During the 3rd EAYW, 26 practices from different fields of youth work were presented within 1 1/2 hour Practice and Reflection Forums, grouped under different headings. Below are the descriptions of the workshops and additional materials and links provided by the contributors.
The practices were grouped under four themes:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Ulrike Werner
Title of the practice: How can digital elements increase the quality of international youth work – Results of the research project “IYW.digital”
Coordinating organisation: IJAB – International Youth Service of the Federal Republic of Germany
Partners:
IJAB teamed up with Franziska Koschei and Dr. Niels Brüggen from the Institute for Media Research and Media Education (JFF). The project was run with funding and support from the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (BMFSFJ) and the specialist and funding agencies for international youth work: Franco-German Youth Office (DFJW), German-Polish Youth Office (DPJW), ConAct – Coordination Center for German-Israeli Youth Exchange, Tandem – Czech-German Youth Exchange Coordination Centre, Foundation for German-Russian Youth Exchange, JUGEND für Europa, German Greek Youth Office (DGJW) and German-Turkish Youth Bridge (Deutsch-Türkische Jugendbrücke).
Email contact: werner@ijab.de
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Aims/objectives of the practice:
The project “International Youth Work.digital” was occasioned by the pandemic-induced switch from analogue (offline) to digital (online) projects in international youth work. It was designed to systematically evaluate the insights gained during this period so as to identify the success factors at play and help the international youth work field to evolve. The team researched how and to what extent it is possible to realise new potential through digital and hybrid formats and what challenges may need to be overcome. The research project sought to create an evidence-based framework for developing a digital methodology for the international youth work field. The learning experience of the participating young people as well as of the experts played a key role in this context. The analysis centred on extra-curricular youth exchanges and workcamps for young people.
Description of the practice:
Digital formats have become commonplace in recent years, digital elements deliver real added value to learning mobility and International Youth Work activities. They make it easier to involve young people in programme design, they enable organisations to reach out to new target groups, and they allow participants to get to know each other even before they travel to an on-site activity.
Yet how can digital elements be integrated in a purposeful way? What methodological aspects and challenges must be considered? The findings of the research project “IYW.digital – International Youth Work.digital” provide important answers, which were outlined in the presentation.
The findings suggest that digital elements in international youth work can offer diverse and accessible formats, but success depends on careful planning and consideration of specific challenges. Three key hypotheses and their corresponding success factors provide a foundation for adapting and evolving youth work in the digital era.
Success involves aligning activities with participants’ daily lives, combining offline and online elements sensibly, considering new target groups, and addressing potential disadvantages.
Success factors include providing adequate resources (for example the necessary devices), implementing a specific methodology to encourage communication and (informal) exchange, offering training for team leaders in digital methods, and considering varying digital skills in training.
Success involves careful design of digital spaces, recognizing participants’ media skills as valuable resources, and integrating various media skills during digital projects.
The outlined success factors provide a foundation for adapting and evolving youth work in the digital era.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
The participants emphasised how important it is to first plan the objectives of the project and, building on this, the methods. Only in the next step should the appropriate digital tools be selected.
In this context, one participant pointed out that not too many different tools should be used at the same time. A ‘firework display of tools’ may seem impressive at first glance, but can easily overwhelm both participants and the team. A well thought-out educational approach and methodology are always more important than the latest fancy tools.
Links for further information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Marzena Ples, Ondřej Bárta
Title of the practice: How to be more sustainable in learning mobility projects? Framework for sustainability in learning mobility
Coordinating organisation: European Platform on Learning Mobility (EPLM) / EU-Council of Europe Youth Partnership
Partners: Members of the EPLM
Email contact: marzena.ples@gmail.com
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Aims/objectives of the practice:
The practice focuses on sustainability in learning mobility and consists of the exploratory study and compendium of good practices.
The objectives of the practice were the following:
Description of the practice:
The practice consists of the outcomes from research devoted to sustainability in learning mobility, the Sustain-Mobility Conference, and the Compendium of practices. The presentation began with a summary of the research findings, followed by insights on integrating sustainability into learning mobility and beyond. It explored the concept of sustainability, based on the definitions of sustainable development and three vital dimensions of sustainability: environmental, social, and economic. It defined sustainability in learning mobility and presented the main outcome of the practice: an analytical framework of sustainability in learning mobility organisations.
In addition to defining sustainability in learning mobility, the practice proposes preconditions for sustainable practices (attitude, knowledge, and skills), a model of sustainability levels in organisations implementing learning mobility projects, and a compendium of practices demonstrating those levels.
The theoretical framework presents seven key aspects of sustainability in learning mobility, each accompanied by examples of practices. These key aspects include:
These aspects provide a comprehensive view of how sustainability can be achieved and promoted in learning mobility activities. Furthermore, the recommendations from the Sustain-Mobility Conference for youth work practice were presented. Among them, the integration of sustainability as a fundamental approach in learning mobility and a comprehensive and holistic understanding of sustainability were emphasised.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Participants highlighted the need of holistic approach towards sustainability and underlying not only environmental aspect of it but also social and economic ones. The discussion showed the importance of emphasising especially the social dimension of sustainability as this is the strongest domain of youth work, which largely contributes towards social change among young people.
Furthermore, participants discussed in smaller groups the future of sustainability in learning mobility and wow can learning mobility become not only a sustainable force but also a restorative and regenerative one?
Links for further information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Laura Grineviciute
Title of the practice: Inspiring IT Curiosity in Girls
Coordinating organisation: Rural Internet Access Points Association
Partners: Hellenic Open University (Greece), Simbioza Genesis (Slovenia), Information Technology Institute (Lithuania), Instituto Politecnico de Tomar (Portugal)
Email contact: laura@vipt.lt
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To present the project Empower Girls’ Creativity Through Use of Digital Technologies (SparkDigiGirls), which responds to the need to increase girls’ interest and curiosity in the world of computing and STEM.
Description of the practice:
In fact, too few girls are studying computer science, engineering, or mathematics today. According to Eurostat 2021 data, women represent only 19% of all IT students in the EU. Of course, there has been progress over the last decade, but gender inequalities still exist in this sector. There is also a paradox: 70-80 years ago, there were more women than men in computing and software development.
During the workshop at the EAYW event, the focus was to discuss key factors preventing girls from exploring career paths in computer science as well as to present the project SparkDigiGirls which was selected as a finalist for the European Digital Skills Awards 2023 in the category Youth in the digital world.
