The thought process behind the “Structures of Activism” is based on the need to improve the conditions for young people to become active in their civic engagement and participation, building it in a larger framework within an entire educational cycle “Flow of Activism” designed by IYNF for the entire year 2019. Starting from improving general sensitivity towards social issues and opportunities for change in their communities in both narrower and broader sense in the “Patterns of Activism” phase, the currently proposed project will bring together 24 young people/youth workers from different Naturefriends (and associated) organizations from across Europe to learn how to practically implement their project ideas reacting on the needs of their communities. The practical and project-oriented dimension will be brought into the mix of competences needed for a successful project. In a longer run, IYNF wishes to contribute to the development of resilient and strong society consisting of active people who are able to take initiative and help their communities instead of passively consuming and delegating full responsibility for the state of the society on their political representatives. We believe that improving the competences of young people with the potential for social change (which is a common characteristics of young Naturefriends) is the most natural step towards achieving that goal. Activism is an important feature of the Naturefriends movement for more than 120 years. The capacities and experience vary a lot throughout the European network, but a good potential for a fruitful exchange and capacity building is guaranteed. The “Structures of Activism” will provide its participants and their sending organizations with knowledge and practice in the field of international project management and implementation, so their awareness built in the previous instalment of the educational cycle is grounded and framed by actual knowledge and skills. More specifically, the participants will get chance to: - gain knowledge and skills in the field of project management and all its phases of implementation (planning, implementation, evaluation and presentation of results) - gain skills in financial management and fundraising, having also the knowledge of concrete grant schemes that can be applied for - gain competence in the HR management (leadership, tools for group work, facilitation of group processes, fostering motivation) - get the opportunity to continue with developing their project ideas into a more concrete form, based on the practical inputs received during the training, and to reflect on the long-term process - use the collective power of the team for facilitating the development of their projects, to find opportunities for mutual cooperation on particular projects among the participants The learning process will be carried out through three thematic blocks. First one will focus on the technical part of project management, exploring the fields of financial management, fundraising and general project implementation. In the second block, the participants will get familiar with the promotional and HR aspect of producing a project, learning and practicing way of promoting their projects (with focus on social media and online tools) and also being trained in competences focused on leadership, working in groups and effective communication. The last block will focus on using the collective knowledge gained through the previous days in actual practice, elaborating on concrete project ideas through a Hackathon method, making the participants leave with a very concrete picture of their projects and how those can be supported by IYNF and partner organizations, with implementation phase of those project immediately following after the “Structures” training. Informational sessions on competence development and how it can be facilitated by the YouthPass tool will be part of the programme as well. The learning process stands as a goal by itself. “Structures” is a part of a broader educational cycle, which pursues further goals, ultimately bringing at least 15 participants of the cycle to develop their own independent projects on a local, national or international level, bringing to life 5 such projects European-wide, accompanied by full documentation and results, which will be presented on the final conference of the year in Brussels in November 2019 in order to showcase effective ways of work towards a positive change, inspiring action and empowering youth to organize itself. Following Erasmus+ objectives in the field of youth will be addressed: improving the level of key competences and skills of young people, promoting participation in democratic life in Europe, active citizenship, social inclusion and solidarity, enhancing the international dimension of youth activities and helping the organizations to be a successful support structure for young people in complementarity with the European Union's external action.