Sports and other leisure activities as a transfer instrument for the successful address of young adults in precarious situations Erasmus Project

Project Title

Sports and other leisure activities as a transfer instrument for the successful address of young adults in precarious situations

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 adult education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Access for disadvantaged

Project Summary

A) CONTEXT/BACKGROUND OF THE PROJECT
A German sports club has gained very good experience in a volunteer project involving a group of imprisoned youths and young adults in regular softball training sessions in a prison. These processes, which are essentially initiated in the context of softball instruction, make it much easier for the prisoners to achieve learning success in other areas such as vocational training and further education.

B) PROJECT GOALS
The STEPS project therefore aimed to realize an exchange with other European organizations and to extend it to other areas of education besides sport and to other institutions and facilities for adolescents and young adults in precarious situations, so that sport and other leisure activities are used more specifically as a tool for resocialization and social inclusion.

C) PROFILE OF PARTICIPANTS
The project activities involved full-time and volunteer workers from sports clubs and other educational sectors, as well as other institutions and bodies that work for adolescents and young adults in precarious situations as stakeholders, in particular employees in the prisons of Heinsberg, Vicenza and Innsbruck and representatives of the legal system in Greece. The project brought together experts from different educational fields, as it was precisely these different perspectives from the fields of sports, volunteer work, school education and vocational training that brought very exciting exchanges of experiences.

D) DESCRIPTION OF THE ACTIVITIES
In addition to their main field of activity, which is usually run commercially, the partner organizations involved also have extensive experience and access to other organizations in the field of youth and young adults in precarious situations. Against this background, all partner organizations within the project have exchanged views on initiatives they have carried out themselves or are familiar with, which specifically use sport and other leisure activities as a tool for the resocialization and social inclusion of adolescents and young adults in precarious situations.

E) METHOD
The project partners have entered into a personal exchange with each other. The participation in these activities as a transnational group and the subsequent discussion process within this group have generated very exciting insights into the culturally influenced views of the participating nations and, moreover, unexpected attention from regional media, but also from science and .

F) SHORT DESCRIPTION OF THE RESULTS AND EFFECTS
A) To establish a European network of experts in the field of vocational, general and adult education who wish to disseminate sport and other leisure activities as an appropriate way of reaching young people and young adults in precarious situations.
B) To carry out thematic exchanges of experience and gain knowledge among all participating organisations.
C) Project website (www.gfwh.de/steps), which describes the objectives of the project, documents results and project meetings and provides contact details for the interested (professional) public (in English).
D) Implementation and documentation of a visit day including a softball training unit in the Heinsberg Prison (JVA) for all project partners.
E) Catalogue of good examples (in English and all partner languages) with written presentations (reports) of activities for adolescents and young adults in precarious living conditions in the participating partner organizations or their stakeholders.
F) Creation and distribution of three project newsletters in the languages of the participating project partners and in English.
G) Facebook profile page for direct exchange with other experts and interested parties in the field of work with adolescents and young adults in precarious situations. Although the traffic on Facebook has been rather modest, the facebook presence was able to win over the “Alliance for Sports in Criminal Justice” as a strategic partner of the project, with whom discussions on joint follow-up projects are currently underway.

G) LONG-TERM EFFECTS OF THE PROJECT
In the long term, all participating project partners should use sport and other leisure activities as a tool for the resocialization and social inclusion of adolescents and young adults in precarious situations. Various ideas for follow-up projects are also already being planned and implemented.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 64385 Eur

Project Coordinator

Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Weiterbildung im Handwerk mbH (GFWH GmbH) & Country: DE

Project Partners

• SCUOLA COSTRUZIONI VICENZA ANDREA PALLADIO
• DATCA ILCE MILLI EGITIM MUDURLUGU
• Club Life Long Learning
• EYROPAIKO INSTITOYTO TOPIKHS ANAPTYKSHS
• Base- und Softballvereinigung Wassenberg 01 e.V.