There are many reasons for the lack of girls’ interest in IT. Some girls perceive the field as uninteresting or believe they wouldn’t be able to code or create as effectively as boys. Media suggests us with images of male tech pioneers like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, while it forgets women like Ada Lovelace, the first programmer. Furthermore, the relative newness of many IT jobs means girls might have fewer female role models in their own circles. Therefore, these negative stereotypes and a lack of awareness about the diverse and exciting opportunities within IT significantly influence girls’ career paths.
In response to the need to increase girls’ interest in the world of IT, partners from Lithuania, Portugal, Slovenia and Greece have launched a two-year international project funded by the Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership Programme for Youth. The project aimed to engage girls aged 14 and over in the latest technologies (such as AI, AR, IoT, Pogramming, etc.) by integrating a creative approach and demonstrating how technology can be used in practice. Within this project an online learning programme Unleash Your CreativITy with Technology was created. The aim of the programme was to engage girls aged 14-18 in a hands-on, experiential learning model to solve various life situations and problems through the practical use of modern technologies. The distance learning programme consists of 16 separate learning paths, called challenges. Each challenge covers a specific topic or area of interest to girls aged 14 and over. For example, fashion, design, environment, cooking, art, etc. In each challenge girls are invited to solve a simple problem they could face in their lives with a help of technologies and creative thinking. For example, how to make a birthday present in 3D, how to design clothes using programming, how to create a culinary website, how to create own NFT, etc.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
During the workshop at the EAYW event, participants highlighted different aspects of the presented practice and raised specific questions related to the SparkDigiGirls project. The most interesting element of the presented practice for the participants was related to the online training programme and concrete actions on how to involve girls and youth workers in an area of IT.
Links for further information:
Link to the online programme Unleash Your CreativITy with Technology
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Aagje Rottiers
Title of the practice: Playfield of mental well-being
Coordinating organisation: De Ambrassade, Belgium
Email contact: Aagje.Rottiers@ambrassade.be
Description of the practice:
The issue of mental well-being has risen to the top of the agenda in recent years, including for De Ambrassade and youth work. So what can youth work do? How do we tackle the issue, and is this really the role of youth work?
We wrote a vision statement on mental well-being and defined several transition paths to get started. One of these pathways is developing a mental well-being framework in youth work. It aims to give youth work an anchor and a language to formulate its own mental well-being policy tailored to your organisation; to define the role and responsibility of youth work in the mental well-being of children and young people; to build bridges to other sectors (especially well-being); and to provide examples, concrete tools and support.
The ‘Playfield of mental well-being’ is not a rigid tool to be followed from A to Z, but rather a ‘playfield of possibilities’ (hence the name) to start the thinking exercise within your youth work organisation.
Links to more information:
Playfield Mental Well-Being – Presentation used during EAYW event
Mental Well-Being in youth work – Roadmap
Playfield of Mental Well-Being in Youth Work – overview (one-pager)
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Karolina Kosowska
Title of the practice: Inclusive Digital Communication for Youth Information Services – where to begin?
Coordinating organisation: Eurodesk Brussels Link (EBL)
Email contact: info@eurodesk,eu; karolina.kosowska@gmail.com
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Description of the practice:
Eurodesk’s practice (“Inclusive Digital Communication in Youth Information Services – where to begin?”) aims to support all those working with and for young people, in designing more inclusive and accessible youth information. The guide covers general principles relevant to building inclusive and accessible information and communication based on best practices from organisations striving for a more inclusive world. It offers 7 key principles to make youth information services more inclusive. Following these principles, you will able to:
The practice supports a reflective process among participants, based on the 7 principles presented in the guidebook. By sharing concrete measures and examples, I hope to inspire new practices and build a stronger culture of belonging in youth information services and youth work fields in general. Participants took part in a gamified learning experience which introduced them to the 7 principles and a facilitated reflection and discussion session on the current situation in their diverse realities.
At the end of the session, the Eurodesk “Guide on Inclusive Digital Communication for Youth Information Services” was presented, along with access to the electronic version. In addition, participants had the opportunity to receive a printed copy.
Being inclusive requires changing our mindsets and continuing to learn about Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). My practice makes the entry into the topic more approachable for the beginners and provides inspiration for those already knowledgeable about it.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
I got some comments, questions connected with the inclusive language – how complicated and difficult it is, how much depends on the national, local context, internal group “agreements”.
After the presentation, I received several positive comments saying that they found my presentation and guide very practical and reflection-provoking.
Links for further information:
Eurodesk project websites: https://eurodesk.eu/; https://eurodesk.eu/nxKJ
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Filipe Moreira Alves
Title of the practice: VER – Regenerative Employment Nursery
Coordinating organisation: Biovilla
Partners: IEFP, IPS
Email contact: aprendizagem.biovilla@gmail.com
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Aims/objectives of the practice:
The VER program aims to tackle two fundamental regional socio-ecological problems: firstly it addresses the current youth unemployment crisis; at the same time, and from an ecological standpoint, it addresses the ecological destruction and degeneration of our territory. These two social issues are taken together, as different sides of the same coin of unsustainability of our current economic paradigm. In that sense social and ecological restoration and regeneration, are not separate goals, but intimately intertwined and interdependent realities that in VER we approach with an integral, regenerative approach.
Description of the practice:
The whole program takes 9 months, and each class has a minimum of 18 participants and a maximum of 30. The program targets specifically unemployed youth and long-term unemployed from our region (Palmela and Setúbal municipalities), however it is open to received applications from all over Portugal.
The whole program consists of 6 key phases: 1) Application and selection of participants (3 to 5 weeks); 2) A kick-off immersion with 3 days residential and 2 days online; 3) A 3 months “learn-by-doing” hybrid period with online classes, hands on work at Biovilla and inspirational visits (12 weeks); 4) A second 5-day immersion into regenerative business models; 5) A 2 months mentoring phase (8 weeks); 6) A final graduation and pitch-night event (1 day).
This a long-term educational program that requires a high degree of commitment and investment from the participants, as well as from the hosting organization and the trainers/facilitators. This is done intentionally to give space and time for the necessary transformations, connections and realizations to take place, mature, evolve. Although all participants start and end this journey together, during phase 3 and 4 different constellations emerge. In phase 3 participants divide themselves according to one of four specialization areas – Nature Tourism; Regenerative agriculture; Sustainable cooking; Herbs and Medicinal plants – depending on their expertise or project. Phase 5 is either individual or done among teams up to 3 people, working on a common project.
