Recently, Eurodiaconia hosted in Brussels the Final Project Meeting for its Erasmus+ project “Empower You(th)! Training of innovative models and methods in youth work”.
The two-day event brought together representatives from the organisations participating in the project led by Eurodiaconia, including Svenska Kyrkan from Sweden, Kirkens Bymisjon from Norway, Diakonie Kosova from Kosovo, Slezská Diakonie from the Czech Republic, Diaconia Valdese from Italy and the Armenia Round Table Foundation from Armenia.
The projects is aimed at equipping youth workers with the necessary knowledge, skills and competences in order to support young people in facing contemporary challenges such as youth unemployment, multicultural societies, digitalization and social exclusion.
The meeting started with a summary of the previous steps of the project (such as the kick-off meeting, the Training for Trainers and the Online-Toolkit meeting hosted in Brussels over the last months) and the presentation of the two regional workshops held last November in Italy and Sweden, by Diaconia Valdese and the Church of Sweden
Later, the project’s Online Toolkit – to be released soon – was presented. The Toolkit includes all the innovative approaches to youth work outlined by the project, with descriptions and practical examples. The presentation was attended also by two representatives of JINT, the Belgian managing authority for Erasmus+ projects. The representatives highlighted two key-features of the toolkit, which makes it stand out compared to similar tools: the digital format and the specific focus ensured by the diaconal approach. The presentation was followed by an interactive evaluation session of the whole project by the project consortium.
On the second day, the participants had the chance to meet Ellen Durst from DG Education, Youth, Sport and Culture of the European Commission, who presented the latest Commission’s publication on Digital Youth Work . The meeting ended with a follow-up session, during which several guidelines and ideas to provide continuity to the project’s main outcomes were shared.