"<< Objectives >>The project’s main objective is to encourage young people from socially disadvantaged communities to shape their local natural environment and contribute to fight climate change through a collaborative, cross-border effort between Austria and the Netherlands. Young people are sensitized in environmental topics through the conduction of a Green Summer Camp. Trainers and educators working with young people are given the tools to carry out non-formal education programs on environmental pedadogy.<< Implementation >>Firstly, a framework program for the Green Summer Camp and a guideline for experiments and a case study concerning awareness for environmental issues among the target group is created. Secondly, a Green Summer Camp for 10 young people from both partner countries each will be implemented. Thirdly, the results will be summarized in a 40 page-manual for trainers and educators. In a forth step, the manual and its findings will be spread to different communities through train-the-trainer workshops.<< Results >>GECCO contributes to the fight against climate change on different levels. On the one hand, young people with specific needs are sensitized for shaping their own communities in an environmentally-friendly way. On the other hand, trainers and educators have improved opportunities to conduct ""green weeks"" in non-formal education settings themselves. If this pilot project is successful, an expansion of the initiative with further project partners is conceivable and desirable."

<< Objectives >>The READ project aims to demystify the EYWA/Bonn Process and make it more understandable for professionals, especially young professionals. Different methods are to be developed and tested with young people. It is essential to transfer knowledge across generations, so to speak. By educating young professionals, we want to provide young people with role models to guide them. Young people's interest in Europe should be improved and their own commitment strengthened.<< Implementation >>The project is approaching its goal in various steps. These are workshops at national level for young professionals, workshops with young people, an international meeting and a final evaluation event. The participating organisations are strengthened in their daily educational work through new methods and the training of junior staff.<< Results >>We expect from this project that, on the one hand, young professionals who have not yet worked at European level will gain knowledge that they did not acquire during their training/studies. On the other hand, the organisations will further develop their methodological pool through young professionals and in exchange with experienced professionals.

<< Objectives >>MHYT provides the partner organisations with an understanding of the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on young people’s mental health internationally. It creates a forum to exchange good practises about dealing with young people’s mental health issues with regard to Corona and beyond, and a support network for youth workers .Beyond that it will help build a network from which future cooperations, e.g. a Cooperation Partnership, can be formed.<< Implementation >>MHYT will consist of three main activities:On regional/local level the partner organisations will carry out workshops for youth workers to exchange their experience and best-practise solutions.On transnational level youth workers will participate in a workshop about mental health of young people in transitional times.Then the partner organisations will meet to put together the results of the previous activities and to develop ways to further implement the shared good practises.<< Results >>The participating organisations will have a better overview of the effects of Corona on mental health of young people. Their youth workers will be strengthened in dealing with the psychological implications of the pandemic and in accepting their limits.Aside from that it will establish a network to exchange experiences on the topic of mental health of young people.

"CONTEXT2019 marks the year of the elections of the European Parliament. The results of the 2014 EU elections however show that the overall voter turnout was low and lowest in the population aged 18-24 years (cf. European Parliament “Post-election survey 2014”). Our network partners who work with young people daily experience that active citizenship has become yet another area of exclusion, especially for disadvantaged young people who struggle to participate in society anyway. Thankfully, the new EU Youth Strategy takes this topic seriously with its goals of engaging, connecting and empowering, especially disadvantaged young people (cf. European Commission 2018: EU Youth Strategy 2019-2027). These goals are key to the Europe3E project and set the agenda for the ways in which we want to encourage young people and youth workers to grow.The Europe3E project is designed as a follow-up project of the highly successful ""YourEP"" project, which ran from 2016-2018 (https://bit.ly/2TIvlMu). ""YourEP"" tackled the exclusion of young people in active citizenship by developing a political simulation game together with disadvantaged young people. Furthermore, it draws on the positive experiences with peer research in the equally successful ""Our Life. Our Voice. Young people and poverty"" project (https://bit.ly/2O5nK4k).OBJECTIVES, OUTPUTS & IMPACTThe Europe3E project aims to develop with the IO1 “Europe3E ” Europe and me – participatory photo voice research, IO2 “Europe3E – How to involve all youth in the European project” solid training material to be used by youth workers and youth practitioners in political and civic education. It will be available in all partner languages. Finally, the project will analyse and collate the experiences and knowledge generated by this working process into policy recommendations (IO3). The recommendations will build on the process and results of the peer-research of the young people and the training activities, in particular the simulation game. By giving young people agency, we want to make sure their perspectives and voices are heard. The youth workers and practitioners complement the recommendations by contributing with their expertise as well.Participating in the project will ensure that youth workers improve their professional competences across different areas of the European Competence Model for Youth Workers (https://tinyurl.com/y42xeroa). Most notably they will increase their competences in the areas of -designing programmes, -facilitating individual and group learning in an enriching environment-networking and advocating.The project aims also at engage young people who are furthest away from the political sphere, promote active citizenship and support social inclusion of young people with fewer opportunities. Through the project, the involved young people will improve:-Social, civic, intercultural, interpersonal and communicational competences;-Leadership and entrepreneurial skills thanks to their active role in the project;-their EU and general political awareness.PARTICIPANTSOur project partners work with young people facing different difficulties every day. Each project partner will identify young people that are facing multiple challenges in life to participate in the project as these youth will be likely to benefit the most from the Europe3E project. As youth work professionals, our partners have the methods and tools needed to recruit young participants who would usually not participate in such activities. Next to the young participants, the partners’ youth workers will also be involved in all activities. They will 1) empower the participants to be the main actors of this project exploring, exchanging and exhibiting their views of Europe and how it can become engaging for young people and 2) lead the work of the Intellectual Outputs by collating the material into 3 products. ACTIVITIES To reach our goals, we will set up groups of young people in each participating country to discuss the meaning of the EU from their own experience. Supported by youth workers, they take part in local meetings and Blended Learning activities (C1 and C2) that facilitate their understanding of Europe and the EU, and then find out more in their communities using the method of photovoice. Testing the EP simulation game during the second Blended Mobility will provide the chance for the young people to put their knowledge into practice. As mentioned above, youth workers will ensure to collate the experiences into the 3 Intellectual Outputs. The Multiplier Events (E1-E7) locally and a final conference in Brussels will give the young people the chance to discuss their research results and the knowledge gained with a wider audience, empowering them further to become change-makers in their communities and beyond. To ensure a solid management of the project and development of high quality products the project consortium will gather at 4 TPMs over the lifetime of the project."