The regenerative dimension of VER is present at 3 different levels: on one hand the starting point of this program is that the “BaU” or even the “sustainability” approaches to developing projects is no longer viable, possible or sustainable. New projects, new business need a radically different working paradigm that goes much beyond sustainability and that questioning for us is anchored in the field of regeneration. Regenerative thinking and doing is the theoretical and practical compass of VER; on another hand, from our perspective regeneration requires a deeper, more integral approach to entrepreneurship, one that invites a redefining our relationships with ourselves, with others and with the landscapes we connect and interact with. That requires a holistic approach to socio-ecological entrepreneurship placing the socio-ecological landscape needs and wants at the centre of our projects and dreams; finally, VER is very much focused on learning-by-doing and on a direct observation-interaction with the fields we want to influence or transform. In that respect our program focus greatly in the ability to listen consciously as much as in acting purposefully, stimulating a constant prototyping dynamic and working with good-enough for now, safe enough to try mentality. These three characteristics are fundamental aspects of the program and its impact.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Links for further information: Project website
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Laimonas Ragauskas
Title of the practice: Quality and Recognition! Explore modular courses and micro-credentials for Youth Workers and Trainers. Aligned to the European Training Strategy.
Coordinating organisation: Nectarus
Email contact: laimonas@awero.org
Description of the practice:
The presentation aimed to explore the approach to developing modular training courses aligned with the European Training Strategy (ETS) competence model, designed for both youth workers and trainers developed and implemented by Nectarus and their partners. It includes a curriculum and open educational resources for youth workers and trainers. These resources are available on Youth Work Pathways and Trainers Appraisal platforms (check the links below).
The programme also includes a system to recognize and validate learning outcomes through open digital badges aligned with the ETS competence models. We are engaging partners to research credential recognition across Europe and to translate the ETS models, making them available in multiple languages. We are rolling out 18 modular training courses in total – 9 for youth workers and 9 for trainers, designed to be replicable and scalable throughout the sector.
Links to more information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Ivona Šimunović, Croatian Youth Network
Title of the practice: Transforming Youth Work: A Breakthrough in Quality and Tech!
Coordinating organisation: Croatian Youth Network
Partners: University of Ljubljana, Mladinski svet Slovenije, Out of the Box International, NAPOR – Nacionalna asocijacija praktičara/ki omladinskog rada i Osterreichische Kinder Und Jugendvertretung Verein (Bjv)
Email contact: ivonas@mmh.hr
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Aims/objectives of the practice:
We aim:
Description of the practice:
Innovative quality standards in youth work educational practices developed through the Erasmus+ project “Blockchained Youth Work.” This pioneering standard is a direct outcome of our project, formulated with a meticulous and appropriate methodology. Our approach begins by gathering input from stakeholders who play a crucial role in shaping the quality in youth work (education). We engage with youth organizations, training providers, and representatives from politics/decision makers and administration to understand their specific needs regarding educational programs and quality parameters in youth work. The quality framework is not only a valuable resource for youth workers but also holds potential benefits for educational institutions, public authorities, and other organizations providing education and training. It enhances the professionalization of youth work, streamlines the digitalization of educational outcomes, and offers a reliable process for validating acquired competencies and qualifications. The core innovation lies in our utilization of blockchain technology within the “Blockchained Youth Work” project. This digital approach ensures the immutability, traceability, and accessibility of diplomas and certificates earned in youth work, transcending traditional boundaries. By making the acquired competencies visible and transparent, both within and beyond the youth work sector, we aim to enhance the recognition of youth work training. Furthermore, the blockchain platform established in our project can serve as a model for creating similar platforms within different countries and systems, be they national, macro-regional, or European. This system is versatile and valuable for students, educators, youth workers, and public authorities alike, addressing the identified gaps in competencies or knowledge within the youth sector.
The practice’s core outcome is the creation of a comprehensive quality framework linked to a digital repository, contributing to the recognition and transparency of quality educational practices in youth work at both national and European levels In conclusion, our application seeks recognition for the quality standard in youth work education developed through the “Blockchained Youth Work” project. We believe this innovation will significantly contribute to the advancement of quality education practices in the youth sector.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
The participants actively participated in the workshop and expressed a great deal of support for the development of such a framework, and they themselves participated in choosing the criteria that they believe are important in youth work.
Links for further information:
Title: The “Politics” of Evidence: Knowledge to Action with the Youth Research and Evaluation eXchange (YouthREX)
Organization: The Youth Research and Evaluation eXchange (YouthREX)
Contact: Uzo Anucha, MSW; PhD // anucha@yorku.ca
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About YouthREX
YouthREX is an Ontario province-wide initiative based at the School of Social Work at York University funded by the Ontario Ministry of Children, Community and Social Services in recognition of the role that research, and evaluation can play in improving outcomes for youth in Ontario. YouthREX’s mission is to provide the youth sector with research and evaluation resources, tools, supports and services to promote the well-being of Ontario Youth. YouthREX translates and mobilizes evidence and creates opportunities for learning, connection, and sharing through professional development programming for youth workers, both online and in person, tailored to the diverse and intersecting issues and contexts impacting youth and youth worker wellbeing. We also support youth workers in infusing evidence in the design, development, and evaluation of their programs, understanding and improving their impacts, and telling the stories of their work. YouthREX has been very well served by a community-university model that brings the expertise, knowledge, and resources of community partners and university researchers together to support Ontario’s youth sector. YouthREX in many ways is an example of how universities can be in service to the community in deeply meaningful ways while also providing benefits to the university community.
Aims/objectives of the Practice:
This Practice contribution to the 3rd European Academy of Youth Work reflects on the successes, challenges, and lessons from YouthREX’s collaborative approach to building the evaluation capacity of youth organizations in Ontario, Canada. Central to YouthREX’s approach is a nuanced understanding of ‘evidence’ that acknowledges the politics of evaluation and the need for evaluation processes and methods to reflect youth sector realities. It describes the evaluation framework that YouthREX developed to guide program evaluation for community-based youth programs. This framework offers a youth program a three-phase, seven step process to develop an evaluation plan, implement the plan, and use the findings to improve the program and support the wellbeing of young people.
Description of the Practice:
“Evidence and evaluation support youth programs to do what they do, better”.
