With this project ECAS aims at involving volunteers in various activities supporting the awareness and active participation of young people in the European public sphere, in particular in the policies which directly affect them. We firmly believe that as leaders of tomorrow young people should be put at the centre of policy-making. The project involves three partners in addition to ECAS (project coordinator and hosting organisation). The sending organisations are based in Italy, Poland and Turkey. The Europe Direct Office of Trieste in Italy supports citizens' awareness on European issues through information, education and animation activities. The Robert Schuman Foundation in Poland works to advance the EU citizenship and values and to strengthen the Polish civil society. The newly established EU Office of the University of Istanbul in Turkey supports the participation of the University and its students in EU-funded projects. The first two are experienced organisations with EVS and the latter is a newcomer to this programme. In order to make the process as transparent and open as possible to potentially interested candidates, ECAS has agreed with its partners not to choose the volunteers prior to this project submission, but to organise an open call for participants and select the volunteers out of this pool thereafter.The project is structured in three axes, which address ECAS’ main areas of work (digital democracy and EU rights), in addition to an axis devoted to ECAS’ outreach strategy and alliance building. Volunteers may be involved in more than one depending on their individual profiles and motivations. - Axis A: Empowering disadvantaged youth through digital literacy workshops: volunteers will assist in the mapping of partners in the EU and the neighbourhood countries to organise digital boot camps empowering young people to use of digital tools to channel their views to the political level. Activities under this axis will complement ECAS’ efforts in the digital democracy field through a larger project implemented with other six European partners;- Axis B: Supporting ECAS’ outreach strategy to youth organisations in both the EU and beyond: Volunteers will support ECAS’ goal of engaging the unengaged and in particular young people in EU public sphere by addressing them to explain what the EU can do for them. ECAS provides information and advice services on EU policies, events and funding opportunities to a network of over 90 civil society member organisations based across Europe. It also collaborates with partners to support citizens’ dialogue with EU decision-makers. Volunteers will assist in the mapping of youth organisations in Europe and its neighbourhood, in particular in the regions where ECAS is not yet present. Having more youth organisations in its network will strengthen ECAS’ youth dimension and help it better address young people;- Axis C: Making young people aware of their rights related to mobility in the EU: Volunteers will use ECAS’ expert knowledge in the area of EU rights’ advice to translate it into understandable and useful messages for young people travelling across borders for work or studies. They will assist in the preparation and dissemination of messages to youth using interactive communication tools and will contribute to the launch and content creation of a “Youth Newsletter” that will be distributed among young people and organisations. The activities undertaken by volunteers under each of the axis will combine research, outreach and Public relations (PR)/networking tasks. In addition, volunteers will attend in-house training sessions to support them in the completion of their activities. Volunteers will never be left alone in their tasks; they will play a supportive role and benefit from the guidance of the assigned supervisor and the project coordinator. They will be invited to share their own ideas and take the lead whenever interested in order to encourage their creativity and entrepreneurship skills. They will be offered the opportunity to attend French and English courses to integrate better in the hosting environment, and will participate in regular reflection meetings with a mentor to assess their learning progress. This project expects to raise the awareness about youth policies and initiatives at EU level among young people and organisations both in Europe and in the neighbourhood countries, focusing on the “unengaged” groups in the partners’ countries. This should result in a higher engagement of these youth groups with the EU, which will contribute to enhancing the EU’s legitimacy. In addition, the volunteers will develop a number of key competences that will help them in their future careers. They will also have the chance to relate directly to their local communities, which will support the project’s sustainability, as they will be able to share the knowledge acquired once the EVS service is completed and they return to their home countries.