TOY - Trainers Online for Youth
This is a reference for Gabriella Nagy
GENERAL AIM:
the general aim of the course was to help EVS mentors at the beginning of their career to be able to provide quality support to their volunteers.
OBJECTIVES OF THE COURSE:
- to deepen knowledge about and reflect upon the concept of mentoring,
- to connect personal experience of being a volunteer/a mentee with the concept of mentoring, and transform this experience into practical ideas,
- to overview the tasks of an EVS mentor and learn practical ideas, tools and methods to be able to carry out these tasks efficiently,
- to experiment with tools and methods which can be used by mentors,
- to deeply understand and explore the EVS framework, seeing the restrictions and possibilities inherent in the structure (EVS as a process: before-during-after, separating the role of the mentor and that of other parties involved in an EVS project, priorities of the programme, inclusion issues, recognising key competences, Youthpass, etc.),
- to share experience, fears and doubts, just as well as good practices of mentoring; to word feelings and motivation,
- to empower ‘beginner’ mentors to feel safe and competent, identifying the competences needed for a mentor, encouraging self-evaluation and the revision of strengths and weaknesses and offering resources to support further professional development,
- to connect participants, creating a supporting “network of mentors” of them, which can be used also after the course.
Target group:
EVS mentors at the beginning of their career, with a concrete project in which they were already working or about to start working.
There were 14 participants from 10 countries.
The trainers' team: Gabriella Nagy (HU), Emiliano Bon (IT)
We used methods typical of non formal education: interactive games, group work, discussions, dramatic methods (esp. role plays), world café, individual reflection, written tools of self-evaluation and planning professional development.
The main outcome is that participants have become able to work efficiently as EVS mentors. Based on the evaluation questionnaires and the evaluation excersises used during the training, and on the e-mail exchange with our international partners after the training, we can conclude that the training activity has been successful.
I had full responsibility of planning, carrying out and evaluating the training activity, together with my colleague Emiliano Bon.