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Start date: Feb 1, 2015, End date: Jun 30, 2015 PROJECT  FINISHED 

We organised a five-day youoth exchange between young adults from the Landkreis Wesermarsch (Lower Saxony, Germany), the département Finistère (Brittany, France), and the Vale of Glamorgan (Wales, UK). On the whole, 26 young people, aged 16 to 23, participated in the youth exchange - accompanied by social pedagogues. The young people are socially disadvantaged youths who are not in employment, education or training (NEET) and who are limited in their mobility, have social and academic problemns, and therefore little chance to enter training or find work. The youth exchange aimed at promoting mobilityfor the participating youths and enhancing their employability. To achieve this the young people trained their intercultural competences and acquiered a variety of appropriate informal and non-formal lerning content and abilities. The youth exchange followed a previous exchange in Brittany, which took place in February, and where most of the participating young adults got to know each other. Daily language animation formed an important part of the youth exchange in Esens, since it helped reduce participants' inhibitions about learning new languages by offering a playful lapproach to it. During the project special emphasis was put on conveying impressions on and possibilities of training and occupational outlooks. To this aim, the participants visited six local enterprises, interviewed employees, and used the received information to create an exhibition as well as a video on job opportunities on the coast. Additional to this, cooperative activities served to train social skills and non-verbal communication. An employee of Eurodesk Oldenburg strengtheend the youths perception of European issues and showed them possibilities to gain further intercultural experiences. The youth exchange strengethened the participants understanding that they have the power to effect changes in their life by getting involved in new situations as well as previously unknown contexts and by making new experiences. Their self-confidence grew, as well as their feeling of belonging to an international community. The youths gained important abilities regarding to their employability. As such, they were motivated to take further independent steps towards occuaptional integration into the common job market. Three of the German participants have contacted Eurodesk and are inetrested in participating in the European Voluntary Service. The same is true for some participants from France and GB. During the development of the Youthpass, the participants stated that they had become more self-confident, had learned many new information about other European countries and their cultures. Besides of this, the exchange received a lot of positive feedback from other local organisations who work with the target group (vocational schools, youth services, employment agencies, etc.).
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