Webinar: Making Youth Goals Visible

They were created together with young people in European wide Youth Dialogue. See more here: http://www.youthconf.at/youthgoals/

Find more about Youth Goals here. Not all EU countries have a youth strategy. Here is the website to the EU youth strategy. 

Youth Goals are a result of long and massive discussions with young people to hear what really matters for them (see more: Youth Dialogue). The aim of Youth Goals is to make youth voices heard and to move our policies towards youth friendliness and participatory in the process.

There is an ongoing project called “ Youth Goals Lab” – where one of the researches who has been involved in the whole Youth Goals process is working on indicators. The output will be published on www.youth-goals.eu

Making policy for young people is a shared effort by many actors – including Ministries, NAs and NGOs.They work together in most countries in National Working Groups and this is a place where they can coordinate the implementation.

The EU Youth Dialogue process is taking on youth goals as topics. That process supports the implementation.

The aim is not to make everybody know about the youth goals but to make clear that linking with the youth goals or take them into the youth field give projects a real relevant political dimension.

See here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fFsfocC-rQ 

The European Commission and European Youth Forum work together to bring more examples of the implementation of Youth Goals to the European Youth Portal. But also check out: www.youth-goals.eu

Find them here: www.oph.fi/en/young-people-values-and-eu

There is no central budget for promoting the youth goals. Some public funding was used from European Programmes like Erasmus+ and some ministries funded specific activities.

Erasmus+ programme will always have a place for youth participation, but it is still unclear what the new programme will look like exactly. However, if we look into the current Erasmus+ KA3 funding scheme, it becomes clear that there are lots of projects, which directly work on dissemination of Youth Goals on local level. So it seems that Youth Goals are an implicit part of the current youth programme, which in turn gives us reason to believe that it will be so in the new programme, as well.

Youth Goals seem to be quite visible in the current programmes already. Many incentives of different youth programmes can be connected to Youth Goals quite easily. So if this is the case now, there is all the more reason to believe that there will be even more synergy between Youth Goals and youth programmes in the future. We see many stakeholders doing advocacy work on behalf of youth and pushing for Youth Goals, so it is very likely that these goals will be integrated into the new generation of youth programmes even more. Furthermore, Youth Goals are also part of the European youth strategy.

Key Action 3

The strategy in itself is a tool to help implementing the Youth Goals.

The Erasmus+ and European Solidarity Corps programmes make support available in a sustainable way. With the EU Youth Dialogue process we have a structure where we continuously support the implementation of the Youth Goals.

There is no formal link. The Youth Goals were not created within a UN-framework but within a European context.

These two sets of goals work on different scales. Youth Goals are targeting Europe and the European Union specifically, while sustainable development goals work on a global scale. These goals also differ in terms of their development process. Sustainable development goals have had a top-down process, whereas Youth Goals have been developed with a bottom-up process. However, sustainable development goals were used as a benchmark and an inspiration for Youth Goals. These two sets of goals could be linked with each other to increase impact. Interlinking can be simply done by promoting both goals at your events. You can find more guidelines on how to interlink the goals here (available in German only).

There is no specific strategy for connecting Youth Goals with sustainable development goals, but it would definitely make sense to connect them. Although sustainable development goals and Youth Goals tackle different geographical fields of policy making, they have many links and connection points that you could use. For example, Youth Goal number 2 and sustainable development goal number 5. There are many non-formal methods that can be used for interlinking these goals, some of which can be found in tool boxes “Jugend Europa Politik” or “Alles Gender, aber wie?”. These resources are available in German and can be downloaded from here. 

Aside from linking Youth Goals to sustainable development goals, Youth Goals can also be linked with other local initiatives. For example, in Finland Youth Goals were implemented in cooperation with local youth workers, NGOs and municipalities in such a way that Youth Goals could be linked with their strategies and future plans. The idea here was that stakeholders could take Youth Goals into account when planning and designing services for young people. In this way, European Youth Goals can be integrated into local plans and developments. More often than not, European Youth Goals go hand in hand with local youth strategies, so the two are quite compatible. Of course it differs from country to country, but it is definitely a good idea to look into connecting local plans with Youth Goals.

Example from a participants:

1. To promote the SDGs we made this video clip  with youngsters from Utrecht and Rwanda: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VN5IOn0cBM
2. Youth Goal n°10 -> GREEN alert !!! The theme for DiscoverEU for this year is «Sustainable Green Europe» (aligned with Youth Goal n°10) ! It is a green year for DiscoverEU : not only the visual identity is green but also in the activities that we are organising such as Green online competitions where we ask the young people to show us how they contribute to a greener planet. The prizes to win are zero waste (of course)! We also will promote the biodiversity strategy and the Farm to Fork strategy.

Here today we share some examples – starting from cards, games, posters, chocolates – there are many ways!

An example of what was done in the Finnish National Agency was that we used the visual tools and content of Youth Goals to promote European Solidarity Corps and Erasmus+ programmes within the local youth sector. We put emphasis on the fact that Youth Goals add value to youth projects, which are then more likely to get funding from the EU Youth Programmes. In addition to that, we participated in a huge annual youth work fair in Finland and used Youth Goals posters there to raise awareness among youth workers about the meaning and possibilities related to Youth Goals. So this was a very practical way to use Youth Goals, so as to make the values behind the EU youth programmes more explicit.