Youth programs provide young people with the skills and resources they need to overcome challenging circumstances and make positive contributions to their communities. But youth programs sometimes struggle with how to understand and measure these outcomes and articulate the impact of their programs to stakeholders – including family members, funders, and youth themselves.
Evaluation provides youth programs the tools to understand, measure and track if their programs achieved their intended outcomes and impacts but equally important, understand how they are successful and how they can be improved. Program evaluation can support youth programs to be reflective, improve, change and grow to ensure that young people that participate in programs are experiencing the outcomes that these programs are working towards.
Despite the benefits of program evaluation, youth organizations frequently struggle with evaluation and ask questions such as:
1/ How can evaluation improve our practice rather than get in the way of it?
2/ What do we need to evaluate given the tension between what funders want measured and we are interested in knowing?
3/ How do we evaluate, and what does our evaluation mean?
4/ How can we change based on what we learned
This Practice contribution describes YouthREX’s approach to building the evaluation capacity of youth sector organizations. Central to this approach is a nuanced understanding of evaluation that acknowledges that evaluation is sometimes ‘political’ as well as acknowledging the influence of paradigms and values. Understanding the concerns of youth workers with evaluation opens up the space to thoughtfully address these concerns and discuss how evaluation can be ‘leveraged’ to improve outcomes for youth, which is what the sector is passionate about.
YouthREX’s Customized Evaluation Supports (CES) provide a continuum of evidence-based services to support youth programs with the design, development, and evaluation of their work with young people. It supports youth programs to understand their program theory and intended outcomes so they can develop and implement evaluation plans that track, measure and share the impact of their work with young people. CES support youth programs to not only understand the impacts of their work but to also use the findings to strengthen their programming and improve youth wellbeing.
CES is guided by an evaluation framework that YouthREX developed to guide program evaluation for youth programs. This framework offers a three-phase, seven step process to develop an evaluation plan, implement the plan, and use the findings to improve the program and support the wellbeing of young people. The framework pulls together the key elements of program evaluation in a simple step-by-step process that is suited to the context of grassroots youth programs. This process supports re-imagining evaluation as a storytelling tool, including creative strategies for visualizing and sharing your evaluation findings so stakeholders can understand the REAL story of a program.
The framework emphasizes three lenses that are uniquely suited to the organizational, social and political realities of youth programs. The lenses provide youth programs with a guide on how to choose evaluation methods from the many evaluation options available. The first lens is a Learning Focused Lens that asks: “Will the evaluation produce insights and findings that can be used by the youth program to improve and promote youth wellbeing?” Evaluation for grassroots youth sector programs is better focused on improving the program than proving the worth of the program. Program evaluation is about developing insights and findings that a program can learn from to improve outcomes for youth – evaluation helps a program do what they do, better. ‘Good’ evaluation is not just about gathering accurate evidence about how a program is achieving outcomes for youth wellbeing, but ‘good’ evaluation produces findings and insights that a program can use to learn and do its work better.
The second lens is a Youth-Engaged Lens that asks: “Does the evaluation meaningfully engage youth participants?” This lens recognizes that meaningfully involving youth strengthens evaluations of youth programs. Youth engagement improves the overall quality of evaluation and more importantly, meaningful youth involvement in evaluation can support the outcomes for youth that the program is working to achieve. Youth engagement in research and evaluation provides opportunities for youth to develop relationships with peers, mentors, and adult allies. Opportunities for relationship building, such as adult-youth pairings and the development of youth-friendly environments, can provide the context for relationship development for young people.
The third lens is a Contextualized Methods Lens that asks: does the evaluation methods allow a youth program to tell rich and nuanced stories of their processes and outcomes that acknowledge the complexity and dynamism of youth work? Rather than privileging an experimental approach that views evaluations with randomized control groups as the gold standard of evaluation, YouthREX embraces the rich, contextual insights that mixed-methods including qualitative methods can provide an evaluation of a youth program and recommends that evaluations of youth programs include mixed-methods and multi-sources. A program evaluation can build in rigor by having multiple lines of evidence from different methods and data sources, for example, multiple methods (i.e., ways of collecting data), multiple sources (i.e., different types of data), multiple timepoints, and multiple analysers. For instance, collecting both quantitative and qualitative data through surveys and interviews with youth program participants and their parents or other caregivers. When analysing and interpreting data, you may include multiple staff members.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Discussions generally focused on how to evaluate, and leverage the findings to sustain a program.
Links to Explore Further:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Tine Bergiers
Title of the practice: The power of networking and broad policy influence around play
Coordinating organisation: Vlaamse Dienst Speelpleinwerk vzw / Goe Gespeeld!
Email contact: info@goegespeeld.be
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Goe Gespeeld! was founded in 2008-2009 out of a need to support and visualise the playing of children and young people in a positive way. It was a counter-reaction to the negativity that was developing at the local level around the presence of children and young people in public spaces.
The network has been in the lead of the VDS since then. It consisted at the time of traditional youth work. It focused mainly on local governments.
Through the Goe gespeeld! label, we challenge municipal and/or city councils to commit to 8 playful pledges
Meanwhile, the network has grown to 41 partners. These partners represent various sectors and contribute to the network. Together, we defend the right to play for every child and adolescent. We have partners from the education sector, partners who focus on research related to children, young people, play and public space, partners involved in green spaces, childcare, youth work, parent organisations,… you name it.
Together, we choose a main theme to work on every year. That theme always results in an end product: a symposium or a campaign or an action, etc. The target group at which the action is aimed also depends on the theme and the end product. Policymakers, politicians, parents, organisers,… at various levels.
In 2019 we were asked to participate in the umbrella organisation of the Outdoor Play Day as well. The need for policy and knowledge on play was great. Through that collaboration with other partners, a trajectory was issued around 365 days of outdoor play. Since the end of 2022, the VDS has been leading the process around 365 days of outdoor play and the Outdoor Play Day. This way, we highlight the importance of outdoor play. Again, we focus on different target groups and policy levels.
With 365 days of outdoor play, we are working on an Outdoor Play Agreement, both for local authorities and Flemish policy. We provide a playful measuring instrument, the Ice Cream Standard, to measure the accessibility of playgrounds for children and valuable meeting places for young people. And we encourage organisers to make their Outdoor Play Day the icing on the cake of a whole year of outdoor play.
