During the last European elections in May 2019, voter turnout was extremely low in the Outermost regions (ORs) of the European Union (EU): 19% in Guadeloupe, 15% in Martinique, or 18% in the Azores. The EU seems very distant for citizens living in the ORs. In order to fight this sense of alienation, Les Jeunes Européens - France and their partners will create a network of ambassadors for European citizenship and mobility in the Outermost regions. This project is carried out by Les Jeunes Européens - France, in partnership with The European Association of Young Educators (EAYE), Los Jóvenes Europeístas y Federalistas de España (JEF - Espagne), Le Forum Français de la Jeunesse (FFJ), La Fédération des Maisons des Lycéens (FMDL) and Le Comité pour les relations régionales des associations de jeunesse et d’éducation populaire de La Réunion (Crajep Réunion). By building on the partners' various complementary skills in terms of European civil education, non-formal education methods and project management, the 6 partners want to develop educational activities in the ORs for audiences most remote from their European citizenship. They will be able to rely on the twenty years of experience of the educational programme « L'Europe Par les Jeunes » carried by Les Jeunes Européens - France (http://www.europeparlesjeunes.fr/), founded in 1999 and supported by the Ministry of National Education and Youth. A first experiment was ran in March 2019, which resulted in the organisation of 10 educational activities in one week, raising awareness among 270 young overseas residents in Martinique and Guadeloupe. Building on this success, the association and its partners wish to further develop educational interventions with youngsters on a larger scale in the ORs. To this end, we want to train facilitators and representatives of youth organisations in order to create a transnational network of ambassadors for European citizenship and mobility. These ambassadors would be able to train other facilitators and to organise and host pedagogical activities in the ORs. The project will start with a preparatory phase from February to August 2020, during which the organisations will reach out to educational institutions, youth organisations and centres, and organisations focused on popular education in the ORs. Pedagogical tools and frameworks will also be developed during that period and adapted to the specificities of each territory. The project activities will run from September 2020 to August 2021. They will consist of educational interventions and training of trainers in the targeted ORs: Guadeloupe, Martinique, Reunion Island, the Azores and Madeira (in partnership with The European Association of Young Educators) and the Canary Islands (in partnership with Los Jóvenes Europeístas y Federalistas de España). The pedagogical interventions will be directed towards young people from 6 to 25 years old. The organisations will use fun, participatory, non-formal education methods. The goal of these interventions will be to familiarise young people with the functioning of the EU, to raise their awareness of their European citizenship, the rights associated with it and the opportunities for international mobility it offers them. In addition to these educational interventions aimed at a young audience, we will also run training of trainers for youth workers in the fields of education, training and youth. There traineeships will enable the trainees to develop their skills and adopt new teaching methods and tools, so that they themselves would be able to organise interventions and trainings after the end of the project. Finally, the dissemination phase of the project will take place between September 2021 and January 2022. The main objective of this phase will be to share the good practices and experiences gained throughout the project with other youth and education organisations established in the ORs. To this end, an international seminar will be organised to exchange good practices on European civic education in the ORs, bringing together around 30 youth workers to share and discuss methods, tools and facilitation techniques adapted to the ORs. During this dissemination phase, we will also hold training sessions dedicated to youth organisations and groups of youngsters to support them in structuring a network of ambassadors for European citizenship and mobility in the ORs. The objective is to provide them with all the necessary tools so that educational interventions can be renewed and so that these ambassadors, trained and equipped, can continue to raise awareness of European citizenship and mobility in the outermost regions.
The objective of this project was unequivocal: to raise awareness of European citizenship and mobility among young people in the outermost regions and to encourage them to take advantage of the opportunities that the European Union offers them. It was clear to us that the citizens of the outermost regions, including young people, do not feel remote from European issues because of a lack of interest, but rather because of a lack of knowledge and information. It therefore appeared essential that the heart of our project be focused on training in European civic education for local actors (teachers, educators, elected officials) in the territories targeted by our actions. From then on, thanks to the training provided and the availability of our educational tools, they become ambassadors of European citizenship and mobility for young people in the overseas territories. In addition to the educational interventions provided to young people throughout the duration of the project, the training of trainers ensures the long-term sustainability of the benefits of our approach in addition to considerably broadening the target audience.
In 2019, following the European elections, the picture is clear. While the Outermost Regions (ORs) often face specific challenges that are closely linked to European Union (EU) policy, the turnout rate in these territories remains low compared to the European average (51% on average compared to 15% in Martinique, 14% in Guadeloupe and 18% in the Azores). This feeling of remoteness, which is primarily geographical, is heavily accentuated by a lack of access to European information and news. Based on this observation and in the wake of the 2024 European elections, the project of Ambassadors for European citizenship and mobility in the outermost regions of the European Union has been drafted. Young people represent a large part of the population within these regions, which makes them a prime target for raising awareness of European citizenship and for involvement in transnational exchanges. It therefore seemed essential to be able to provide young people in the outermost regions with all the keys to understanding the challenges of the EU and to help them develop their capacity to act as active and committed European citizens.