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Innovative thinking as a tool for supporting inclusion and employability of youth from deprived urban areas
Start date: Aug 1, 2016, End date: Feb 28, 2017 PROJECT  FINISHED 

The empowerment and community engagement of the young people, especially those facing disadvantages and coming from derived urban areas has to be seen as the first and central building block for local strategies for social cohesion in the European community. Difficulties in accessing social rights in a range of areas can lead to a feeling of being marginalised from the rest of society, of not being recognised as a normal citizen, of “us and them”. The despair and anger that is felt in this situation makes it extremely difficult to recover ground in any particular sphere such as education or employment.According to Eurobarometer more than a half of all Europeans (65%) now put economic and social security at the top of their concerns together with crime and terrorism. It has been enough to make it a dominant issue in the latest elections in most of the EU and Neighbouring partner countries as well as to address this issue at this Youth Exchange to be held in Kazan, Russia. The goal of this project is to equip young people from deprived urban areas with an increased level of key competences and skills in order for them to improve their employability, enhance their feelings of social inclusion, increase their skills in policy making input, build a sense of belonging to their communities and increase their ability to work towards an effective solution in addressing the problems that affect them. This exchange will bring together 64 young people and youth leaders from the UK, Russia, Bulgaria, and Belarus. The participants for the exchange will be chosen by the participating partner countries and will be young people from deprived urban areas who face a higher than average chance of being unemployed or disenfranchised. The youth leaders will meet the criteria of being peer leaders, youth activists, and having some experience in working with youth on a international level as well as involvement in community councils or forums.It is expected that the exchange will:- promote volunteering as a starting point for employability;- create the possibility for young people from deprived urban areas to become visible members of the community;- empower young people to recognize that they can be agents of change;- open opportunities to become active, informed citizens.We anticipate that we will be able to further spread our findings and knowledge to other youth organisations active with the issues of practicing peer education as a tool to promote social inclusion and increased the employability, skill level and competences of young people.The following working methods will be used: - theoretical inputs on various aspects of communication, information and ICL and exercises (simulations, consensus and confrontation exercises, workgroups, etc.);- presentations of best practices; - role play and simulation exercises; - workshops on management of a peer group, inter-cultural communication and on peer communication; - “Open Space” method; - “Theatre of the Oppresssed”; - volunteer work as a way to pick up new job skills, presentation of the Erasmus+ Programme with a special focus on new developments and opportunities for cooperation between the partners on the project’s theme.The impact and results that we anticipate will be an identification and acknowledgment of the issues affecting youth from deprived urban areas, concrete solutions to address these problems, the active use of these solutions with continued refinement through feedback and communication, dissemination of the results to include a wider and wider audience, and sustainment of these practices via support through youth leaders and partner organisations.Creative thinking will help young people understand how to overcome the fears and discouragement often experienced if facing a challenge, whatever the obstacles: educational, labour, or social. The idea can be further developed in local projects after the exchange and serve as an inspiration for developing follow-up projects by the participants who will establish new contacts for future cooperation. Furthermore, the participants will be introduced to new methods and tools for generating ideas and developing strategies for successful project implementation targeting deprived urban areas and become familiarized with the basic tools in project management. The exchange will shed light on the objectives, strategies, project phases and evaluation guidelines and enable the participants to share best practices and start the process of developing ideas for future cooperations.These long term, synergistic benefits will help to propel forward a more inclusive and better attitude towards active citizen participation throughout Europe and the surrounding countries.

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