YOUng Women grEen ENtrepreneurs

Background The aim of the project was to give effective tools to young women living in rural areas to take up their lives thanks to specific entrepreneurial training in sustainable development, fostering their employability, and socio-educational and personal development. Through the promotion of green thinking, raising awareness of sustainability, promoting development in rural and/or isolated areas, exchanging good practices, and providing expertise and knowledge for women from rural areas, the project will considerably promote entrepreneurship education and activities amongst young women. In fact, young women with fewer opportunities coming from rural areas are the main target group of the project. Participating to the YOU_WEEN! the project, they will improve their level of key competencies and skills as well as have an effective strategy to enter the labor market, at the same time enhancing their social and intercultural skills. Putting emphasis on the social inclusion and training of women in less advantaged areas to plant seeds for their professional careers, business and community development, and well-being, will result in greater growth and economic activity in rural areas, as well as will motivate other youth to search for niches in these areas without moving out to urban areas. In fact, “Aging and out-migration of younger qualified people due to fewer education opportunities, poorer job opportunities, lower access to public services, transport or infrastructures, as well as the higher risk of poverty and social exclusion are the key reasons for the decline in local rural populations” (LUISA report, 2018: Territorial Facts and Trends in the EU Rural Areas within 2015-2030). As stated in the European Green Deal for the European Union (2019), the future development of the EU must be green and sustainable, or it shouldn’t be at all. Offering young people and particularly young women, tools, to improve their potential in the labor market and, at the same time, find sustainable solutions to support the local development of their rural communities, is a good strategy to have a “greener” Europe. As a horizontal priority, we aimed at "supporting individuals in acquiring basic skills and key competencies", since it stands as a pillar for the outcomes of the YOU_WEEN! project by means it will provide knowledge, and develop skills and competencies for participants, thanks to non-formal learning methodologies. Nevertheless, project implementation attracted attention and raised awareness about the importance and relevance of developing skills in rural areas and that there are unique opportunities in these regions that are often forgotten. Therefore, it's crucial to be proactive and take leadership in those areas. As the second youth priority, we choose “engaging, connecting and empowering young people”, as one of the project’s major outcomes has been the creation of a “European Network of Grassroots initiatives of Young Women green entrepreneurs”, thus fostering their civic participation, and creating a resource that will remain after the project’s end as a mean for connecting groups of young women in all Europe, that share as common values the idea of a “Greener Europe” and the importance of young people's sense of initiative. The project also fostered the creation of synergies across different areas of action that matter for young women in order to let them lead “grass-roots initiatives” involving and supporting their local communities. Addressing sustainability, development of rural areas and capacity building/training opportunities for young people is also in line with what is called for in the UNESCO’s Global Action Programme (GAP) on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), which is “a concrete response to the urgent need for a new way of living that respects the limits of our planet’s resources while enhancing our collective well-being” and where 2 priorities specifically tackle Youth Empowerment and Accelerating sustainable solutions at the local level. At the same time the project YOU_WEEN! responds to SDG 10 “Reduce inequalities” – since we involved young women from disadvantaged groups – and SDG 5 “Gender equality”. In fact, although gender disparity is higher in developing countries, compared to the developed countries (Ahmed et al., 2001), in the EU women are still a long way off from achieving full economic independence, with higher unemployment and under-employment rates (EU Equality Report, 2018). Likewise, the Global Sustainable Development Report 2019 emphasizes that “achieving the SDGs fundamentally requires decoupling economic growth from environmental degradation, while at the same time, reducing social and gender inequalities in wealth, income and access to opportunities”: this is way YOU_WEEN!’s challenge is to work at the same time on gender equality, sustainable development in rural areas while offering high-quality training and opportunities to young women. Objectives The project addressed the key competencies in the development of entrepreneurial skills, as identified by the EU as the capacity to act upon opportunities and ideas, and to transform them into values for others, working on both young women and youth workers. The project will reach out to young disadvantaged women and stimulate their active participation, reshaping the local communities by enhancing their entrepreneurial skills in a sustainable framework, thus addressing their social inclusion and well-being and their participation in democratic life. Youth workers will be trained in digital, entrepreneurial, and peacebuilding skills and will pilot good practices through grassroots projects and local engagement actions. Objectives: - train the trainers about instruments for rural development, (social) entrepreneurship, women empowerment, and sustainable ideas - start rural development local grass-roots initiatives led by young women - inspire rural communities for agroeconomic and social change - share good practices of rural development and women empowerment in Consortium countries - develop 3 IOs: 1- Set of educational videos 2- Virtual