Aside from that example, there are many national youth councils in Europe working on Youth Goals. Cyprus and Portugal have some good practices around Youth Goals, which might be worth looking into. There is a plan to publish some best practices from national youth councils within the upcoming weeks on the Youth Goals website www.youth-goals.eu. 

The Austrian Youth Council has used the youth dialogue ambassadors model, which is also similar to the one used in Cyprus. As a part of this, local young people from different regions, who participated in the youth dialogue process, were recruited to host sessions in their schools or sports clubs about youth dialogue and Youth Goals, specifically. This way, a high number of youth was reached and not only in big cities. Another good practice from Austria involves partnering up with existing youth events, so as to integrate Youth Goals themes into these. Youth Goals are introduced to event organisers and all the relevant materials are provided to them, so that they can use Youth Goals in their events.

As a general rule, Youth Goals visuals are very helpful for starting up a conversation about Youth Goals and promoting these goals.

Possible solutions from participants:

• Using local media to introduce the youth voice, brining interesting people in as spokesperson who understand the topic – always a good idea. 
• Cooperation with youth related podcasts could be a way to go.
• Connect the Youth Goals with meaningful study – and school assignments of Students Social Work.
• Youth Goals YouTube channel.
• In rural areas it works to promote them by local radio & tv programmes.

Examples from participants:

• We launched a social media campaign #YouthGoalsChallange, where young people and organisations personalize each goal through their experience and memories.
• The Global Goals Rap Challenge.
• We are thinking about using different kind of pasta to explain Youth Goals to Young people in elementary school as a interactive game.

The first priority is to make sure that you have all the necessary materials available in digital format. It also helps to create a structured database for these materials, so that they can be found and used easily. From there you can digitally foster Youth Goals by developing a tool box of non-formal methods for talking about Europe and integrating Youth Goals into non-formal learning activities online. A similar initiative is currently being developed at the Austrian Youth Council in cooperation with youth workers and the resources will be shared within the youth sector, once this project concludes.

Many activities are digitalised and moved online in current times. This raises concerns about youth, who do not have access to digital tools or internet and are therefore fundamentally excluded from participating. However, it must be kept in mind that for many youth workers, using digital tools has been a learning process, as well. So in a sense we are only moving into the digital territory now, in addition to offline activities. Ideally, we should utilise both online and offline solutions for the youth field to better ensure that all youth would have access to participation. It is really important to be aware of the dangers of exclusion and complement online efforts with offline efforts or vice versa. On the one hand, we have seen some brilliant examples of youth work in digital spaces, but on the other hand it is clear that youth needs their analog spaces, as well. The key is to find the right balance between these types of spaces and have them both covered. This will give us a better chance of reaching more young people. Perhaps one of the important things to focus on is using digital tools to actually defend the physical spaces of civil society, which are essential for a functioning democracy.

While the youth field has had the opportunity to digitalise and develop its online activities due to the lockdown, it has also moved into the other extreme now, where offline activities are non-existent. This has definitely made some inequalities amongst youth more visible, as well as created some mental distress in young people, who now feel very isolated and lonely as a result. The importance of having a good combination of both online and offline youth work cannot be overstated. This is definitely a big future topic for the youth field to address.

It can be targeted with a bottom-up process that can reach the national level and reinforce the local impact as a consequence. #Europiamo.

Additionally, you can cooperate with your National Agency, as it can be easier for them as governmental organisation to contact local authorities. National Agencies are sharing those values and understanding of the need of Youth Goals as well.

What we did when we tried to conceptualize our projects was look at the Erasmus+ project results platform. There are many inspiring projects you can read about. As for the tools for the implementation of such activities, I would suggest looking up the EU-CoE Youth Partnership toolkits related to youth work.

When we brainstormed our KA3 project, we explored the results of the previous Erasmus+ projects in related areas. I suggest to check the Erasmus+ project results platform for inspiration about both activities and tools. Also, EU-CoE Youth Partnership and SALTO have many tools you can use in your work. These can be found on their websites.

The European Youth Forum together with the European Commission prepare a pin-drop map to collect outcomes of the EU Youth Dialogue –  available soon.

Also you can send us your suggestions to include in the participation resource pool: www.participationpool.eu

Everything that promotes Youth Goals and does not misuse them in some way is a good opportunity to promote them. Perhaps fundraising could be a great tool for smaller groups that want to use Youth Goals and promote them. Fundraising could be an especially useful tool, when local authorities are unable to provide sufficient funding for good youth initiatives.

A best practice from the EU Youth Dialogue experience in different countries and situations is that all different parties (unless they are not living up to democratic standards) should equally be invited.

Mila Lukic: Regarding the neutrality in projects and involving politicians, I believe it is essential to clearly state that Youth Goals and youth activities in general concern everyone regardless of their political background or other aspects. They are the public interest and as such should be in the agenda of all stakeholders (political, civic, educational, etc.).