Youth Action for Nature and Well-being is a strategic partnership for innovation including ECO-UNESCO in Ireland, Gaia Education in the UK, the Forest Therapy Institute in Portugal, Youth for Smile in Latvia, the Rural Parliament of Slovakia, and Resilience.Earth in Spain, as well as Dr. Arjen Wals and Dr. Stephen Sterling as associate partners. The idea for this project came about because of the confluence of two crises: the climate crisis and the coronavirus pandemic. These crises have brought to the surface both the severity of the challenges posed as well as the unprecedented opportunity to rethink how we work, learn, live and exist on our planet. Young people are in a unique position with respect to their development and to the ongoing climate and pandemic crises. They are rapidly developing as people, have a great need for social connection and a lower tolerance to uncertainty than other age groups. We also know that young people believe protecting the environment and fighting climate change should be the top priority for the European Union (Eurobarometer 478, 2019). For these reasons, young people have unique and extraordinary needs for support to connect to their communities, to take action for the environment, and to build resilience for positive mental health in facing an uncertain and challenging future. Now, more than ever, it is important that we come together to respond to the need to 1) restore the environment, 2) engage in society as active citizens to influence the future, and, last but not least, 3) strengthen our mental resilience to be able to act on our knowledge and awareness of the challenges rather than feel overcome by them. Therefore this project aims to innovate new ways of working with young people that combine transformative learning, action competence and nature-based strategies for positive mental health. The objectives of the project are: -To collaborate on the design and co-creation of new ways of working with young people that improve well-being and strengthen their sense of self-efficacy, that build their leadership skills and competence to act, that enable them to respond to the global crises and gain positive mental health at the same time. -To pilot the new ways of working we create in four innovations, with participants from all partner countries, and assess the impact of the methodologies tried using quantitative and qualitative evaluation methods. -To create and publish a toolkit, a case study, a pedagogical strategy, an evaluation tool and an e-learning course representing the product of the co-creation, the innovations, and the evaluations. -To share these intellectual outputs with young people, youth workers, practitioners, educators and policymakers to magnify the project's impact and contribute to the advancement of education for sustainable development. -To fulfill the important policy priorities in the UN Sustainable Development Goals, UNESCO's Education 2030 and the European Youth Goals, especially: education for sustainability as a vehicle for empowerment and citizenship and mental health and well-being. There will be a total of 128 youth participants, 16 youth workers and 6 trainers directly involved in the project including 30 participants with fewer opportunities. Participants will come from the partner countries of Ireland, Slovakia, Latvia and Spain with trainers also coming from the UK and Portugal. Four, 5-day Learning, Teaching and Training Activities will be held during which the new methods created will be piloted with young people. Design thinking methodology will be used in carrying out the project for its effectiveness in facilitating innovation that meets the needs of the target group by including them in the design process. Iterations of creation, testing, evaluation and revision will guide the development of the new methods. The project includes five intellectual outputs to contribute to the achievement of its objectives: a pedagogical design guide, a case study, an e-learning course, an evaluation tool and a toolkit for youth workers and educators. Participants in the project will gain a greater sense of self and of citizenship, a greater understanding of the challenges and crises we are facing, but also greater competence to respond to them while maintaining positive mental health. Participating organisations will benefit from increased effectiveness in their work that comes from deep engagement in development and innovation of new working methods. They will have greater impact as practitioners and greater impact on young people as a result. The partners will build their capacity as change agents in their communities by developing and using methods that better support youth empowerment, action and well-being. The intellectual outputs represent a contribution to the field of transformative learning for sustainable development that will inspire practitioners and thought leaders in their work.
There were five objectives we wanted to achieve by implementing the project: 1.) To collaborate on the design and co-creation of new ways of working with young people that improve their well-being and strengthen their sense of self-efficacy, build their leadership skills and competence to act, that enable them to respond to global crises and gain positive mental health at the same time. 2.) To pilot the new ways of working we create with participants from all partner countries and assess the impact of the methodologies tried using mixed evaluation methods. 3.) To create and publish a toolkit, a case study, a pedagogical strategy, an evaluation tool and an e-learning course representing the product of the co-creation, the innovations, and the evaluations. 4.) To share these intellectual outputs with young people, youth workers, practitioners, educators and policymakers to magnify the project's impact and contribute to the advancement of education for sustainable development. 5.) To fulfil the important policy priorities in the UN Sustainable Development Goals, UNESCO's Education 2030 and the European Youth Goals, especially: education for sustainability as a vehicle for empowerment, citizenship, and mental health and well-being.
The confluence of the climate crisis and the coronavirus pandemic brought to the surface the severity of social-ecological challenges and the unprecedented opportunity to rethink how we work, learn, and exist on our planet. Our research showed us that young people had (and continue to have) a greater need for social connection than other age grounds, a lower tolerance to uncertainty, and a belief that protecting the environment and fighting climate change should be the top priority for the European Union. For these reasons, young people have a unique and extraordinary need for support regarding community building, environmental action, and resilience building for positive mental health in facing an uncertain and challenging future. This is the reasoning that drove our application. Our project addressed the need for a collective, intercultural, and youth-led response to social-ecological challenges. The project processes and outputs addressed the youth's need for active citizenship and environmental stewardship, focusing on resiliency building and strategic action. The innovative approach to development added to the field of transformative learning, a discourse much in need of practical, youth-led contribution.