Description of the practice:
The raison d’être of the Goe Gespeeld! network starts from a social trend that took a very negative view of children and young people. There were more and more complaints of noise problems involving children and teens. Organisations received complaints because children were dirty after playing. Organisations had to move because neighbours filed lawsuits regarding ‘unlivable situations’ due to the noise of children playing. Young people were chased away everywhere because their meeting places were considered disruptive. It was about time that this was addressed. Goe Gespeeld! formulated the eight playful pledges to remind municipal councils that they had a duty to the children and young people in their municipality. Meanwhile, the network annually addresses a theme that, from the various partners, is identified as necessary. That choice is made from social trends, research or general sense. In addition, everything around outdoor play starts from the results of Kind&Samenleving’s 2019 outdoor play survey. There, it became very clear that statistics around outdoor play continue to decline drastically. So, with the network, the project and the Outdoor Play Day, we are going all out to convince everyone of the importance of outdoor play.
As president of Goe Gespeeld! and outdoor play, we are often asked to participate in policy influence. We sit in various working groups and have good contact with partners and the minister of youth. In this way, we can help give direction to the policy and the steps to be taken. We can weigh in on certain themes and help guide new calls for projects or research on the importance of play. We also continue to challenge the field to keep working on opportunities for play. Through the different services or actions coming from the two networks, we continue to work on different aspects of play. We thus create tools, formulate new content and offer inspiration to those who are working on play and leisure on the floor.
Links for further information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Martin Hussa, Marlene Haas
Title of the practice: Social Space Analysis focusing on adolescents in urban areas
Coordinating organisation: LOGO Jugendmanagement / MOJA Graz
Email contact: martin.hussa@logo.at
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Aims/objectives of the practice:
The Social Space Analysis approach discovers youth hotspots regarding their offerings, functions, meanings and possible shortcomings and emerging conflicts within the public space of Graz. The design is created as a steady process that produces an annually report to self-evaluate and communicate to decision makers. The approach recognizes public space as socially constructed and acknowledges that different societal groups compete for the use and definition of urban spaces. Therefore, social spaces must be recognized as more than just their spatial shape, form, or in relation to their material configuration. Social spaces are defined and associated with meaning in a process of social negotiations, that take place within a framework of power relations between different groups with different interests and agendas. Such an approach enables an awareness of youth related public space and the challenges that come with it. This tool helps to structure and plan youth work efficiently within the organizational framework and limitations given. Also sharing the empirical data on a higher level of policy makers aims to facilitate positive systemic change in favour of youngsters living in the city.
Description of the practice:
The Social Space Analysis conducted by MOJA (mobile youth work) for the city of Graz, focuses on youth concerns. It identifies relevant locations and themes through systematic data collection, emphasizing low-threshold offerings, empowerment, and uncovering systemic issues. The analysis offers practical insights, encourages reflection and dialogue, and provides actionable recommendations. The results aim to inform professional and political decision-making in Graz’s youth affairs, reaching various stakeholders. While acknowledging its partial coverage of youth issues, future analyses will refine content, potentially through collaborations, building on the longitudinal design to adapt interventions. The workshop aims to highlight the general benefits of a “social- space perspective” in youth work and especially in the sector of urban mobile youth work and provides an example of how to adapt such a view theoretically and collect specific data methodically.
Links for further information: www.logo.at
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Fergal Barr
Title of the practice: Humour is Serious Business: The Power of Humour To Transform
Coordinating organisation: N/A
Email contact: thekingisalive@hotmail.com
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES or trends in or influencing youth work ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
The aim of the session was to demonstrate to the power of humour as a means for not only engaging young people but as a medium for tackling any issue at all.
It was designed to demonstrate to practitioners that humour is much more than just making people laugh. It has an incredible amount of benefits, it is of great value and benefits to practitioners, has immense value in what it can achieve and all practitioners can use it.
It also affirmed the message that practitioners are ‘the resource’ and should not be reliant on tools to engage young people, and by using their creativity and imagination, they can change the dynamic of the situations they are in and in doing so, create humour.
Ultimately, they don’t have to be a funny person, or a ‘stand-up’ comedian to use humour, they just need a playful mindset and by working on their ‘humour lens’ they can begin to create moments where humour can be used for meaningful engagement, and in doing so find innovative ways to address any topic.
Description of the practice:
The Power of Humour: An innate ability to transform perspective, perception, and possibility will provide you with an overview of humour, its many benefits and how it can be used to support and enhance practice. You will learn about its origins and history, its unique selling points, the many physical, emotional, and social benefits, the different types of humour, theories that underpin it and the ‘Four Secrets’ of Humour. You will also find out how it can be a powerful tool for change and transformation, as well as creating spaces for possibility. Alongside this you will hear about how it is innovative and responsive and how it can ‘open doors’ in youth work practice. You will also get a chance to take part in several small fun exercises.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
The feedback from participants was that they never thought about humour in the way it was presented. They always saw humour as the idea of just simply trying to be funny and nothing more, but were surprised to learn about its history, origins, USPs, and ultimately its ability to address any topic. They left rethinking their perception of humour and how it can indeed be an effective medium in youth work practice, and that they themselves can use it, they themselves can be the resource, and that it costs nothing in real terms, other than time, energy, creativity and imagination.
Links for further information:
Home | humour (thekingisalive.wixsite.com)
EAYW The Power of Humour Presentation – Macro Enabled.pdf | DocDroid
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Urška Česnik
Title of the practice: Quality Label for badge recognition
Coordinating organisation: TiPovej! Institute presented the practice in the name of International partnership.
Partners: Partners include Breakthrough Foundation (the Netherlands) – lead partner, TiPovej! (Slovenia), Nectarus (Lithuania), Associazione Interculturale NUR (Sardinia, Italy), Nexes (Spain), BalkanIdea Novi Sad (Serbia).
Email contact: urska@tipovej.org
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES or trends in or influencing youth work ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
The Quality Label for Badge Recognition signifies a commitment to upholding quality standards in badge-issuing activities. By fostering a community dedicated to delivering quality learning opportunities and skill recognition, it aims to offer additional credibility and reliability in recognizing and promoting quality youth work. We aim to establish an agreed quality standard for Open Badges issuers to promote better and wider recognition of learning activities and outcomes across institutions, businesses, sectors and borders.
