Digitally Agile Youth Work Erasmus Project

Project Title

Digitally Agile Youth Work

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 2017

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Youth (Participation, Youth Work, Youth Policy) ; ICT – new technologies – digital competences

Project Summary

The Digitally Agile Youth Work Project was a strategic partnership between experts and leaders in the field of Digital Youth Work in Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland and Scotland. As a partnership we strongly believe that for youth work in the 21st Century to meet young people’s needs the sector must understand and embrace the role of digitalisation within young people’s lives. There is a catalogue of research that shows that, although some parts of the youth work sector are engaged with digital and incorporating new elements into their practice all the time, there is a significant proportion of the sector that is not fully equipped to engage with the digital era and its important impact on youth work practice. This is often due to a lack of confidence and competence in using technology, making people feel that it isn’t for them or for their practice. Throughout the project we have intended to create accessible resources to help to break down this barrier to engagement and support practitioners and managers to acknowledge the importance of building digital into their youth work, the impact and relevance for young people and the way that new technologies can enhance practice. This project has also engaged with the infrastructure enabling the development of digital youth work; identifying resources needed for good practice examples, building strategic development tools into the training materials and calling on organisations, funders and policy makers to support digital youth work in the European Guidelines for Digital Youth Work.The objectives of the Digitally Agile Youth Work project were:Share good digital youth work practice across Europe leading to improved practice and innovation within the European youth work community Build capacity of youth workers to respond to digitalisation through training that meets their needs Improve digital youth work planning and the development of digital youth work strategies through increasing awareness of managers of ethical and organisational considerations and requirements of digital youth workRaise awareness of digital youth work within the youth work sector and to policy makers and funders nationally and EU wideThe project activities focused on the creation of three intellectual outputs, designed to work towards achieving these objectives. All project outputs can be found on the www.digitalyouthwork.eu website:Good practice collectionThis is a collection of 36 short films showcasing good practice in digital youth work from our 6 countries, with the aim of inspiring youth workers to get involved with digital youth work. Each good practice film is accompanied by text outlining the target audience and aims of the practice, the resources needed and feedback and evaluation. The practices are on a range of themes and are generally low-threshold, not requiring a lot of technical equipment.Digital Youth Work Training ResourcesMaterials to develop digital youth work within the youth work sector. The materials include workshop plans to use when training youth workers, session plans for use with young people and self assessment and organisational development tools. The training materials are on a broad range of topics including media literacy, online counselling, STEAM and social media.European Guidelines for Digital Youth WorkThe European Guidelines for Digital Youth Work have been designed to clearly define Digital Youth Work, its impact and the value of youth work as an important educational practice which can empower young people in a digitalising society. The Guidelines give practical and ethical guidance to youth workers, managers and organisations. They also include a call to action for funders and policy makers for the youth work sector, outlining steps they can take to enable the development of digital youth work for all young people.The project outputs have been developed to complement and augment other developments on Digital Youth Work in Europe, to raise the profile and equip the youth work sector to better meet young people’s needs. The methodology to create these intellectual outputs was a collaborative approach, including an innovative ‘Training Jam’ process as well as training, networking and consultation within the sector.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 218525 Eur

Project Coordinator

YOUTHLINK SCOTLAND & Country: UK

Project Partners

• JFF – JUGEND FILM FERNSEHEN E.V.
• NATIONAL YOUTH COUNCIL OF IRELAND
• Camara Ireland Limited
• Youth Division, City of Helsinki, Culture and Leisure sector
• wienXtra, ein junges Stadtprogramm zur Förderung von Kindern, Jugendlichen und Familien
• CENTRE FOR DIGITAL PAEDAGOGIK SL