Project Summary
Objectives
The objectives of the project for the participants is to increase their confidence, teamwork skills, project management, cooperation, intercultural awareness, empathy, and knowledge of the refugee situation in Europe. Also, to increase their active citizenship on a local, national and international level. They will gain technical skills by creating an online platform with the aim to promote and discuss civic engagement, activism as a democratic practice, and the current refugee situation in Europe. Through the project and the online platform the participants should know how a democratic Europe could be and what role the civil society should take. The project will use different non-formal methods to enhance an understanding of the refugee situation historically and politically, but also focus on the ethical and philosophical areas with intercultural dialogue and solidarity. For organizations we hope that they can increase their organizational capacity. We want each organization to learn from each other through the process. Each organization will learn more about communicating, web page building and maintaining, and gain ideas from the Youth Exchange that will happen they can bring back.
The objective for this project is for all involved:
– Learn more about the refugee situation
– Learn about how the EU has handled the current refugee situation and why it has been that way
– Enhance critical thinking and discussion techniques
– Give youth the skills to be active citizens in their communities
– Strengthen the sense of initiative, confidence and responsibility for the youth for the future
– Gain critical thinking skills and how to research how to create better and equal opportunities for all citizens regardless of prejudices
– Reflect upon activism as potential democratic practice and tool for being a change maker
– Reflect upon how a democratic Europe should look like, and in particular how you can be a part of that process
– To create an online platform for active citizenship activities which will give both skills in planning, reflection, critical thinking and technology
Activities
The project will start by increasing the knowledge and understanding of the current refugee situation and how it developed in the past. We will look at how the media has influenced the situation and how politically it has been dealt with, and how it come to be know as ‘Acceptance to All’ in Europe.
One of the main arguments against hosting refugees has been the the economic impact along with cultural differences. In this project, we will look at this argument, but also challenge it. We will look at culture as a stand alone subject, how it has changed, and how other cultures have already impacted the societies in which each of us lives.— Through this meeting and seeing each other and others with an open mind, the project should encourage exchanges of ideas, international cooperation and intercultural dialogue. It will give the participants the possibility to find like-minded people all across Europe and the world, to stand together as youth and take an active position in their society. Another objective of the project is create and promote active citizenship across borders which will be trained through the creation of a common online platform in the project. The online platform will be created by the participants, they will choose the theme, the visual identity and create all content such as videos, text and photographs shared on the platform. This exercise will create concrete and usable tools for all participants that will also be able to share them in their community. They will be introduced to taking action and actually learning how to, from beginning till end. The platform will be possible to use even after project is finished and will therefor be able to keep spreading the ideas, opinion and discussion started during the project.
An important part is to be aware of the already existing possibilities for using platforms and activism. The research part of the project becomes very needed for the participants to get an idea about what works for them and what work in general. Therefore exercise of research for other platforms will create inspiration and a better understanding of what a platform should be able to do and what is actually missing for making active citizenship through online platforms. In addition to that research it will be possible for the participants to choose which kind of online platform they should work with (blog, Facebook page, Website, Instagram, other).
Impact
The desired impact of creating the idea of being a ‘world citizen’ and activism is similar through both local, regional, national, European and international levels. The difference is in the methods. The desired impact of the participants in the project will be discussed frequently during the project, with a large focus on learning about each others countries and cultures, with the intent of learning from each other. This will impact the participants individually, as they will reflect upon new things and expand their world view more. These youth combined, will form their own international network – showing that with cultural, language, and so many differences, friendships and cooperation is possible.For the partner organization, they will strengthen their organization and develop their administrative capacity. They will impact this project by using their resources to share the results and work of the youth. Working with other organizations always creates and chance to gain new knowledge and working methods. Through their obligations they will strengthen their communicative skills by being in communication with several young people with a responsibility of explaining project and task clearly. For the applicant group, which will also function as a coordination group the impact and learning will be greater. There will be a great impact on this group as they will learn much through coordinating through a different structure with experienced partners and people, and there will be an impact at the experienced people with the new techniques, working structures and answering the questions someone less experienced in Erasmus+ field will bring.We hope that the result of this project will also include an online resource that will be able to be used by people across the world, that serves as a place where communication can commence about active citizenship and tools will be available for all that visit. Along with creating an educational event in Kopenhagen after the Youth Exchange. The event will be open to all youth interested in active citizenship work and refugees. Here a discussion of international/local activism movements and online activism will be facilitated. The project and its outputs will be used as examples to promote and share the results. Erasmus+ will be used as a way of finding a possibility and network for young people interested in active citizenship. At this event and during the project several Greek media stations will be contacted to promote the project and the event.