About

 

Networking, Local Roots, European Dimension, Mutual Learning

Location: Clermont-Ferrand – FRANCE

Duration: 03 – 09 June 2022

Head of the Project:  RJPA – Réseau des Professionnels de la Jeunesse en Auvergne – Rhône Alpes

 

The rationale of the Project

 

The idea of ​​this project stems from the need of the RPJA members (Network of Professional Youth Workers – Auvergne Rhône-Alpes Region) to reflect on and better understand the work they usually carry out with young people, especially those with fewer opportunities.

Although self-analysis, monitoring and a regular evaluation are essential factors in developing socio-educational work, we believe that an outside look can help us to better understand the educational impact of our work. The comparison with other realities, other ways of understanding youth work, concrete examples of youth policies in Europe, can mark a qualitative leap in thinking about how to make our educational action more effective and inclusive. All this inevitably involves a broader vision of youth workers/educators’ role in the social context, and the acquisition of new tools, indispensable elements for keeping up with the times, for the personal and professional growth of all those who work with young people.

That’s why RPJA to carry out this project relies on a partnership made up of ten experienced European organizations. Certainly, the Clermont-Ferrand encounter will be a remarkable opportunity for all participants to put in practice an educational process based on sharing experiences, exchange of best practices and mutual learning.

Main themes: Working with people with fewer opportunities – Inclusion

 

Aim

 

Analysis and reflection on the relationship between living conditions and educational work as a premise for understanding how to implement concrete educational actions that can affect the life quality of young people and their communities.

 

Contents

 

• Citizenship: Inclusion – Exclusion… what makes the difference? (reflections, debates and examples of youth policies and measures adopted in Europe)
• Youth Work, Inclusion & Participation: how to make our educational/social action more effective
• Local and International Youth Work: how to combine them (how international work/mobility can strengthen the work with young people at the local level)

 

Objectives & Key Concepts

 

• Pooling experiences gained in the field of youth work by partner organizations and reflect on how to make their social interventions more effective and inclusive
• Exchange of good practices on methods, tools and activities of youth work in Europe
• The figure of the Youth Worker in Europe (work context, formation and juridical framework)
• Networking (interpersonal relationships) and active participation: create the best conditions to getting to know each other in view of future collaborations
• Networking (partner relations): lay the foundations for building strategic collaboration between the countries involved in the Erasmus+ Programme… perhaps the creation of a European Network?
• Follow-up: to give room to participants to launch ideas, proposals, and outline perspectives and plans

 

Participants’ profile

 

This project is aimed at active members of youth organizations (youth workers, trainers/facilitators, educators/“animators”, heads of services/associations and projects, promoter of social campaigns). We ask the partners of this project to send motivated participants, able to present their own organizations, share experiences made working with young people – especially activities/initiatives focused on inclusion and participation issues – and willing to contribute actively to the learning process…. we are sure your participants have a lot to say, share and propose!

Rely on Difference: about participants, our goal is to bring together a heterogeneous group of youth workers from several European countries, having different backgrounds, working in different contexts, and working with different methods and tools.

 

Practicalities

 

Working languages: English and French

Venue: Clermont-Ferrand, Auvergne Rhône-Alpes Region – FRANCE

Number of Participants:  50 (half from France, half from ten European countries)

Duration: 6 days (travels included)

Dates: Friday 3rd (arrival day) – Wednesday 9th (departure day) June 2022

Facilities: The main Activities of the Programme will take place in the classrooms of the Confort Hotel in Clermont Ferrand.

Accommodation: Theix Environmental Center, a structure made up of pavilions that is an exceptional site with wooden-frame situated in a 20-hectare park with a garden, a forest, a pond…

Accomodation and Meals: participants will be hosted in a cottage situated in Theix, a picturesque old village 15 Km far from Clermont-Ferrand.

Breakfasts and dinners will be taken on site while lunches at the Confort Hotel in Clermont-Ferrand.

RJPA will ensure local transportation, including the transfer from and to the airport of Clermont-Ferrand. Upon your arrival, you will find some RPJA members at the airport who will pick you up!

Travel Cost will be reimbursed based on the distance, according to the financial rules of the Erasmus+ Programme.

How to get to Clermont-Ferrand:

By plane, airport of Clermont-Ferrand Auvergne

By train, by bus, both Railway and Bus Station are in walking distance to Clermont-Ferrand city center

 

Some notes on the hosting organization

 

RPJA – Network of Professional Youth Workers – Auvergne Rhône-Alpes Region is an association created in 2012, whose purpose is the exchange of good practices among its members and the promotion of long-term experiences in the youth field, especially work with young people with fewer opportunities. RPJA brings together professional youth workers operating in different contexts and from different Bodies (Youth Services, Student associations, PIJ – Support to Youth Initiatives, Youth Clubs, Neighborhood Centers, etc.). Despite these differences, the members of the network have much in common: their work is inspired by the great principles and methods of Popular Education (“l’Education Populaire”) and Non-Formal Education (“l’Animation Socio-Culturelle”). All are committed to improving the living conditions of young people in their respective communities and supporting them to achieve their goals. The guiding principle of the work of all RPJA educators is that of inclusion/fight against discrimination.

Through the network the members have the opportunity to give visibility and share their projects, pool their experiences and put in common knowledge, skills, and competences. Each member brings their expertise to the network and thus helps to feed it.

Over time, RPJA has remarkably growing up. Now it can count on members from other Regions/Cities of France such as Ile de France (Trappes, Pantin, La Verrière, Montigny), and Nord-Pas de Calais (Dunkerque, Dijon, Calais).

Now the new challenge is to acquire a “European dimension” by including international work among the activities that RPJA already carry out. This is why we work to become a reliable and recognized European partner. This is why this project!

 

 

 Küsimuste korral estyes@estyes.ee