Social Media for Active Citizens

Social Media for Active Citizens WHY? Because we believe that: • Social networks are a new and exciting field, which offer a lot of space for creativity, invention and imagination in developing youth led projects • It would be difficult to convince young people to disconnect and come offline, hence youth leaders might as well learn how to use social networks in order to engage young people • Active participation of young people is always in need for new initiatives and creative approaches and social networks are a field to be explored • Social networks bring a new dimension to intercultural learning and international cooperation as a whole WHAT? The main goal of the project is to develop competencies of youth workers to support active citizenship of young people in community contexts through use of social media tools and methodologies. More specific objectives are: • To explore active citizenship from participants own experience and the resources and opportunities available to address issues of concern through democratic, civil and civic engagement • To explore possibilities for utilization of social media for youth activism • To reflect on non-formal education and its methods and their applicability within social networks • To develop creative and attractive ways to apply social media for youth activism, with a special emphasis on civic engagement • To identify local opportunities for community engagement and to design and develop an action plan for use of social media in the local context. FOR WHO? For 28 youth leaders who: 1. are working with young people in their everyday reality 2. are active on social networks and are interested to explore their use in youth work 3. have knowledge and practice of non-formal education and learning 4. are interested in developing social medial projects focused on active participation of young people 5. have basic IT skills and are not afraid of experimenting with the computers :) 6. are committed to applying their newly gained skills in their communities and within their respective organisations Dynamics of the training course The training methodology has 2 dimensions (online learning platform and the residential part) which will be implemented as follows: 1. Introductory phase (preparation for the course) starting after the selection of participants till the beginning of the residential training course. This phase will require few hours per week of participant’s dedication. 2. Residential training course, from 1st to 10th November in Montenegro. 3. Follow-up phase through distance e-learning, after the residential training for 2 weeks (couple of hours required).