Deepening democracy! – a strategy for improving the quality of democracy in school context Erasmus Project

Project Title

Deepening democracy! – a strategy for improving the quality of democracy in school context

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for school education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy; Civic engagement / responsible citizenship

Project Summary

“Deepening democracy! – a strategy for improving the quality of democracy in school context” is a project of 24 months duration coordinated by YUPI organization in Famalicão, Portugal, in close partnership with other portuguese partner (Agrupamento de Escolas Camilo Castelo Branco), Poland (EPI and Liceum Ogolnoksztalcace w Kielcach) and Romania (Asociatia feedback PM-Brasov and Colegiul National de Informatica Grigore Moisil), for a total number of 1700 young pupils and more then 140 youth workers and teachers in the 3 European countries involved (140 teachers and youth workers and over 60 students will have the chance to engage in international learning experiences). The partners are schools and non governmental organizations already experienced in working in close cooperation for a better integrated system of education for young people, combining formal and non formal learning. “Deepening democracy!” aims at contributing to the recognition of the importance of cooperation between non formal and formal education systems in order to offer the young pupils a more integrated education and allow more adequate strategies to integrate young people in the society. The partners are coming from disadvantaged areas of their countries, where geographical, social and economic obstacles are conditioning the development of young people and the mobility experience for learning, especially for young girls.
The two topics chosen by the partners for the local activities in close cooperation between the non formal and formal sectors are 1) method of sociocracy for a more engaged decision-making in schools; 2) Sustainable development goals for a more sustainable strategy of the school. These topics are channels on how to involve young pupils in activities supported by youth workers and teachers inside classrooms and schools.
Our main goal is to create an international network of partners interested and cooperating for the recognition of combining non formal and formal educational for a more comprehensive education alternative for young pupils, therefore contributing for a better development of the local community. We act at different levels to achieve this goal: local activities under the topics, coordinators meetings, staff training events for youth workers and teachers and short term exchanges of groups of pupils and multiplier events at every country involved in order to disseminate the outcomes and output presentations, as well as the 2 intellectual outputs developed, reaching a higher number of local partners interested in mainstreaming the tools.
The outputs created during the implementation and closing stage of this project are: a Guide on Sociocracy with results of the research on in each school on how decision-making is happening and what can be done for improving the quality of democracy and an Educational game on Sustainable Development Goals created in collaboration between teachers, students and youth workers to inform and explore the strategy of SDG’s in a more youth friendly and interactive way. All these tools will allow the improvement of quality of practices from all professionals involved and also contribute to the sustainability of this project after the funding ends and the dissemination of results towards other interested partners.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 135142 Eur

Project Coordinator

YOUTH UNION OF PEOPLE WITH INITIATIVE ASSOCIACAO PARA O DESENVOLVIMENTO SOCIAL E COMUNITARIO & Country: PT

Project Partners

• Agrupamento de Escolas Camilo Castelo Branco
• IV Liceum Ogolnoksztalcace w Kielcach
• Colegiul National de Informatica Grigore Moisil
• Asociatia pentru Integrare Sociala si Protectia Mediului “Feed-Back”
• Stowarzyszenie Edukacja przez Internet