INCLUSION IN DIVERSITY SCHOOLS : THE INCLUSION OF YOUNG ROMA WOMEN THROUGH NONFORMAL EDUCATION Erasmus Project

Project Title

INCLUSION IN DIVERSITY SCHOOLS : THE INCLUSION OF YOUNG ROMA WOMEN THROUGH NONFORMAL EDUCATION

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: Access for disadvantaged; Gender equality / equal opportunities; Inclusion – equity

Project Summary

Young roma women in Europe have multiple obstacles that hinder their inclusion and their capability for emancipation, mainly gender, cultural, and economic obstacles. This is shown by multiple studies and reports of the European Union and the Spanish Government, such as the report of the European Commission “ESF and the roma population” that states “The roma population suffers discrimination in all existential areas, and needs access to social services in equal conditions”; and also in the study “Social diagnosis of the roma community in Spain of the MINISTRY OF HEALTH, SOCIAL POLICY, AND EQUALITY: roma women spend the least hours in formal employment, less than roma and non-roma men, and that the rest of all Spanish women. Their low levels of qualification and limited time availability due to family burdens and their participation in family economic activities outside the strictly domestic ones are behind these large differences”.

Based on this context, and in line with the actions of the EU and the Erasmus Plus Programme, that aim to promote the inclusion of roma people in Europe, a project has been carried out that has advanced in the achievement of the following objectives:
Promoting the inclusion and training, through non-formal education, of young roma women to strengthen their entrepreneurship, initiative, critical analysis, and empowerment skills.
Promoting intercultural dialogue and strengthening knowledge and acceptance of diversity in society, preventing racism and gender inequalities.

In order to carry out these ambitious objectives, organizations from different European countries have joined, who had previous experience working together, specifically in the field of the inclusion of young roma women: ASOCIACIÓN DE GITANAS FEMINISTAS POR LA DIVERSIDAD (Spain), RIBALTAMBIÇÃO (Portugal ), E-ROMNJA and AMARE RROMENTZA (Romania).
As a result of the collaboration of these 4 organizations in this project, very relevant results have been created to facilitate the inclusion of young roma women, including:
THE WEB PLATFORM: “INCLUSION IN DIVERSITY”: (https://www.skolaromani.org/aula-de-jovenes/) an online platform to act as a gateway to non-formal education for inclusion, specifically aimed at young roma women, where they will find many training materials, a learning support service, and videos with specific dynamics and workshops to work with young people for inclusion in diversity.
This platform also serves as a window to disseminate the project and its results, since it has a specific section describing its main activities, the Erasmus Plus Programme, information on the progress of the project, and successful experiences in the inclusion of young roma women. This platform will be the first seed to create the Schools for Inclusion in Diversity, which will also have on-site training in the future.

In order to achieve these very ambitious results and objectives, the participating organizations carried out multiple activities in which more than 100 young roma women from different countries were directly involved. Some of the most relevant activities implemented were: the 3 Transnational Meetings held – the first in Madrid (Spain), the second in Bucharest (Romania), and the last in Figueira da Foz (Portugal); and the preparatory activities of multicultural and linguistic training, for overcoming obstacles, virtual mobilities, participatory workshops in which the young women themselves developed the results, etc.
All these activities and results of the project have been based on a participatory methodology focused on non-formal and informal education, with the aim of making the learning process more appealing, motivating the participants, involving them in their own learning process, and boost peer learning, in addition to the fact that the young roma women themselves were the main characters of the project, by designing and developing the training materials and managing the entire project.

Lastly, note that the impact of this project has been very strong, especially at the local and regional levels, where more than 100 young roma students have been directly involved, and have overcome many obstacles at the end of the project, but also at the national and European level thanks to the extensive dissemination of the results. The long-term impact is expected to be even greater since this project is the seed to create the Schools for Inclusion in Diversity, which in the long term will strengthen the Web Platform for Inclusion with physical spaces with on-site training to promote the inclusion of young roma women through non-formal education.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 38920 Eur

Project Coordinator

Asociación GitanasFeministas por la Diversidad & Country: ES

Project Partners

• E-Romnja Association for Promoting Roma Women’s Rights
• RIBALTAMBIÇÃO- Associação para a Igualdade de Género nas Comunidades Ciganas
• Centrul Rromilor “Amare Rromentza””