Global education Agora (globalno učenje Agora)

Nowadays the realization of youths about the influence which they have on social change is in decline. That is why it is crucial to ensure the youths several different channels which will enable them greater and more active participation in society. One of these unused channels is the street and that's exactly the channel we have been researching throughout this project. Sensibiliz´Action, Officine Cittadine, Humanitas and Lojtra have linked together different previous know-how from the fields of non-formal education, global education and street methods and developed a new and innovative approach GEAgora. This approach enables us to raise awareness about global topics throughout the streets where trained multiplicators animate passersby and create a space for meeting, exchange and activation. Through the organization of two job shadowings, more than thirty street actions, publishing of a newspaper, setting up of an online platform (www.geagora.eu), which represent new methods and events, organization of a multiplicator event, observation and support of the followers of the online platform as well as the visitors of the street actions and a series of other disseminative activities we have addressed the so called invisible youths and pulled them into the field of responsible global citizenship. The used methodology was participatory and originates from the global education approach and methods from the streets (storytelling, public debate, interactive games, simulation games). We have inspired other local and national organizations to use this newly developed approach. A special publication of our newspaper has pointed the political decision makers to our work and the work of youths, as have our multiplicator event and several advocacy meetings. The included participants are now more critically informed, active citizens. With this project we have contributed to empowering youths, to mobilization of youths from the bottom and to better participation of youths on the streets and beyond. The participating youths have increased their global learning competences (aspiration for global fairness, equality, understanding of the global co-dependence, sustainable way of living, respect for diversity, critical thinking, cooperation). They learned about the opportunities and possibilities for further self activation and mediation of their own opinions. The performance of the organizations has increased, as has their recognition and quality of work. Furthermore the international integration of the organizations has increased, since we have carried out and planned further partnership projects. The online platform, developed throughout the project now represents a source of knowledge from the field of GEAgora and is disseminated internationally, which enables an even broader application and recognition of the approach. The project has been awarded recognition by the Global Education Network Europe as one of 20 most innovative projects from the field of global education in 2018 and is featured in the GENE brochure: https://gene.eu/wp-content/uploads/GENE_2018_Award.pdf