Gemeinsam Europa gestalten Erasmus Project

Project Title

Gemeinsam Europa gestalten

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 2015

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: EU Citizenship, EU awareness and Democracy; Inclusion – equity; Entrepreneurial learning – entrepreneurship education

Project Summary

The idea of the transnational youth initiative “Building Europe Together” is based on the following guiding principles: Every European citizen can contribute to make a place in Europe more attractive to live and thus practically to make Europe a more attractive place to live in. We, the project participants, are convinced that Europe can only be structured through shared commitment beyond the borders of any European country; because in terms of mobility and economic integration Europeans are closely connected and therefore they cannot afford to reduce their world to their own hometowns, as it is a matter of time that social problems in an EU member state affect the well-being in another one.
Having these thoughts in mind, we developed our project idea with overall twenty-nine German and Bulgarian participants with the mission among other things to make a Bulgarian city more attractive to live. The encouragement of self-definition, self-responsibility and team spirit as well as open-mindedness in order to understand better social and cultural diversity in Europe was the central project goal for all of us. Additionally, our experience in Bulgaria was a basis for our endeavor to turn the public attention towards more livable townscape in the city.
Teams of people with and without disabilities, with and without migration background and with different social backgrounds were formed in rich West Germany and the poorest EU country – Bulgaria. The thirteen German participants took part in the project “Building Europe Together” within the informal group “We for us in Europe”. The sixteen participants from Bulgaria participated in the project within the charitable non-government organization “The Fire of Orpheus”. All together they gathered experience in being active citizens and so they recognized social problems and found workable solutions in order to make European towns and cities a better place to live. Thus, they promoted the building of an inclusive Europe and created a public awareness of living the European values on local, regional and international level. The collaboration between the Bulgarian and German teams was based on their mutual interests to make their environment more inclusive and livable so that everyone can feel comfortable and respectively participate fully in social life without restrictions. Especially for people in risk of discrimination, it is often difficult to feel belonging to a place and we wish that this would change! That is why this project gave these people the opportunity to help determine how a town or a city should look like, so that they can feel good residing it.
Furthermore, in our common urban design, we applied a method based on inclusion: “I accept you with your limitations and potential and want to know what you really need in order to help you as you want!” Therefore, the German participants went to Bulgaria not in the role of a fault-finder; their hosts, the Bulgarian participants, were the „experts in showing their own world“ with its limitations and possibilities. These limitations and possibilities were respected by all project participants and so they contributed together to sustainable solutions to social problems.
In addition, we organized a 10-day meeting in the Bulgarian town Razlog and together with locals realized prospective ideas on how the city can be made more attractive to live. We prepared as well an exhibition and a discussion with the mayor of the city Razlog and representatives from politics, economy and culture to present our ideas in the form of art works and to clarify our questions. Furthermore, we fulfilled the request of the mayor of Razlog and compiled a memorandum with suggestions how the city can be made more attractive to live. In our home country we reflected on our own inclusive experiences through an online exchange and featured the production of a documentary. During the screenings and the subsequent discussions with political and cultural representatives from Germany and Bulgaria we presented our perception what a home city needs to become more livable.
We got feedback from many interested parties, among them politicians like Mr. Strässer (ex-commissioner for human rights in Germany), that the project is a best practice model in view of the advancement of inclusion in the European Union.
For more information please visit:
https://europagemeinsam.wordpress.com/eu-projekt/

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 24367,24 Eur

Project Coordinator

Wir für uns in Europa & Country: DE

Project Partners

• “OGANIAT NA ORFEI” / “THE FIRE OF ORPHEUS”