CONTEXT / BACKGROUNDSince the outbreak of the Covid19-pandemic, our lives and the way we perceive social interactions have changed drastically. Youth organisations have had to reinvent themselves, find new ways of working and interacting to ensure that those in the most vulnerable situations would still be supported. These adaptations call for innovative and creative practices. That is why with the VOICE project, we want to engage youth organisations, formal education institutions as well as creative actors to work together towards professional youth work in Europe.PARTICIPANTSParticipants in the VOICE project are youth and social work students as well as young youth work professionals actively supported by the project partners. The innovative combination of youth organisations, social work students and creative organisations will allow for innovative and intercultural practices to emerge and for all participants to develop creative competences and skills. By involving further education institutions as Associated Partners, VOICE ensures the anchoring of skills shared and competences learned in the project not only in youth work practice, but also in formal youth work education.METHODOLOGYThe VOICE focuses on using the innovative and creative approach of Photovoice to empower youth workers, future youth workers and young people around Europe. It builds on our successful implemented project YourEP and its follow up Europe3E, which we want to adapt to the international youth work context. Photovoice (and abbreviation of “Photos Voicing Our Individual and Collective Experience”) is an innovative creativity-boosting method used to share personal stories supported by photos. It aims to enable people to record and reflect their community's strengths and concerns, promote critical dialogue and knowledge about important issues through large and small group discussion of photographs, and to reach policy makers.ACTIVITIESThrough short term joint staff trainings and local activities, participants will learn and experiment the creative Photovoice method. Using Photovoice is a learning process for the newly trained students and youth workers. Learning this method will provide the youth workers involved with a new way to activate young people, provide ways of expressing and discussing issues as a way to involve young people in the EU – and other topics beyond the project which are of significance in their local context.Intellectual Outputs are planned to bring project partners together and guarantee the sustainability of the project. The Giving young people a VOICE - Creative Tutorial will serve as an accessible and fun introduction to the Photovoice method, targeting future and current youth workers. The Making VOICEs heard - Participative Exhibitions will consist of a mobile multi-usage concept enabling the exhibited project process and results to be used by further education institutions and youth work organisations not only during the project, but also long after the project has ended. The Giving young people a VOICE – Photovoice Training Resource is aimed at increasing the sustainability of the project through written documentation that complements IO1, giving the chance to go into more detail especially regarding the theoretical background. Lastly, a Policy Brief will be drafted with social and youth work students. These recommendations aim to bridge the gap between policy and practices, for a more diverse and creative youth work training in formal education institutions training future youth workers. OBJECTIVESBy bringing together future and current youth workers, young people and creative organisations (eg. photographers and graphic designers), the VOICE project aims at promoting the method of Photovoice in youth work, to make it more recognized as a creative tool that future and current youth workers can use to promote social inclusion, engagement and active citizenship of young people. RESULTSVOICE is expected to have a positive and long-lasting impact, by equipping social and youth work students, as well as youth workers with new creative methods to work with young people. The expected direct impacts of the Intellectual Outputs described above are an increase of the quality of youth work using innovative and creative approaches, and the training of future youth workers to get familiar with Erasmus+ and international youth work. Additional positive outcomes will be to foster a creative dialogue with young people, enable them to voice their ideas and develop entrepreneurship and creative skills.Furthermore, the project is committed to participate in the achievement of goals set by the European Youth Work Agenda, by supporting the further development of high-quality youth work, supporting the ability of youth work to tackle emerging challenges and innovate its practices, or enhancing the promotion and recognition of youth work.