Youth@Work: Reinforcing the Youth Guarantee - time to increase the impact of the Youth Sector

Vision

The youth sector is already delivering on the main challenges identified by the EU Youth Guarantee i.e. to reconnect youth with the education, employment and training pathways, to reduce social exclusion and increase life chances.  However, they are not widely involved in the EU Youth Guarantee initiatives funded at national level.  Their knowledge and practical expertise of youth engagement and empowerment can support a stronger delivery of the EU Youth Guarantee initiatives, and build on the commitment to explore more innovative approaches to combating the ongoing challenges of social and economic exclusion that are increased when young people are not in education, employment and training. This seminar is about identifying the opportunities and challenges towards close involvement of the youth sector into EU Youth Guarantee initiatives.

Youth@Work is the link between NGOs and government-led youth initiatives, and it can offer the channel to promote and engage youth actors into national actions on EU Youth Guarantee.

Event objectives

- Opening-up an understanding of how youth work providers can contribute to innovative and effective provision of the EU Youth Guarantee

- Map examples of provision that engages the youth work sector into EU Youth Guarantee provision

- Exchange existing practices of youth guarantee initiatives that are led by or actively engage the youth sector

- Exchange innovative practices that deliver youth employability pathways(potential to adapt/inform development of Youth Guarantee)

- Create synergies between youth sector and the other providers of the EU Youth Guarantee

- Share the pathways of development and build towards new collaborations 

Anticipated results/outputs

- Practical examples of how to link youth work with development of youth employability - either new ideas or existing examples that can be scaled

- Mapping the links between the youth sector and the ecosystem of the EU Youth Guarantee provision

- Identifying how the youth sector can address the gaps identified by the evaluation of the first phase of EU Youth Guarantee provision.

- Build awareness, rationale and practical pathways for youth sector actors to become involved in the provision of the renewed EU Youth Guarantee

- Demonstrate how Youth@Work and its member organizations, Erasmus+ National Agencies, can support implementation of the EU Youth Guarantee particularly through the involvement of the youth sector.

This is an event organized by the Erasmus+Youth/European Solidarity Corps National Agency of Cyprus in the framework of the Youth@Work Partnership. Youth@Work is the alliance of the Erasmus+/European Solidarity Corps National Agencies of Italy (the leading NA), Cyprus, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Malta, Poland, Republic of North Macedonia, Spain, and Turkey, as well as of the SALTO-YOUTH Eastern Europe and Caucasus (Poland), SALTO-YOUTH South East Europe (Slovenia) and SALTO-YOUTH Training and Cooperation (Germany) Resource Centres and the Resource Centre for the European Solidarity Corps (Austria). It has been running since January 2018. For more information about Youth@Work, please visit our website - www.youthatworkpartnership.org and social media channels.

Seminar Programme - Kindly note that the Seminar starts @ 09.30 CET and finishes @ 13.00 CET, on both days

TUE - 13/12/22

       09.30 - 11.00 

• Intro & Welcome
• Inspirational speaker – exploring the Youth Guarantee in action and opening up the challenges of engaging the youth sector in this work
• Practice presentations – sharing insightful examples of how the youth sector is      supporting implementation of the Youth Guarantee across Europe

        11.00 - 11.30  Break

        11.30 - 13.00 

• Explore – virtual open spaces to consider how to increase engagement of the youth  sector in the Youth Guarantee
• Expert Witness – a key stakeholder will share their perspectives on the learning and sharing so far
• Reflection – gathering thoughts and ideas to take into day 2

WED - 14/12/22

         09.30 - 11.00 

• Check in
• Inspirational debate – a panel of stakeholders representing policy, research and      practice will discuss their different views of why and how to engage the youth sector into the design and delivery of the Youth Guarantee
• Practice presentations – more examples from across Europe to extend thinking & ideas

         11.00 - 11.30  Break

         11.30 - 13.00 

• Plan & Pledge to Act – virtual open space to decide on concrete actions that can be    taken to increase the impact of the youth sector
• Expert Witness – a final set of reflections from a stakeholder with direct experience of this work
• Evaluation – understanding the process and progress developed during this seminar