Description of the practice:
Photo: Tipovej (Urška Češnik)
Our Quality Label initiative aligns with the latest developments in the Youthpass and recognition strategy at the European level. It echoes the Council of the European Union’s recommendations from June 2022, recognizing the diversity of micro-credentials and tools for non-formal learning recognition. Through this project, we are encouraging the development, implementation, and recognition of micro-credential across institutions, businesses, sectors and borders. Our objectives and mission is clear and ambitious. We aim to establish an agreed quality standard for Open Badges issuers to promote better and wider recognition of learning activities and outcomes. We plan to:
The Quality Label for Open Badges promises substantial benefits. It is designed to: (1) Attract and capture learners’ attention; (2) Communicate the quality of learning activities; (3) Bring transparency, clarity, and trust to Open Badges recognition; (4) Boost career development and job search, setting a quality standard for recognition at all level.
We recognize Open Badges as a digital solution that still lacks wider adoption and recognition. Currently, there are no agreed quality standards and procedures within the youth work for using Open Badges. That is why our initiative aims to develop and implement such a quality standard for Open Badges, more specifically, to set the first standards and procedures and offer a technical solution to implement Quality Label for badge recognition in the youth work field and hopefully in outside sectors as well. That is why our motivation behind this project is to develop a shared quality standard and procedures in the form of Quality Label for badge issuers, their badging activities and issued badges. In a long-term perspective, we wish that this solution will better support young people’s learning processes/outcomes and improve their chances to transfer learning from the youth work sector to other sectors, e.g. formal education, vocational education, employment.
Photo: Tipovej (Urška Češnik)
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
During the presentation there were three main highlights coming from the participants’ and with all three we (the partnership) agree and are careful to take them into account while developing our practice:
Links for further information:
All relevant resource of the practice are available (and more will be added regularly) on our website: https://badgequalitylabel.net/
Materials used during the EAYW event:
Other documentation:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Dragan Atanasov
Title of the practice: National Quality Label for Youth Centres
Coordinating organisation: Union for Youth Work
Partners: Agency for Youth and Sport, North Macedonia
Email contact: atanasov.dragan@gmail.com
Description of the Practice:
The presentation focused on the newly established Quality Label for youth centres in North Macedonia.
The process of assessing the quality of youth centres was initiated in 2023 in cooperation between the Union for Youth Work and the governmental Agency for Youth and Sport. It is based on the national quality standards for youth centres created through a wide consultative process and adopted as a by-law in 2021. The aim of the assessment process is to evaluate and improve the work of youth centres, as well as to recognise the good quality work by awarding a quality label. The youth centres go through a process of self-evaluation, and then each youth centre is evaluated by two assessors from a national pool established by the Agency for Youth and Sport. The report from the assessment process is provided to the youth centre and the municipality.
Links to more information:
National Quality Label for Youth Centres – North Macedonia – Presentation used at the EAYW event
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Harika Kalman
Title of the practice: Shift
Coordinating organisation: Link in de Kabel, Belgium
Email contact: harika@lidk.be
Description of the Practice:
Shift is an initiative of the youth work organization Link in de Kabel. It is a digital and cultural youth house for teenagers and young adults aged 12 to 25, where they have the ability to experiment with digital technologies and media like 3D-printing, virtual and augmented reality, or a motion capture suit. Although Shift resembles parts of a high-tech lab as well as an art academy, it’s unique and differentiating approach is the setting of a youth house, which implies: no money has to be paid, no appointments to be made, no agenda to be followed and no pressure to be felt. Thanks to this approach, outreaching communication and collaboration with local partners, the Shiftlabs in Leuven and Borgloon reach an equal number of vulnerable and less vulnerable young people.
The inspiring location and decoration of the Shiftlabs and the supportive presence of familiar media coaches trigger most of the visitors to start experimenting. The media coaches take a supportive role and create an inclusive learning environment where vulnerable and less vulnerable young people work together and learn from each other. As such, Shift can be considered a practice of informal and nonformal education, improving digital and media literacy for all teenagers and young adults, including the most vulnerable ones.
Links to more information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Berina Bulatović
Title of the practice: Board game “Vijećko”
Coordinating organisation: Youth Council of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Email contact: info@vijecemladih.ba; berinabulatovic@vijecemladih.ba
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES OR TRENDS IN OR INFLUENCING YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
The main idea behind this game was to teach young people about their rights and chances as outlined in the Law on Youth of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina in a creative and unique way. The game also aims to get young people excited about learning again by giving them a fun and interactive way to do it together, which will eventually lead to better teamwork and smart thinking.
Description of the practice:
We are the Youth Council of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (YCFB&H), the umbrella body for youth in the Federation of BiH. Our mission involves informing young people about the Law on Youth of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, enhancing their capacities, advocating for their improved societal status, and creating opportunities for them. In line with these objectives, the primary goals in developing this game were to creatively and innovatively familiarize young people with their rights and opportunities as stipulated by the Law on Youth of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Recognizing that many young people often view anything related to politics, including laws affecting them, with a certain stigma, we identified the need for a change in approach when disseminating knowledge on such topics. Consequently, we decided to work towards reigniting the youth’s enthusiasm for learning through a game—a pursuit that many abandon in childhood.
In the process of developing the game, our aim was to incorporate elements from various well-known social games such as Risk, Ludo, Monopoly, pantomime, word associations, and Pictionary. By doing so, we endeavoured to make the game more relatable and appealing to young people, leveraging the familiarity of these games to facilitate a more engaging and effective learning experience.
The primary aim of the game is to effectively establish the Youth Council of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH). Players are required to work together, employing collaborative strategies to secure a successful outcome. Failure to establish the Youth Council results in the game prevailing over the players. The focal point of the game centers on the organizational dynamics of FBiH youth, providing an in-depth exploration of the concept of youth organizing.
The game features accompanying cards that highlight essential aspects of the Youth Law of FBiH, shed light on the outcomes derived from youth policies in FBiH, and address ongoing challenges faced by young individuals. Prominent among these challenges is the pervasive issue of brain drain. The game has been designed to accommodate 3 to 8 players, with a targeted duration spanning between 1.5 to 2.5 hours.
The collaborative nature of the game fosters teamwork and strategic thinking as players collectively strive to achieve the establishment of the Youth Council of FBiH.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Attendees at the EAYW event discussed several key aspects of our work. Many wanted to know how they could adapt our ideas to their own country. They enjoyed learning about our inventive ideas for youth and the attention to detail required.
