The Necessity to Negotiate the Syllabus in Second Chance Schools: An Innovative Approach

European unification and the scale of current economic and social change has led to the construction of a multidimensional, constantly evolving environment diversifying in languages and cultures, social communities and political constitutions. The demands for the maintenance and development of such a multifarious population are thus increased. Second Chance Schools (SCSs) were established in Greece in 1999 as a special programme which offers education and training to adults “at risk of social exclusion” aiming at their social and economic integration. Diversity in SCSs demands a new approach to education and training, and the existence of multiple identities, values and cultures within SCSs challenges both trainers and trainees to cultivate mutual understanding and to promote democratic standards in order to ensure equality in education and facilitate SCS trainees’ inclusion in social, economic and cultural dimensions. This paper argues that EFL literacy in SCSs can best be developed on the basis of a negotiated syllabus which has been promoted by recent trends in educational theory as the most democratic and flexible syllabus that can offer significant opportunities for developing basic skills and qualifications and trigger processes of self-discovery, shared decision-making and responsibility. The paper draws its materials from a systematic research conducted in different SCSs in northern Greece over a period of 8 months. Adopting a mixed-method approach, I analysed data from a variety of different sources, such as official documentation, detailed questionnaires, semi-structured interviews with trainers of EFL literacy, and real time classroom observation. This paper outlines in detail the main elements of the negotiated syllabus and, on the basis of research findings, discuss why such a syllabus is appropriate to the teaching of EFL literacies. It also presents practical devices for the implementation of a negotiated syllabus, which allow the development of negotiated work in class. It concludes with some possible implications and stresses the need for further investigation.