TOY - Trainers Online for Youth
This is a reference for Petra Cule
Although it is a problem that young people are increasingly failing to vote in elections, there are some studies which
indicate that participation in different forms may actually be on the increase (pressure groups, civic initiatives, consultative
organs, etc.) These forms of participation are just as important to the effective functioning of democracy as voter turnout
at elections, if not more so.https://www.coe.int/en/web/compass/democracy
Because of mentioned, we believe that the YW have an extremely important role in the non-formal education of young
people and in encouraging active and political participation and understanding of basic civic concepts. We consider Civic
monitoring as an innovative form of citizen engagement and we want to present the tool to YW with the idea of them using
a range of different activities of civic monitoring in their work with youth. Civic monitoring is led by citizens and civil society
actors; process of public scrutiny of public interest issues and political and economic power center. It is promoted by civil
society participants who have taken advantage of the opportunities offered in the new digital communications
environment. Such monitoring focuses on the public denunciation of power abuses or citizen demands regarding the
absence of transparency and potential imbalances in the democratic system.
Therefore, the main aim of this project is to empower youth workers to use Civic Monitoring as a tool in order to support
and motivate young people for active involvement through the following specific objectives:
1. to raise awareness of importance of active involvement
2. to understand the relation between lack of information and low level of participation among young people
3. to explore broader understanding of citizens
There were 27 participants from a total of 9 countries: Croatia, Georgia, Ukraine, Greece, Portugal, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia and Spain.
The project team was composed of 2 traners and 1 facilitator.
Non-formal methods were used such as: role playing, simulation, brainstorming, experiental learning, creativity, debates.
As the main result, we will present the CIVIC monitoring tool for youth workers and young people that they will be able to use in their daily work. We will present non-formal methods in the field of active participation for youth
workers and young people with the aim of strengthening the knowledge, skills and opportunities of young people’s
participation. The result will also be the fact that through this project 27 youth workers will be trained and a total of 9 organizations will improve and strengthen their capacities in the CIVIC monitoring field.
- 9 community action plans
I was a full time trainer.