Participants applauded the new approach to including youth, emphasizing how thoroughly planning and implementation had transformed things. Our comprehensive solutions, including methods for encouraging youth participation and ensuring inclusiveness, were recognized for their practicality.
Links for further information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Vladas Polevičius and Aistė Rutkauskienė
Title of the practice: Where Does Youth Motivation Come From and Where Does It Disappear?
Coordinating organisation: Society and Enterprise Development Institute
Email contact: info@vvpi.lt
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES or trends in or influencing youth work ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
The primary aim of this practice is to explore the origins and fluctuations of motivation among youth. It seeks to understand the factors that influence young people’s drive and engagement in various activities, particularly in the context of youth work. The objective is to identify strategies to sustain and enhance motivation over time.
Description of the practice:
The practice, presented at the European Academy on Youth Work, focuses on the concept of motivation among young people. It delves into questions such as how motivation appears, what drives the most motivated individuals, and how motivation levels can change over time. The presentation uses a multi-layered approach to explain motivation, starting from external influences (“You told me to do it”) to more intrinsic reasons (“It makes a difference”).
Key points covered include:
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Participants found several elements of the practice particularly interesting:
Links for further information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Vid Tratnik
Title of the practice: Climate Creatorship
Email contact: vid@thefield.consulting
Description of the Practice:
Climate Creatorship is a leadership programme that empowers participants to engage with the climate emergency and identify meaningful ways they can individually and collectively take action. Its scope is to empower a new generation of change-makers fit for tackling the complexity and uncertainty of the climate crisis: creative, collaborative, compassionate, emotionally intelligent and values-based.
Originally developed in the creative sector with outstanding feedback, this presentation pitches Climate Creatorship as a program to extend to the youth sector, given the urgency to provide young people with antidotes to the severe climate anxiety and frustration with political inaction. The youth sector is a generator of innovative education practices and a keystone in forming and supporting youth leaders.
The Erasmus+ programme clearly recognizes the role of the sector in being an active contributor to the green transition in the EU, which is why we feel the sector is a natural fit for this training. It also touches on other topics that are acute at this moment in the sector, such as participation and the psychological and emotional wellbeing of young people and youth workers.
Links to more information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Andreja Korsic
Title of the practice: Yurish – stories we can live in
Coordinating organisation: Sende
Email contact: andrejakorsic@gmail.com
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES OR TRENDS IN OR INFLUENCING YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
The aim of the approach is to tell silenced, previously untold stories of the historically marginalised communities and issues that require a cross-pollinating approach to social innovation.
Description of the practice:
How do we think, speak and act with(in) stories of change? The leading premise of the approach is that long-term change needs to be made of historical experience, new behavior, and culture-integrated services and products.
Youth work has been historically engaged with aiding and inspiring social change. Today, communicating the values and principles of youth work needs to be part of the broader media technology landscape. This is especially true for youth information work but it is crucial for advancing the youth work’s social recognition in general as well as driving its partnerships development. It also may empower youth workers in creating opportunities for young people to tell and engage with complex social issues surrounding them.
Drawing inspiration from transmedia, this approach is intersecting art, new media technology and non-formal education values and principles. The goal is to tell untold stories and model diverse social change impetus. The experimentation is two-fold. We are looking at socially-engaged initiatives via what we call the Anatomy of Social Issue method. Interactive transmedia pieces arising from this are story worlds inviting participants to inhabit it, experience it in diverse ways. A transmedial approach to story development means that an initiative is using multiple communication channels and diverse platforms to engage communities of interest in a deeper, innovative manner.
Since youth work aims to, among its other missions, inspire inclusive values, new behaviour, and collective change-making, its initiatives may benefit from multidimensional storytelling as well. Using this approach, the point is to venture beyond the algorithmic notion of social media and engage communities for change across our channels, online and offline, so that they learn more and connect deeper with issues we are trying to propel forward. In this way, we are not building an audience but we are rather inviting and including participants. Our communications are not marketing this way, but part of our activism.
One of the participants in the EAYW presentation session reflected on the type of stories and potential impact created in this way – stories that we can stay with.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Youth work as an innovator of social change and longer, deeper, transmedial stories we can stay with and that can model social innovation.
Links for further information:
Presentation used during the EAYW event: Yurish-Towards inhabitable story
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Sérgio Xavier
Title of the practice: Immersive Audio Unlearning – a radical education methodology
Coordinating organisation: none.
Email contact: sergiomixavier@gmail.com
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES or trends in or influencing youth work ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
Immersive Audio-Unlearning aims to stimulate radical thinking through an elaborated narrative soundscape.
An Immersive Audio Unlearning session (Weimar, 2024). Photo: Aytaj Ibrahimova
Description of the practice:
Immersive Audio-Unlearning (IAU) is a radical education methodology that stimulates reflection about structural questions, often called “difficult” or “uncomfortable”. Participants are invited to shut their eyes, wear a critical lens, and immerse themselves in a narrative soundscape, within a live-performed – carefully curated – story. IAU is similar to cinema, except it is up to the audience to build – and own – the images for the story being told. IAU aims to radically problematize reality and stimulate radical thinking. When alternative utopias flourish, IAU can fall silent. This presentation was a rare occasion when IAU was talked about, rather than performed.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Participants highlighted the distinctive innovative character of IAU and its high potential to develop learning through emotions.
Links for further information:
Teaser: https://vimeo.com/904097959
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Mirko Migliarino
Title of the practice: Re-envisioning the future together
Coordinating organisation: Vedogiovane
Partners: Associanimazione
Email contact: mirkomigliarino@vedogiovane.it
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES or trends in or influencing youth work ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
The workshop gives insights into the experiences and lessons learnt of a KA154 Youth Participation project with the possibility to test the Wheel of the Future methods employed during the project with young people. The project involved young people from different regions in Italy to involve them in a dialogue about the future
Description of the practice:
“Re-Constituent 2.0” involves the creation of workshops in each territory that allow boys and girls to write together an Italian Constitution for 2050, giving voice to their desire for sustainability and justice and to propose their own bridge towards a European Charter. In the collective writing workshops, the children choose a central theme for the country’s democracy in 2050, moving between themes already addressed in our Constitution and completely new themes, for example: digital relations, energy and citizenship, games and sport, protection of personal goods choices,…
After this first phase of local workshops, the project proposes festivals in which young people from different territories can meet and think together, discussing the issues that have emerged and can also benefit from interventions by experts.
