TOY - Trainers Online for Youth
This is a reference for Linda Ulane
Be Well training course is a part of a small scale partnership project of the same name. The program of the course was based on the results of the mapping events in Latvia, Czech Republic and Romania. Mapping explored the situation of mental well-being among youth workers in these countries, and it set the focus for the training course offering competences that youth workers themselves expressed as needed.
The aims of the training course were:
1) understand burnout, stress and mental health challenges in youth work
2)practice self-awareness, mindfulness and emotional regulation;
3) learn tools for stress management, resilience and self-care;
4) experience embodied learning methods and compassionate leadership
5) build peer connections and a supportive learning community.
The group of participants consisted of 16 youth workers from Latvia, Romania and Czech Republic.
The responsible of all the practicalities was the hosting organization Asociația Centrul de Voluntariat Cluj-Napoca.
The responsible of designing and facilitation of the program were two trainers: Linda Ulane and Roxana Silvia Turcu.
Whole program was designed according to non-formal education approach. It also included theoretical input (studies and existing practices) about burnout and basics of mental health.
Besides that the program included experiential learning and embodied practices, nature-based methods, group works, mapping youth work realities, creating work plans and self-care plans, and more.
Program also endured reflective and introspective sessions and tools to connect with a deeper dimension of learning.
The most essential outcome was self-care practices and plans that participants developed. Besides that, they gained tools for burn-out recognition and prevention that they can also use together with the colleagues. As we also aimed to use embodied approaches and nature connection to strengthen the well-being of the participants, another outcome is raised awareness of the available resources of our surroundings and also inner worlds.
I was directly involved in doing the mapping to explore the situation of mental well-being among Latvian youth workers, available resources and needs. Based on the results together with the Romanian colleague Roxana we designed the program. During facilitation I was responsible of the sessions about basics of mental health, burn-out, nature-connection, as well as ensuring morning rituals and various evaluation and reflection moments.