Currently young people are often missed out in the public policy development, as they don’t participate in the "structures". We are planning their future and their voices are not heard before an actual plan is written and confirmed by the politicians. Only when things go wrong we ask "but where have you been when we were making plans?". If we connect young people in the early phase; doing their own peer research, helping civic planners how to understand big data in youth reports, empower young people to design sustainable solutions to their own challenges, the results of the plans could be improved and local action plans could be more accurate. In this way we educate young people to become meaningful purveyors of what they believe are appropriate measures to meet the challenges youth themselves face in society today. Aim of the project: to strengthen the youth voice into social development and civic planning with a particular focus on connecting and training vulnerable groups, for example: youth with fewer opportunities, disabled, unemployed, immigrants, dropouts, young criminals etc. In this project, we want to connect young people closer to civic planning and research on youth. In order to reduce social inequalities we have to connect and engage. Co-creation is a keyword in how we can manage to do that. Co-create both transnationally, cross-sectorial and cross-ages in order to reach the goal on different global challenges. All gobal challenges have to be solved by people, and people live in local communities. We need to learn how to shape things together and build sustainable structures for real participation that is reflected in democratic processes, civic planning and community development. Objectives: • Share practices from the project countries on involvement of youth groups in to decision making and assuring quality in youth policy. • Develop methodology on how young peoples voices could be heard and acknowleged in policy making processes. • Train youth workers and youth policy specialists on how to consult young people, initiate peer to peer processes in policy making; • Promote real participation in policy making in project countries; • Strengthen local network in project countries who are working with participatory policy making. Activities: • 2 transnational partner meetings (in Slovenia, Portugal); • Conference on youth participation in Norway (November, 2018) • Training course how to involve young people in to policy making in Lithuania (April, 2019); • Developing methodology on “Involving youth in to policy making” (September – December, 2018); • Local events in each country to disseminate project results (1 event in each project country, May 2019); • International campaign on promotion of youth participation and produced campaign guide (September 2018 – May 2019); • Research on impact of project on decission making process (February - May, 2019) Partneship: Izmir Governorship (Turkey), Institute for policy research and analysis (Lithuania), DYPPAL NETWORK (Portugal), Youth Policy institute (SLOVENIA), Vestfold fylkeskommune (NORWAY).
“Youth voices up-graded" is a strategic partnership project in the field of Youth partly funded by the Erasmus + program. The project was implemented from 1st of September 2018 till 31st of August, 2019. Project duration was 12 months. Project was implemented by Vestfold fylkeskommune (NORWAY) as the lead partner in cooperation with Izmir Governorship (Turkey), Institute for policy research and analysis (Lithuania), DYPPAL NETWORK (Portugal), Youth Policy institute (SLOVENIA). Project aimed to strengthen the youth voice into social development and civic planning at local and regional level with a particular focus on connecting and training vulnerable groups, for example: youth with fewer opportunities, disabled, unemployed, immigrants, dropouts, young criminals etc. With this project partners aimed to connect young people closer to civic planning and research on youth. In order to reduce social inequalities we aimed to connect and engage. Partners used Co-creation to achieve the set aims. Co-create transnationally, cross-sectorial and cross-age were the approached partners used to tackle the different global challenges. Partners acknowledge that all global challenges have to be solved by people, and people live in local communities. Partners were learning how to shape things together and build sustainable structures for real participation that is reflected in democratic processes, civic planning and community development. Objectives of the Ka2 project were: • Share practices from the project countries on involvement of youth groups in to decision making and assuring quality in youth policy. • Develop methodology on how young peoples voices could be heard and acknowleged in policy making processes. • Train youth workers, youth policy specialists and youth leaders on how to consult young people, initiate peer to peer processes in policy making; • Promote real participation in policy making in project countries; • Strengthen local network in project countries who are working with participatory policy making. Activities of the ka2 project: • 2 transnational partner meetings (in Portugal October, 2018 and in Slovenia August, 2019); • Conference on youth participation in Norway (November, 2018); • Training course how to involve young people in to policy making in Lithuania (April, 2019); • Developing methodology on “Involving youth in to policy making” (September, 2018 - August, 2019); • Local events in each country to disseminate project results (1 event in each project country, March - July, 2019); • International campaign on promotion of youth participation and produced campaign guide (September, 2018 – August, 2019).