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Wear Your Voice!

2021-1-PL01-KA154-YOU-0000199232021Youth participation activitiesfinalized
Countries: PL|LV|IT|EL|ES · Grant: €6,000
Creativity, arts and cultureDigital youth workEuropean identity and values

Objectives

This project was born as a follow-up of an ESC Solidarity Project “Mówiciuch” that we implemented in 2020/2021. Participants of the Solidarity Project came up with an idea to enlarge the impact of the SP and go international, sharing ideas and methods with youth from other countries. Thus, we decided to take the idea to the next level and implement a more developed and upgraded version internationally in the frames of Erasmus+ YPA. In “Mówiciuch” we discussed problems of the local community and discovered that there are many youngsters who don’t express their voice in the society and are not being involved in promoting their opinions. We came to the idea of promoting pro–active youth messages on clothes that will make people reflect and find positive ways of contributing to society or speak their mind. After observing the implementation of the project and its importance and power we Fdecided to create this follow-up project. By exchanging with our international partners, we could see the same need for creating a space of expression about socially important issues among youth from all around Europe. We presented our idea to youth organisations that our NGO has already cooperated with: L’Ayalguina Latvia, Spain | Active Rainbow , Latvia | Be Visible Be YOU, Greece | Beyond Borders, Italy. While preparing the main idea of this YPA we got in touch with youngsters belonging to these NGOs to talk about their possible contributions to the project and we were very satisfied with their openness and creativity. SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES OF THE PROJECT: – To empower young people in expressing their opinions and raise their awareness of the importance their choices have on the society in a creative and non-violent way, i.e. by designing a set of online workshops and street wear with social messages; – To promote responsible consumerism and ecological clothes production; – To promote active citizenship through creativity and development of a clothing line; – To foster communication and cooperation through digital tools between young people from various backgrounds and origins in the topic of active citizenship; – To foster communication and cooperation between young people and youth organisations and blend their experiences in order to empower other youngsters in taking social action. The previous year that brought a complete revolution in education with new digital tools emerging, as well as our experience in “Mówiciuch” and other online events that made us develop methods to move NFE activities into the online and us the potential of e-learning and e-exchanging, all that made us decide on the online strategy of the project. Through the project we wanted to support active youth participation, also online. We wanted to show them that their voice and opinions are important and can be heard in the society. By connecting youngsters from different parts of Europe during these online workshops we wanted to show them that their voice matters and that they can undertake actions to make the world a better place themselves. We wanted to ensure that the project meets best the needs of our target group. We wanted to foster communication with youth from different backgrounds, youth centres and organisations working in the design field, and schools. We also included participants with fewer opportunities. Our project also aimed to raise young people’s awareness about ecology and their impact on sustainability. To do so, we organised everything in the most sustainable way, i.e. when producing designs and clothes with social messages, we cooperated only with local producers who care about the environment. To sum up, our Youth Participation Activity aimed to promote pro–active opinions of young people through messages & designs on clothes developed by young people themselves as a consequence of a set of online workshops on the topics of active citizenship, youth participation, communication, design and social activism. Thus, we wanted to empower young people to speak up in a pacifistic and constructive way about the social issues that touch them (in)directly and make them more aware of the importance of them making their voice heard.

Project partners (5)