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You(th) in Europe!

2021-2-NL02-KA153-YOU-0000393052021Mobility of youth workersfinalized
Countries: NL|HU|RO|AM|IT|PT|BA|MD|AL|AZ|TR · Grant: €53,198.5
Preventing racism and discriminationDigital youth workQuality and innovation of youth work

Objectives

The "You(th) in Europe '' training course was designed to address the issue of stereotypes, prejudices, and discrimination in society, and to explore how media could be a useful tool for promoting anti discrimination and inclusion. Through interactive and engaging sessions, participants gained a deeper understanding of the root causes of discrimination and developed practical skills to challenge and combat discriminatory attitudes and behaviours. The project was implemented by a consortium formed by MP (NL), as applicant and YouthClub (RO), Yopa (HU), SCAMBI (IT), CHECK-IN (PT), BRAVO (BA), MDA (TR), CCT (MD), YV (ALB), APY (ARM), IDEAL (AZR) as partners. The training course took place from 10 – 19 May 2022 in Rotterdam, Netherlands, with the arrival day on 10th May and the departure day on 19th May. Participants had the opportunity to exchange ideas and experiences with trainers and peers from different cultural backgrounds and developed a network of like-minded professionals in the field of antidiscrimination and media. By our project we aimed to make people aware of their subculture, their behaviour towards differences, raise awareness of their stereotypes and prejudices and spotlight when they discriminate against others even unconsciously. Foster understanding how media affect their perspectives towards each other, how a joke can be discriminative even without knowing it. Then as the next step, turn it upside down, use the media as a tool against discrimination. Use the popular tools that young people like nowadays for the sake of anti discrimination and even invent projects and build partnerships around the topic as antidiscrimination by the tool as media devices. As youth workers, we had to deal with a range of challenges related to working with young people from diverse cultural backgrounds. One of the main challenges was supporting young people who experienced social exclusion and discrimination based on their cultural background. Many of these young people faced significant barriers to accessing education, employment, and social opportunities, and struggled to find their place in society. In addition to this, we also work with local young people who were influenced by hate speech online and at the local level through media and family backgrounds. These young people often had negative attitudes towards those from different cultural backgrounds, which could lead to further discrimination and exclusion. We also encountered young people with migrant backgrounds from very different cultures, many of whom were still traumatised by their previous life experiences. These young people face unique challenges related to language, culture shock, and the need to adapt to a new way of life. Themes of our project were: as youth workers, youth leaders we work directly with young people and of course, we cannot know all the details such as family life, religion, cultural background, etc. of our target group. So, several times we don’t want to, and we can hurt. We can hurt with an innocent joke; we can discriminate with a look, a phrase, an unconscious behaviour. Nowadays, working with immigrants, Roma people, members of different ethnic groups, or only with a young person simple, we cannot know which issue can be really sensitive, as e.g. showing a funny short movie about religion or women can be really discriminative towards someone and we even don’t know about it. We don’t know that we discriminate. The overall aim of our project was to train youth workers and youth leaders on using media (jokes, short movies and advertisements) as tools on anti discrimination. To make them aware of their own cultural background, and how it influences them towards different cultures. To foster understanding the reasons behind their reaction, stereotypes and prejudices, and to recognise discriminations around and by them. To learn usage of new media technology on anti discrimination for and by young people they work with. Learning objectives of the Training Course were: To raise awareness on culture, cultural diversity and own cultural identity; To explore and adapt the 3rd Youth Goal “Inclusive societies” of European Youth Strategy “Investing, Connecting and Empowering young people” to youth work context; To make assessment on stereotypes, prejudices and discrimination in general and self – assessment in personal and professional level in particular; To improve competences as usage of new modern technologies as tools for antidiscrimination; To be able to prepare, realise and evaluate jokes, short movies and advertisements on anti discrimination; To create a new partner network among organisations and invent together future projects.

Project partners (11)