Evaluate, Engage, Empower - Childrens's rights, Youth Goals and Partnership

Background In the face of the increasing disintegration through discriminatory and populist policies and practices and a growing tendency, intensified by the Covid-19 pandemic, towards nationalism and closed borders within the European community, we felt, that this had and still has to be countered by transnational cooperation and public spirit among active EU citizens and their interest groups. We as youth organisations make an important contribution by creating spaces where young people can come together, get involved and experience self-efficacy. So, we chose the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the European Youth Goals as topics to engage with, because we believe them to be useful instruments to learn more about shared values in our work practice in a transnational context and to support each other in developing further our self-image as European institutions. In order to strengthen our advocacy for the rights and social participation of young people in Europe, we were looking for a possibility to share knowledge and best practices with each other. Last but not least, we hoped to build a network of solidarity and a pool of resources and capacities, in order to respond more effectively to the challenges mentioned above. Objectives Firstly, we wanted to integrate Children's Rights (CR) into our organisational structures and working cultures as a foundation, on which youth organisations (should) stand in our opinion. Further, we were planning on reflecting and further developing our everyday youth work practice in relation to the European Youth Goals (YG). Also we hoped to develop concrete recommendations for transnational youth work in Europe, which can be used by multipliers and volunteers in the partner regions and beyond, in form of the handbook and evaluation guide. The establishment and deepening of stable transnational partnerships that form the basis for future cooperation in the transnational field (e.g. ESC, youth exchanges, training activities), was also a main objective targeted towards sustainability. Implementation The core-events of the project were the four evaluation-meetings and the two conceptual meetings at the beginning (kick-off) and at the end (wrap-up) of the project. Another big activity of the project was the training which took place rather towards the end of the project. An activity which we came up with along the way, was the internal workshop, which took place around the middle of the project and was focused on forming a shared conception of the project evolution by all potential, new and old members of the transnational project team. And last but not least should the numerous online meetings be mentioned, on which the steps were discussed and e.g. the production of the evaluation guide and the handbook could evolve more and more. Achievements Through a mutual evaluation of our work and practices including the integration of CR and YG into the organisation of projects, the aim was to support youth workers in their daily work by designing: 1. a BOOKLET to methods based on the above-mentioned values and topics. 2. a coeducational/co-creative TRAINING for and by youth workers (from 18 years upwards) based on the findings of the evaluation process and the handbook itself. These productions aim to develop the competences of youth workers in transnational non-formal educational contexts. And the tools aim to consolidate international partnerships in the framework of future cooperation.