YOUTH WORK TRAINING SERIES I: Developing Youth Work in South Europe (ONLINE COURSE)

The course intends to equip youth workers from the Southern European countries to be better prepared to support the learning dimension and the local impact of the participation of young people in mobility projects mainly within the Erasmus+ programme and the European Solidarity Corps framework.

Youth work reality is changing quite fast in Europe today. Where nowadays more then ever youth work and youth workers have assumed a central role on the development of young people skills, knowledge and attitudes. Nevertheless, for youth workers to be able to acquire such role they need to be constantly updated and to share new approaches and tools that can increase the impact of their work.

This training course will allow having a detailed look on youth work realities in southern European countries. Equipping youth workers with conceptual models and practical tools to better support young people throughout their personal and professional development based on maximizing the learning obtain by European mobility opportunities and programmes.

The course will also allow to have a deeper look on the role that youth work is having on the pos-Covid19 impact and recovery in terms of answers to support young people, organizations and communities in this difficult times in the south of Europe.

This 4 days training course will offer to participants an intense learning experienced based on a programme balanced between theoretical knowledge and practical experiences based on non-formal education methods, peer learning and experiential learning exercises.

With this training course we aim to:

• To support youth workers to be better equipped to enhance the impact that learning mobilities can have on young people and on their local communities and organizations;
• To be able to identify and self assess the specific competences that are needed to support quality development on learning mobility (based on the European Competences Model for Youth Workers);
• To discuss the role of youth workers on the postcovid19 recovery process, specifically looking on paths to rebuild trust among young people, organizations and communities on the learning mobility programmes;
• To be able to acquire knowledge on key European policy developments and to bring such developments into their practices (New EU Youth Strategy, the European Training Strategy, the Youth Goals, Democracy Reloading, Europe Goes Local, among other processes and initiatives);
• To allow participants to acquire and get in touch with tools that are supporting young people to enhance their learning experiences in the framework of European educational mobility programmes;
• To increase the quality and impact of projects developed in the framework of future Erasmus+ Programme and the future of European Solidarity Corps Programme;
• Support the quality of youth work in southern countries, the networking and the development of future cooperation projects in the region.

Methodology & Technical requirements:

The training course will be online during 4 working days. The learning moments will be developed based on participatory methods that allow participants to learn and debate topics connected with course. Accordingly the training will include online sessions/meetings and asynchronous learning through the HOP platform of SALTO.

There will not be any residential meetings.

The tools that will be used for the trainings and at the same time demonstrated to the participants as examples that can enhance their work include:

• HOP Platform or Moodle (asynchronous learning)
• Zoom (online meetings, breakout rooms, online whiteboard)
• Google Docs (collaborative works, online library of resources)
• Awwapp, Miro, Mural, Jamboard (online collaborative whiteboards)
• Canva, Sli.do, Ahaslides, Mentimeter, Pictochart (dynamic presentations, infographics, polls) • Kahoot (online quiz)
• Padlet (online collaboration including interactive geographical maps, blogging, presentations)
• Siempe (online rooms that can be used for art of hosting such as world cafe and open space technology)

The above tools will be chosen according to the profiles and needs of selected participants.

It is important to mention that the HOP Platform, Zoom, collaborative online whiteboards and documents, online and offline digital flipcharts, tools for interaction, get to know each other and team building are all vital for the implementation of effective and efficient activities and will be transferred as tools to the participants.

All the above tools will be integrating the principles of non-formal, collaborative, experiential, and interactive learning based also on the foundations of international youth work and the International Trainers Competence Model and Digicomp.

Technical equipment needed - Computer with camera and microphone and reliable internet connection. https://zoom.us/ and canvas.net will be the main digital platforms of the course. Participants will need to download zoom and create an account on canvas.net. All selected participants will also be invited to a welcome session to explore the main tools that will be used along the course, to share needs and expectations, to have a first contact among themselves and the team and solve technical issues

OUTCOMES:

The training course will also allow to produce a booklet containing conceptual models and practical tools that youth workers can use to better support young people throughout their personal and professional development based on maximizing the learning obtain by European mobility opportunities and programmes.

These models and tools will be collected based on the realities of the different organizations participating in the training course. But will also gather resources from other organizations that have been working with the programme for many years. And that have develop specific tools to help to maximize the volunteers learning and the organizational and community impact during their mobility projects.

The booklet will be a fundamental resource for youth workers to use in the coming ESC and Erasmus+ Programme in order to increase the impact of youth learning mobilities in both dimension: short and long term mobilities.