity, and addresses how reading, interwoven with creative activities, helps young people become good team players.

The main goal is to translate the framework into a structured approach involving activities aimed at the following desired outcomes:

• a confident person with a strong sense of right and wrong, is adaptable,resilient, knows themselves, is discerning in judgment, thinks independently and critically, and communicates effectively
• a self-directed independent learner who questions, reflects, perseveres
• an active contributor able to work effectively in teams, is innovative, exercises initiative, takes calculated risks and strives for excellence, a concerned citizen who is rooted to their country and EU, has a strong sense of civic responsibility, is informed about their country, the EU and the world, and takes an active part in bettering the lives of others.

The implementation of the project will be based on permanent communication via social media, Twin Space, face to face in 6 short-term students exchange activities. The final product is seen as an e-booklet of reading materials and video clips of drama and debate activities.

Considering that the topic is a European priority, we believe that it must be disseminated widely from the level of partners’ institutions to wider educational community by using mass media, a project website,a FB page and direct meetings. Having a broad range, looking at the interaction of institutions, it could be of interest to librarians, teachers, policymakers, local authorities and school library services. It argues that these, working in partnership, can play an increasingly important role both in helping the next generation to lead richer lives and by preparing them for their role in creative economy. High-level creative reading skills, coupled with social, civic and intercultural competences, media literacy, and critical thinking now form part of the toolkit that young people need in order to get the most out of their lives. This two-year project represents one phase of a long-term goal devoted to the acquisition of specific life and intercultural skills and strategies, which will enable students to make better sense of the world they live in and their place in it.