Innovative ways to include and integrate young migrants and refugees

Aims of the tool

- connect young migrants and refugees to their hosting communities
- increase their skills and competencies in the area of civic participation, active citizenship, environmental protection, cultural awareness, etc.
- present methods how to create a welcoming culture in the hosting countries

Description of the tool

The main motivation behind this booklet is to gather and offer unique experiences and inspirations from four european organisations working closely with youth of refugee and migrant background. As mentioned in the introduction above our different backgrounds and contexts allowed us to compile a huge variety of activities, games, methods and public events to foster more diverse communities.

All the activities and methods described in this booklet follow a common goal: to reflect the needs of people from different cultural, religious and ethnic backgrounds in their inclusion and active engagement in new environments. At the same time, our aim was to avoid another “theoretical” booklet with the data and description of the challenges and problems related to inclusion work. We acknowledge all the limits, challenges and obstacles that organisations working with sensitive issues have to face. But instead of reasoning these challenges we decided to offer a practical guide that is easily applicable in different contexts and helps to include youth from different backgrounds through playful and interactive workshops, activities and community events thus helping them to feel accepted and welcomed in the new environments.

Our main principle while discussing and designing these activities and methods was to engage migrants and refugees throughout the process. We tried to avoid the philosophy of “helping the others” and focused on creating “welcoming environments” in which people regardless of their cultural background, religion or gender feel included and invited. Instead of pointing on the “exclusivity of migrants and refugees” we strived to be open for all and created spaces for mutual understanding and sharing between locals and migrants. Through that approach “safe” environments are created in which relationships can naturally unfold without forcing integration. Another approach was to invite migrants and refugees to be the active subjects in carrying out the workshops and community activities.