Introduction from EYCA President

I have met a lot of EYCA member organisations in the past few months.
 
In addition to your day-to-day work to create and promote exciting opportunities for youth mobility and citizenship, many of you have come to workshops and seminars to share knowledge, experience and ideas. 

Practical ideas for better mobility were shared and generated in a workshop in Madrid in December 2012. These have been pulled together and published in an EYCA good practice series leaflet (GPS number 6). EYCA and Council of Europe co-hosted a seminar in Andorra in March (with support from Carnet Jove Andorra) to consider youth mobility from academic, employer and policy-maker perspectives – the findings are published in GPS 8. Government and other stakeholders in Poland were treated to a series of presentations from EYCA member organisations in a seminar in Warsaw in March. Polish Youth Projects Association commissioned and organized this seminar to help their Government and potential partners better understand the benefits of European Youth Cards.
 
19 representatives from EYCA member organisations along with 7 representatives from Governments, which contribute to Council of Europe Partial Agreement on Youth Mobility through the Youth Card participated in a seminar in Edinburgh in April to explore the impact of European Youth Cards on young people. Results from this seminar will be published soon in yet another GPS leaflet. And in May another seminar, this time in Belgrade, brought together sixteen EYCA member organisations with Government representatives to think together about European Youth Cards as a tool to promote better mobility and tourism for young people.
 
In the past six months, 32 EYCA member organisations have participated in EYCA seminars. If your organisation hasn’t, please let us know why not. If we are delivering events or opportunities that don’t meet your needs, we should do something about that. Participating in EYCA events isn’t just about having fun – although there is often a good element of that! What is more important is that people working in EYCA organisations get to know more about each other and about the great work you are doing. Building connections, swapping or stealing ideas and creating new ideas for projects are what it is all about. Check the information in the GPS leaflets.
 
What has become clear to me is that many of you are deeply concerned about unemployment as the biggest issue facing young people in your country and in Europe today. I am happy to hear that many of our member organisations already respond to this matter with imaginative information, projects and partnerships. That is why I held a President’s Commission again this year with a specific focus on the potential contribution of EYCA and youth cards to promoting employability and entrepreneurship for young people. A 24-hour strategic thinking session included inputs from nine different EYCA member organisations. Specific recommendations will be presented at the Conference in Mollina. I look forward to working with you there to make a real impact on young people’s lives.

Jarkko Lehikoinen

Young people as card ambassadors

How to involve young people in your work without creating a formal structure? The youth card in Luxembourg came up with a very original approach.

In a pilot, they will work with a class of 15 college students with whom the organisation will develop visions and future programmes around the card. One delegate of the class is doing an internship in the CIJ (Centre Information Jeunes) office to get to know the services of the European Youth Card in Luxembourg. The intern prepares presentations and documents for activities in connection to the card to be organized by his/her school class over the next months. The idea is to have young motivated ambassadors of the European Youth Card. The outcomes of the test phase will allow designing a similar programme for larger groups of young people and several school classes all around the country.    

In order to have direct contact to and feedback from cardholders, especially of those with the new European Youth Card co-branded with Hostelling International, the Centre Information Jeunes is offering additional free services. Young people have for example the possibility to do free copying in the youth card office.

More user-friendly youth info

One of EYCA’s three Belgian member organisations nominated their new website features as good practice in the category “communications and PR” for the 2012 Hercules Awards.

Carte Jeunes Wallonie Bruxelles (CJWB) offers two new services to its members: a directory of youth organisations and a youth calendar. How did they come about? “Carte Jeunes used an existing database and updated it with the help of a questionnaire, which we sent to all the organisations listed,” explains project manager Sarah Kebaili. The catalogue includes nine search criteria such as location, area of activities, type of entity etc. Young people can use it to find an organisation to volunteer with or ask for advice.