The project offers opportunities to grow the skills and above all the participation skills of young people in their local contexts to then become creators of change by understanding the broader value of the legislative and institutional context. The practice helped to identify some areas that are important for young people in terms of active participation and social changes, helping to form a mapping of “articles of the future constitution” that contain and reveal the most interesting topics for young people. Another success of the project is that young people were involved and put back at the centre of shared social reasoning, even those who live in a peripheral context placed on the margins of political reasoning. In festivals and events the project has allowed the different areas of origin of the young people to be mixed, offering mobility possibilities that are usually precluded and allowing for comparison by going beyond the territorial level and comparing themselves with young people from other contexts and territories. “Re-Constituent 2.0” has made it possible to offer meeting opportunities to young people of different social classes from universities to juvenile prisons. Another important objective is to broaden our gaze to the future, thinking about the future and not about the emergency. Therefore, the methodologies and tools that allow us to broaden the horizon of time and meaning on which to make young people reflect are different, as they are often forced into the contingency of the present and individualism and have lost the habit of thinking about the future and the social level. The proposing organizations have been active for more than 20 years in their respective territories and work directly with young people of different age groups in very different contexts: non-formal education workshops in schools; community centres; street education; support and development of informal groups.
The need to reconstruct spaces for intergenerational political dialogue clearly emerges, activating groups of young people recognized by local authorities and who can grow, bringing change and new responses consistent with the current social situation, where the “youth” category is progressively disappearing from the agenda local politics.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
A Finnish participant underlined the importance of the systemic approach of the project with respect to the hypotheses of change that we ask of young people. In “Re-Constituent 2.0”, young people are asked to hypothesize articles of the future constitution of 2050, but all this work is preceded by experiences and activities that explain how every change must be thought of in a systemic way and by changing just one thing, many will change as a result others. They also have a similar project in Finland and he liked many things that he believes he will copy in his project many questions focused on how to continue to follow the young people after the project and on how to give the young people the opportunity to follow the developments of their proposal and of the project in general. “Re-Constituent 2.0” is a project that has reached its 5th edition this year and young people who want can follow the project over the years and collaborate in the organization. The KA 154 project was only one of the actions of the complex system that the project represents.
Links for further information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Nedeljka Ivošević (Borojević)
Title of the practice: The Melting Pot
Coordinating organisation: National association of youth workers – NAPOR
Partners: Galerija Matice Srpske, Mreža mladih Hrvatske, Pogon – Zagrebački centar za nezavisnu kulturu i mlade, Sojuz za mladinska rabota Skopje and Opstinska ustanova Muzej na grad Negotino.
Email contact: Nedeljka.borojevic@napor.net
MAIN FIELDS OF YOUTH WORK ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
MAIN THEMES or trends in or influencing youth work ADDRESSED BY THE PRACTICE:
Aims/objectives of the practice:
Main objectives were boosting visibility and recognition of youth work by cultural institutions, elevating the quality of youth work regionally via the integration of creative methods in culture and arts programs, professionalizing youth workers and cultural staff through specialized curricula development, and fostering cross-sectoral collaboration between youth workers and cultural entities.
Description of the practice:
“The Melting Pot!” project, initiated by NAPOR in partnership with NGOs and cultural institutions from Croatia, Serbia, and North Macedonia aims to enhance the accessibility and appeal of cultural institutions to young people through innovative youth work programs.
Main outcomes included, a. o., comparative research on youth cultural needs in the three participating countries – Serbia, Croatia and North Macedonia, the development of educational curricula for youth workers in cultural institutions, alongside six adaptable youth work programs for cultural institutions, and the involvement of young individuals, including those from marginalized groups, in youth work programs tested in cultural settings. The Melting Pot! exemplifies a practice with potential for reflection, debate, and transferability in diverse youth work contexts and it is a good example of cross sectorial cooperation. It focused on the expansion of youth work services beyond the community of practice.
Were there particular aspects of your practice or questions highlighted by the participants during the discussion at the EAYW event?
Participants found the practice very interesting and transferability in their context, not only with cultural sector but also with others. The main focus after presentation was on the discussion about challenges related to cooperation with the cultural sector and how to ensure that the values and principles that are promoted in youth work are respected in the institutional context.
Links for further information:
Organisation/project website: https://www.napor.net/sajt/index.php/sr-yu/medjunarodni-projekti/the-melting-pot
@NAPORsavez
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Tiina Toivola and Eveliina Inkinen
Title of the practice: Springboard to the Event Industry – an innovative approach to promote youth employment
Coordinating organisation: HUMAK University of Applied Sciences
Email contact: tiina.toivola@humak.fi; eveliina.inkinen@humak.fi
Description of the Practice:
The Springboard for the Event Industry coaching model supports young adults (18-29 years old) to find their own paths in the event or cultural sectors. The idea for the coaching model originated from the observation that long-term unemployed young adults may not have an interest in traditional way of employment. The event industry provides an interesting and different learning and working environment for these young individuals. Employment also contributes to the participation and agency of young people. Additionally, the model offers solutions to the workforce shortage in the event industry that arose as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The coaching model provides an opportunity to address challenges in both youth work and the cultural field through interdisciplinary collaboration.
Links to more information:
Name of contributor(s) at the EAYW event: Maja Drobne
Title of the practice: System Thinking and the Future of Youth Work through Lego Serious play
Coordinating organisation: PiNA, Slovenia
Email contact: maja.drobne@gmail.com
Photo: MOVIT, EAYW 2024
Description of the Practice:
The 1.5-hour workshop was part of the “Dive in” citizen science project. It aimed to boost youth awareness of systemic thinking by exploring how daily systems interconnect. This time it was focused on the future of youth work and how the systems around youth work are interconnected.
Participants started by creating individual models representing everyday systems working around youth work and agents, then discussed their interactions within larger frameworks. The workshop emphasized hands-on activities, storytelling and group collaboration to foster understanding.
In the second phase, participants co-created a shared model on the future of youth work, reflecting on how the systems will influence the development. The session concluded with a reflective discussion, enhancing participants’ understanding of complex societal systems and their interdependencies.
This approach not only develops critical thinking and problem-solving skills but also strengthens active citizenship, encouraging participants to think about future developments in youth work.
Photo: MOVIT, EAYW 2024
Photo: MOVIT, EAYW 2024
