‘‘Bridging Youth and Young Professionals in a Migrational Context via Digitalization’’ Currently, the world has been going through difficult times with the spread of the global COVID-Nineteen (19) pandemic. In order to slow down the spread of the COVID-19 infections, many governments including Turkey have introduced several strict measures such as lockdowns, closing of schools, and canceling public events. Considering these new realities, as mentioned by the International Labour Organization, some of the 272 million international migrants and 79.5 million displaced populations worldwide are more vulnerable than others because of personal, social, situational, and structural factors. Their vulnerabilities are likely to be exacerbated during crisis times, as it is the case with the COVID-19 pandemic. The global pandemic caused by COVID-19 hardens even further the responsibilities and workloads of migrant and refugee-hosting countries. Due to the massive forced migration of Syrians who have been escaping from the civil war in Syria adding with Afghan and Iraqi refugees, Turkey hosts the world's largest number stock of refugees and asylum seekers. According to the official records, in 2019 there were 1.1 million foreigners with a resident permit, 450 thousand detected irregular migrants, 330 thousand under international protection, and 3.6 million Syrians under temporary protection status. Although significant progress made in the management of migration in Turkey, the number of trained human resources and professionals working in this field is still not sufficient. In particular, the sensitivity of professional groups that have direct contact with immigrants and their knowledge and experience in this field is limited. Most of the experts who are intense interaction with migrants do not have adequate knowledge of mother tongue or socio-cultural differences of the migrant groups. In this context, our project, first and foremost, aims at adding migrant knowledge and understanding to all related professionals in the long-run. Targeting university students who will be active participants of public services, academia, private sectors, and overall society after graduation is a strategic choice of this project to reach that goal in the long run. Creating and developing a module of learning programs both conventional and digital is the preferred method in this project. These learning programs include academic and policy-related training as well as language modules. Language modules are attached because the language spoken by most migrants and refugees are not available in many tertiary institutions such as Somali, Dari and etc. We have planned 4 transnational project meetings within the project. Each partner will attend with one or two representatives to the meetings. 1. Kick-off Meeting in Ankara, Turkey in May 2021. 2. Mid-Evaluation Meeting 1 will be held in Paris, France in October 2021. 3. Mid-Evaluation Meeting 2 will be held in Lincoln, United Kingdom in May 2022. 4. Closure Meeting will be held in Innsbruck, Austria in April 2023. We are planning 3 Intellectual Outputs (IOs) in order to achieve our goals for the projects. Each partner will take part in developing these Intellectual Outputs. Each partner outside of Turkey will contribute by adding their country perspective. Turkish partners will also responsible for the digitalization of Education. IO1- Curriculum Development: IO1 will be developed after a two-step process. IO2-E-Learning Platform for Language and Culture: IO2 will be developed according to findings and outcomes of IO2. IO3-E-Learning Platform for Sectors: IO3 will be an online platform that aims to train young professionals from different sectors and young migrants, reciprocatively. There will be 2 LTTS one in Turkey and one LTT in the UK. 1. One of the LTTs will aim intercultural dialog and the second will be about the exploitation of digital tools in the migration field with a view of educational context. 2. LTTs will use the outcomes of IO1 and thanks to feedbacks the IO2 and IO3 will be reviewed according to the needs and expectations of the target group. There will be one ME in each partner country and 2 in Turkey. Multiplier Events will include young migrants, young professionals, representatives of NGOs working in the migration field, and decision-makers from each country. Thanks to these MEs, it is envisaged that 345 people will directly participate in our project. In the creation of intellectual outputs, we are going to benefit from various modalities including: 1- Country-based narrowed field researches on defining the present situation and transformative needs and expectations of the young migrants in the COVID-19 period, 2- Work-Shops bringing all related stake-holders, 3- Evaluations and intellectual contributions of important specialists from industry, academicians, and experts in different areas regarding migrants.
• To identify problems of young migrants arising in COVID-19 period will be researched and a final report will be written on the necessities of young migrants and young (pre)professionals from different sectors (Health, Education, Justice, Civil Society). • To develop platforms to be developed to provide learning environment for basic level language teaching for young professionals who are dealing with migrant issues in the project countries. • To launch e-Learning platform for different sectors (Health, Education, Justice, Civil Society) to train young professionals from different sectors and young migrants.
Turkey has been facing an intense wave of migration for more than 10 years. As a result, the need for a well-functioning migration management has emerged for the increasing Syrian population in the country and refugees from other countries. Considering the initial direct impacts of COVID-19, it can comprise enormous socio-economic challenges that can be potentially catastrophic especially for young migrants. Among others, disrupted health services, job, and income losses interrupted access to school, and travel restrictions bear directly on the well-being of young people who are already marked by insecurity will be affected even more seriously. In recent years, the stock of immigrants and refugees in Turkey has dramatically increased. Our project, which is designed to meet this need, aims to increase the communication between young professionals working in the field of migration and young immigrants. Our project tries to provide an important contribution to Turkey's migration management with a human resource sensitive to linguistic and cultural differences, aims to produce various outputs.