The youth card in French-speaking Belgium also created a youth calendar in partnership with the Youth Service of the Community, which allows organisations and youth centres to post activities they wish to promote. “This calendar appears on the homepage of cartejeunes.be and is free of charge,” explains Sarah. “It includes not only cultural activities in Belgium but also workshops, conferences, travel, and job offers”. 

Focus on sports

Come sail with me

The Polish Youth Projects Association (PYPA) will cooperate with Mateusz Kusznierewicz (sailor, winner of two Olympic medals) on his "Maritime Education Programme”. As part of this project, PYPA plans to issue co-branded cards for all participants and add to their database also “sailing” discounts such as charter, equipment rental, sailing shops, sailing schools and courses.

The Maritime Education Programme is implemented in Gdansk by the Gdansk Foundation upon commission of the Mayor of the City and is a brainchild of Mateusz Kusznierewicz. In this programme, all first-grade students of junior high schools based in Gdańsk go on a few hours’ cruise of the Harbour Canal and the Bay of Gdansk, in which they learn the rudiments of sailing and a bit of history, geography and biology, as well as get to know their city from the waterfront perspective. The goal behind the programme is to raise awareness of the maritime tradition and Gdańsk’s heritage. Young residents learn about opportunities in a city at the water and develop their ecological know-how. Cruise admission is free – more than 10.000 participants have cruised since the start of the project three years ago.
 

A special card for football fans

The Raiffeisen bank is a key partner for European Youth Card Austria and the main sponsor of the football club Austria Vienna (Wiener Austria).
 
From February 2013 on, the bank offers to the fans of this club a special banking card in the colours of the club (violet) and a special VIOLA banking account connected to exclusive benefits:

• A discount of 19,11 € for fan articles in the Get Violett Megastore (to reflect the funding year of Austria Vienna, 1911)
• Two free tickets for FC Austria matches
• A visit to the FC Austria museum

As there has been remarkable interest from young people, there will be a special version of the Raiffeisen club card, in the colours of Austria Vienna, with the EYCA logo. The project starts in June 2013, 1.000 cards are planned to be printed.

Feeling Slovenia under your skin

6 young people from 6 countries visiting Slovenia and European Youth Capital 2013 Maribor for 6 days, for free - photography, writing, and fun, social media...
These are the key words of the new FEEL SLOVENIA - YOUTH MEDIA LITERACY PROGRAMME put together by EYCA's member MOBIN and Slovenian Tourist Board.

One participant from Austria, Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, Sweden and Slovenia respectively will attend the project at the end of June 2013 and the programme expecting them is really exciting.
 
Young people selected for the adventure will have a background in media, tourism, anthropology or other areas with a strong interest in publishing online. During their trip, they will get to know Slovenia – a country in the centre of Europe, a place where the mighty Alps meet the colourful Mediterranean. An important feature will be a visit to the town that, in 2013, hosts the European Youth Capital – Maribor. 
 
The journalists and bloggers will discover the local environment and possibilities for young travellers in Slovenia and create engaging texts, photos and videos about Slovenia through the eyes of the young for the young. Throughout the programme, they will upgrade their knowledge about photography, creative writing and experience intercultural learning. The Slovenian Youth Card will keep us posted when the articles about Slovenia and Maribor, the European Youth Capital, are published on the web and on social networks. 

Engaging young people through the arts

CJP Netherlands cooperates with cultural events to attract new audiences to well-known but sometimes highbrow form of arts under the title CJP serveert (CJP serves).

Popular arts events are not always very welcoming to young people. Sometimes they have early sold-outs, sometimes the audiences are too in crowd to feel welcome and sometimes the venues are simple too posh to just pop in. CJP tries to lower all these trespasses by simply organising an event inside the event where all these non-going issues are dealt with.
 
At the International Film Festival Rotterdam CJP got the best day (Saturday) in a nice venue (Pathe Cinema) and the festival offered 3 films, which were representative for the event but not too artistic. The entrance fee for a full day was just 17,50 euro which is a 33% discount and as a bonus, the card organisation served beer and snacks. 
 
