TOY - Trainers Online for Youth
This is a reference for Aiste Slajute
The main aim was to promote inclusive youth work practice in Europe through human rights education and creativity.
The core elements of this project were: up-skilling of youth workers through Youth Workers Mobility Activity, empowerment of young people through Youth Mobility Activity and capacity building of Partner Organisations through all Mobility Activities. This project was build on strong believes in the power of human rights education and importance youth empowerment; also the needs of youth work practitioners and the young people in seven partner countries. Organisations taking part in ‘Create You(th) SIDE’ completed the full circle of experimental learning throughout the project ‘experiencing, reflecting, generalising and applying new experiences’
Youth Workers Mobility Activity was for youth work practitioners: youth and community workers, teachers, volunteers, local activists, students on placements, youth leaders and youth work trainers who are directly involved in Partner Organisations ‘day to day’ operations and who work directly with young people. Priority was given to participants with little or no Erasmus+ experience and those who demonstrated commitment to implement human rights education activities into their work practices.
Participants came from: Ireland, Italy, Spain, Georgia, Turkey, Romania and Lithuania.
We used experiences and expertise sharing, group work, facilitated discussions, interactive methods,
simulations and daily reflection sessions.
Through Youth Workers Mobility Activity we accomplished specific objectives of this project, such as defining the main points of human rights education approach in youth work; addressing the needs of improving and developing inclusion, equality and diversity policies within participating organizations; sharing good practice examples through our networks in Europe and Partner countries; inviting youth and community organizations to introduce human rights educational approach into their ‘day to day’ practices.
As a result of this training course youth work practitioners deepened their understanding on inclusion, equality and diversity policies in youth work; developed new skills and knowledge of human rights education within the European youth work frame; gained competences to use different human rights methodology that is available; ability to reflect and to critically analyse their youth work practises; developed ability to approach ‘heavy’ topics by using creative approach and methodologies; clarified definition of Youth Work in European and in different national contexts; gained ability to deconstruct and critically evaluate personal youth work practices; knowledge about No Hate Speech Movement; improved skills of group work and working in international environment; deepened understanding of benefits of youth work in wide context; discussed personal benefits of being a youth work professional and improved English language skills (these findings are based on participants daily reflection sessions and evaluation forms).
Four trainers worked in this training course bringing different strengths, experiences and expertise to the team. I was preparing, running and evaluating the training, as well as coordinating the whole trainers team. Project implementation A to Z.