Empowering Young Disadvantaged Individuals to Trigger Change in their Communities – You.Change.Com Erasmus Project

Project Title

Empowering Young Disadvantaged Individuals to Trigger Change in their Communities – You.Change.Com

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 youth

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2016

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Inclusion – equity; Youth (Participation, Youth Work, Youth Policy) ; Labour market issues incl. career guidance / youth unemployment

Project Summary

The world is gradually becoming witness to the disenfranchisement of youth. The world is gradually becoming witness to the disenfranchisement of youth. This is due, in part, to the recent economic recession, which has placed young people in a disadvantaged socio-economic position with higher youth unemployment, and has generated political distrust and loss of values in society. As a result, feelings of exclusion or inequality further diminish the will of youth to participate. Thus, young people are characterized to a large extent as “passive recipients” and the role of youth in development and decision making is marginalized or underestimated.
It is verified, therefore, that it is necessary to build trust in young people, transfer skills and give them responsibility and encourage their right to participate in civic and cultural life, while at the same time generating a positive impact on the social ecosystem.
Participation can be strengthened by including young people in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of tools, policies and projects, and by establishing the civic commitment of young people as a priority.
This project has been implemented in 3 countries with a dual partnership structure including, for each country, a support entity and a local-based entity: Spain (ITC and FASL), Greece (KMOP and ADDMA) and Cyprus (CARDET and AA ). The objective of the project is to involve and recruit young people with fewer opportunities to act as “promoters of change” (Community Angels) in their local communities to conceive and carry out socio-economic development strategies, using disused spaces (urban recycling).

The objectives include addressing social exclusion through active participation and motivation of young people in disadvantaged environments; Involve local stakeholders, private entities, trainers and NGOs in joint planning to promote growth and socio-economic stability and promote multilevel collaborative approaches to promote youth social entrepreneurship.
The implementation of the project has been developed in two phases: the training phase and the implementation phase. The training phase has included:
• carrying out basic research on the training needs of young people, including the analysis of 63 responses: 27 responses from Spain, 17 responses from Greece and 21 responses from Cyprus.
• Based on the results of the analysis, the preparation of the training curriculum in 4 training modules in 3 languages (EN, GR and ES): soft skills; fundraising skills; skills for the recruitment and training of paid staff including general administrative tasks and local action planning skills and information in the framework of local development strategies.
• The recruitment of the participants and the training itself, of 40 hours in an average of 10 sessions per country, with the completion of the training by 45 participants (15 per country).
The implementation phase has included:
• The development of a common methodology for the 3 countries involved;
• The presentation of local action plans prepared by young people as part of the “practicum” of the training, and the selection in each country, through committees created specifically for that purpose;
• The development of each local action plan and the mobilization of resources in Spain, Greece and Cyprus:
In Spain: (Almería): “Workshops for the empowerment of young people in Los Almendros”
In Greece: (Athens): “Educational theater workshops to raise awareness about human trafficking”
In Cyprus (Agios Athanasios): “Human Scale Park”;
• The implementation of activities included in the community action plan by the youth with continuous orientation;
• The preparation of a guide for the implementation of local action plans that facilitate the dissemination and transferability of the model tested in the framework of the project.
• Follow-up and report of final evaluation of activities.
The results and impact have reached and even exceeded expectations, including the design of 4 complete training modules in 3 languages (EN; ES; GR), completion of the training of 45 young trainees (out of 60 recruited), the selection and successful implementation of 3 local action plans selected through multidisciplinary selection committees, the participation of 136 interested in the day of diffusion held in Almeria in May 2018 as well as the participation of 42 interested in Athens and 40 in Cyprus in the context of multiplication events. The dissemination activities have consisted of a battery of actions including website and Facebook, press releases, newlstters and dissemination events that have exceeded the scope of 5,000 people initially planned with the publication in local press (in Spanish and Greek) of the different activities of the project.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 142670 Eur

Project Coordinator

FUNDACION ALMERIA SOCIAL Y LABORAL & Country: ES

Project Partners

• CENTRE FOR ADVANCEMENT OF RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT IN EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY LTD-CARDET
• KENTRO MERIMNAS OIKOGENEIAS KAI PAIDIOU
• Innovation Training Center, S.L.
• DIMOS AGIOS ATHANASIOS
• ETAIREIA ANAPTYXIS KAI TOURISTIKIS PROVOLIS ATHINON – ANAPTYXIAKI ANONYMOS ETAIREIA ORGANISMOU TOPIKIS AFTODIOIKISIS