CJP found out that the trick is recognition. As soon as a visitor recognizes him or herself in the other visitors, they feel more welcome and comfortable. In the survey afterwards cardholders gave an average 8 out of 10 to describe their experience. 80% of the audience were first timers, i.e. new audience to the film festival. In this combination everyone is happy: the film festival because of the new audience; the film distributor because they show their film to a specific target group; CJP because the event defines the card as a means to cool discount and the young people because they had a positive cultural experience. No wonder that after the initial success of the International Film Festival Rotterdam, also the Dutch Film Festival, The International Documentary Festival Amsterdam as well as the Fantastic Festival Amsterdam copied this structure. In 2013, CJP will use and translate this concept towards museums.

The red carpet of the Young Scot Awards 2013

We’ve heard so much about them that our expectations couldn’t be any higher. A bus-full of EYCA staff from 15 member organisations, friends from different European partner organisations as well as national governments set out to Glasgow (the Dutch delegation wearing a kilt!), to finally see the Young Scot Awards with our own eyes and take some inspiration home.

This group came to Edinburgh on April 18-20 to explore how we can plan and measure the impact of our work – the European Youth Card - on young people. The Awards ceremony was surely one of the best practice examples of how we can change the perceptions of young people among the general public, motivate thousands of young people to aim high and make a difference in their lives and societies and spread the word about our work country-wide.
 
The Awards were everything we thought they’d be: first a little bit of glamour on the red carpet, “dress to impress” dress-code and young Scottish stars that brought the audience of more than 1500 young people into a frenzy. All of us became absorbed reading the list of nominees and it was impossible to decide, which of the three nominees in each of the 12 categories (sponsored by different partners) should win. We were amazed what these young people achieved at just 20 or even 15 years of age; their stories were worth to be turned into a book or a movie.
 
The evening flew by with short presentations about each of the contestants, followed with a video about the category winner, announced by pop stars or previous winners. Seeing the young people on the stage – some of them nervous, but all very natural, humble yet proud of what they achieved and all really inspirational, reminded us all why it is so important to continue the work we’re doing.
 
Coming back home, we already know of three EYCA members, who have started negotiating with their government and corporate partners about running similar events in their own countries. Well-done Young Scot(s).

No Hate Speech campaign for human rights online

EYCA has joined at the European level as a special partner to CoE with the No Hate Speech movement. Since the launch of the campaign’s online platform in March 2013 many EYCA members have got engaged with national events to raise awareness about cyber-bullying and encourage young people to act against it with the help of the tools that the campaign provides them.
 
Besides the European dimension of the campaign the success on spreading the messages rests in the hands of the national campaign committees and their partners. Many EYCA members are part of the national coordination committees like in Finland, Czech Republic, Greece, Spain, and Malta. European Youth Centre Serbia is also one of 8 organisations, which have joined forces and supported the Ministry of Youth and Sport in establishing a National Committee. The activists have applied for a grant from the Norwegian Embassy, which would cover the key campaign activities as well as for a Swiss Development Cooperation grant, which would allow for country-wide research on hate speech in Serbia.
 
Various activities are being planned to take place throughout the duration of this campaign in Malta. So far, Agenzija Zghazagh set up both a Facebook group and a blog for No Hate Speech Malta. The agency participated in the EEA Grants Launch, during which they made an official presentation of the No Hate Speech movement to local NGOs and various youth organisations.
 
Together with SHS, a local youth organisation, they have participated in a debate held at the University of Malta. Sponsored by the European Parliament Office in Malta, it introduced university students to the campaign.
 
Throughout the year, Agenzija Zghazagh will visit various local youth organisations to deliver a workshop on the No Hate Speech Movement.
 