Interactive Network and platform 3- Exploitation roadmap and guidelines for policy influence - Strengthening Consortium partnerships by developing common events and activities YOU_WEEN! project's final beneficiaries are young women who live in rural areas, while young groups, youth leaders, and trainers who deal with rural affairs are the target group for training activities and they will be in charge of training young women in rural areas and involving them in grass-roots projects. There was be 1 LTTA aimed at training the trainers (short-term joint staff training event) followed by local activities and the set up of grass-roots projects. There will be a final blended mobility for young women that will lay the foundations of the European network. Implementation All activities under the project have been implemented to date: IO1 O1/A1 Production of training framework and tools O1/A2 Mapping and collection of best practices O1/A4 Organise coaching circles with the target audience in each project country to assess young women's needs O1/A5 Production of educational videos in each project country O1/A6 Translation and subheading of videos O1/A7 Uploading of the videos on the platform IO2 O2/A1 Design and develop the online collaborative training platform O2/A2 Integration of the network and the training tools in the platform O2/A3 Translate the platform interface O2/A4 Piloting of the platform from network first users O2/A5 Upload contents from the grass-roots activities O2/A6 Adaptation and improvement of the Platform IO3 O3/A1 Produce exploitation roadmap O3/A2 Design and organization of Grass-roots activities, involving local communities O3/A3 Implementation of Grass-roots local activities for the involvement of local communities O3/A4 Produce Guidelines for transferability and upscaling in EN O3/A5 Translate the guidelines into partner languages Achievements During the project, rural young women (the direct target group) directly benefited from different types of actions directly addressed to foster their competencies. They have been involved in: 1) 56+ grass-roots projects (8 in each country), involving 5 young women each 2) creation and piloting of the European Virtual Interactive Network and platform 3) LTTA to develop entrepreneurial competencies. The young women involved had, as results: - empowered entrepreneurial and managerial skills; - discovered insights and knowledge about different rural life, hidden opportunities, and organizational structures (in terms of business and entrepreneurship); - improved communication, interpersonal, and foreign language skills; - refined and increased teamwork capacity, social skills, cultural awareness, acceptance of cultural diversity, increased tolerance to others, and gender equality; - raising awareness and knowledge about environmental issues and good practices as well as sustainable solutions; - improved ICT competencies thanks to the use of the platform and the creation of innovative content; - increased self-confidence and self-worthiness. With regards to the Youth worker, they directly benefited, during the project from a specific LTTA where they have been trained in: 1) coaching circles methodology 2) YOU_WEEN! non-formal training methodology for involving young women in local grass-roots projects 3) use of the platform in order to follow the activities through blended learning They have: - improved competencies in non-formal training methodologies; - improved communication, interpersonal, and foreign language skills; - improved ICT competencies; - experience in leading youth groups in sustainable grass-roots projects. Partner organizations and staff have: - developed greater motivation for research, project management skills, and vocational and personal capacity building; - carried out smoother collaboration and workflow among old and new partners; - increased knowledge about rural development practices and situations in Consortium partners' countries; - developed skills and competencies that partners are experts in (e.g. technical knowledge related to rural area development activities, soft skills, problem solving, etc.) Additionally, the project helped with the achievement of wider audiences for information about the EU and its priorities; the cooperation between local companies, entities, and NGOs fostering environmental awareness and gender equality in rural areas. As tangible results, YOU_WEEN! has produced: - 14 educational training videos (translated and sub-headed in English and partners languages) - 1 Virtual Interactive Network and platform (in English) - 56 grass-roots projects - 1 Exploitation Roadmap (in English and partners languages) - 1 Guideline for Policy recommendations (in English and partners languages) - 7 Multiplier Events - 3 social media pages of the project - 280 young women involved in the grass-roots projects As Intangible general results, we have: • Developed and enhanced digital and entrepreneurial competencies of youths at risk of social exclusion in non-formal educational settings and engaging their local communities. • Supported young women in developing a global consciousness and acquiring social, civic, and intercultural competencies through a project-based training program with a focus on SDGs and sustainable local community actions implemented with the use of digital tools. • Provided evidence-based policy-making at the local and European levels, offering an effective approach and methodology to empower the youth participants for active participation in society and increase their employability. The project reached policymakers and key stakeholders throughout its entire duration through dissemination and exploitation activities at local, national, and European levels. Moreover, during the project, there has been a series of innovative "green challenges" for the communities represented by the Young women, promoted through the platform and connected to the thematic days of sustainability, such as Earth Day, World Water Day, and the Commission's sustainable energy Week. The challenges were designed in order to get the participants and the local communities involved in the project