A primary goal of this project was to promote personal responsibility and strengthen self-esteem of students. The majority of the project participants were between 16 and 18 years old at the time of the international internship. At this stage of life, personal development is particularly important. The students organise their everyday life independently (washing clothes, organising trips) and become much more independent and self-confident. In addition, the "Landjugend Niederösterreich" wanted to increase the students intercultural understanding and foreign language skills. Through the international experience, mostly in non-German speaking countries, the students learn to use the English language and can improve their language skills extremely. Through integration in foreign host families, intercultural understanding and tolerance towards other cultures can be strengthened. Competences are important for everyone's personal development, social integration, citizenship and employment. Improving the eight key competences, some more others less, was a major goal of this project.
The "Landjugend Niederösterreich" is the largest youth association in rural areas and operates in six different areas. The programme of Young & International has set itself the following strategic goals. - To motivate young people to deal with international topics as well as other cultures and languages. - To enable young people to have international experiences in order to promote their openness to the world and tolerance. Through an international work experience with integration into family life we can achive this goals. With the project "Explore Europe through Agricultural internships", the "Landjugend Niederösterreich" was able to give as many pupils as possible from agricultural secondary schools in whole Austria access to an international experience. The students have to complete a 14-week agricultural internship during their education. They can also do this abroad. The interest of the students has increased from year to year. With this project, the "Landjugend Niederösterreich" can support the students with competent advice and financial subsidies for their international internship.