Find out more about national campaigns and the campaign toolkit for organizations interested in taking part at http://act4hre.coe.int/no_hate

Youth Mobility seminar in Andorra

A Seminar on “Developing better youth mobility for young people and for Europe” was held in Andorra on 27 February - 1 March under the Andorran Chairmanship of the Council of Ministers of the Council of Europe, in cooperation with the Council of Europe and Carnet Jove Andorra. Youth mobility was looked at from policy, practice, research and employers’ perspectives. http://www.carnetjove.ad/
 
Andorra’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Gilbert Saboya Sunye, welcomed the 40 participants and stressed that education and youth are priorities of the Andorran presidency – a new reality in Europe requires that we identify obstacles to mobility, and work on measures to support it.
 
David Cairns, Senior Researcher at the Centre for Research and Studies in Sociology, (University Institute of Lisbon), presented the academic view of youth mobility. Despite the fact that mobility is for many young people a question of access to employment and studies, it is seriously under-researched in terms of statistical evidence. Morana Makovec from the Croatian Ministry of Social Policy and Youth, who pointed out, confirmed this that a lack of facts and data makes it difficult for policy makers to design strategies for youth mobility. Jacques Spelkens of GDF Suez, an EYCA corporate partner organisation, spoke on behalf of employers who would like to work together with NGOs and governments to stimulate physical mobility and “mobility of the mind”.
 
In workshops and in plenary, participants agreed on an urgent need to (re)define mobility to include all its aspects (cultural, learning, touristic, employment). A full report of the seminar will be published as part of EYCA’s Good Practice Series.

Structured Dialogue under the Irish Presidency

The EU Youth Conference is an element of the Structured Dialogue process, which brings together young people and policy makers to jointly discuss and inform the development of youth policy at national and European level. For the 18-months cycle (1 January 2013 – 30 June 2014), the Trio Presidency, Ireland, Lithuania and Greece, in cooperation with the European Commission and the European Youth Forum have agreed that the theme of the Structured Dialogue is Social Inclusion.

Seven thematic areas, drawn from the results of national Structured Dialogue consultations in the 27 Member States, were explored at the Youth Conference of the Irish Presidency in Dublin (March 2013). Young people and Ministry officials have jointly defined a set of 21 priority conclusions.

EYCA member organisations have significantly contributed to involving young people in answering the Structured Dialogue questionnaires. An illustrative example is the Polish Youth Projects Association. As part of their activities in the Polish Youth Council, they promoted a simplified questionnaire to cardholders on their newsletter, Facebook and website. The topic of the first round was the contribution of quality youth work to social inclusion and the Polish youth card organisation collected 675 answers to the following questions (closed and open formula):
 

1. What are the main challenges in the life of young people nowadays?
2. What does social inclusion mean to young people?
3. What kind of activities are known and popular among youth organisations to promote social inclusion?
4. What groups of young people /subcultures are at the high risk of social exclusion in our country?
5. What kind of actions is developed in your local environment to promote social inclusion?
6. What are the advantages of being active in NGOs and in local environment for young people?
7. What standards of youth work are required to promote positive aspects of social development of young people?

Often the questions of the Structured Dialogue are difficult and the youth card makes sure to reward young people’s participation with prizes such as European Youth Cards, books, languages courses and a study visit to European Parliament for one person funded by MEP Krzysztof Lisek.
 

News in a flash

A new European Youth Portal

EYCA congratulates European Commission and our partners in Eurodesk for the launch of the new European Youth Portal on the 24^th of May at http://europa.eu/youth.
 

EYCA study session in Strasbourg

Already 14 EYCA member organizations have registered to take part with their national partners at the study session on “Partnerships for Youth Mobility and Active Citizenship” between 7-12th of July held in cooperation with the European Youth Centre in Strasbourg.
 

Carte Jeunes Wallonie-Bruxelles and EYCA at YO!Fest 2013

EYCA and its member organization Carte Jeunes Wallonie-Bruxelles are taking part in the fourth edition of the annual youth festival – the YO!Fest between 30-31th of May in front of the European Parliament. The event takes place in the context of the European Youth Week and it consists of two days of debates, interactive workshops and activities, concerts and much more. As a part of the event, the celebration of the 25th anniversary of the EU Youth Programmes will take place.