<< Objectives >>Main, long term aim of this project is to improve quality, availability and visibility of youth work, by building capacities of youth workers and youth leaders to create and implement new and innovative programs in the sphere of digital youth work.Specific objectives are: • To raise the awareness of competences for digital dimension of youth work and encourage youth workers to relate them to their practice • To improve youth workers’ and youth leaders’ understanding of digital youth work, as well as capacities to critically explore digital media and technology; • To equip youth workers and youth leaders with competences to use digital tools in effective way in their youth work programs; • To enable space for youth workers and youth leaders to explore new and innovative ways of using digital media and technology in their work with young people; • To build capacities of youth workers and youth leaders for creating and implementing new and innovative youth work programs in the sphere of digital youth work.<< Implementation >>The project includes one professional development activity - training course for youth workers and youth leaders. The training course will also include online phase for preparation of participants, as well as follow up phase for participants' practical activities - youth work programs with digital dimension. The training course will take place in Sremski Karlovci, Serbia, from 28th of March until 3rd of April 2022. It will involve 30 participants from 8 countries and 10 different partner organizations. Participating countries include EU member states, program countries outside of EU, as well as one partner country. The following profile of participants will be included in the training course: • Youth workers and youth leaders, employed or volunteering in youth organizations, youth clubs, youth centres, etc. • Already experienced in local, national or international youth work; • With different level and types of experiences with including digital dimension in their work; • Enthusiastic about their work and motivated to improve their digital competences in order to improve their work with young people; • Motivated to expand their work into digital realm – creating new programs and activities for young people in the sphere of digital youth work; • Ready to participate in all segments of the learning process, including online phase before and follow up practical phase.It is expected that at least 12 participants will be from different disadvantaged backgrounds.<< Results >>Main impact of the project will be achieved on the level of youth workers competences and partner organisations’ capacities in youth work.The youth organisations will: ● Have their youth workers and youth leaders motivated to include digital component into their youth work programs; ● Have new tools for working with their young people on different topics relevant to their target group; ● Benefit from the transfer of competencies from their participants to the work of their organizations; ● Have their beneficiaries involved in youth work programs created by participants during the project (training course and follow up phase);● Have a solid base of at least 11 partners coming from 9 European countries; ● Develop international projects in the frame of the Erasmus+: Youth in Action programme in the near future.The youth workers will: ● Acquire new and improve existing digital competences;● Increase their competence in developing and implementing youth work programs; ● Improve their communication, leadership and teamwork skills; ● Learn how to use different digital tools in order to support active participation of young people; ● Gain greater understanding of the Erasmus+ programme and its benefits for the youth work on the international level (as main beneficiaries and multipliers); ● Transfer gained competencies into new initiatives and projects within the Erasmus+ programme; ● Develop new international partnerships and cooperation; ● Develop new local projects incorporating digital dimension; ● Have Youthpass and Open Badges (http://www.badgecraft.eu/) that will help them to reflect on their learning and gain recognition in the future.

This project is based on need for competent youth workers to support young people in their socio-economic development as responsible citizens with fundamental European values as well as to facilitate civic engagement of youth in reconciliation at various levels. They should be equipped with competences to practice bottom-up and human-centred approach to reconciliation since it is all about people2people actions that contribute to societal reconstruction and finally to society/community transformation. This way, we are contributing also to European education and training policy since we deal with quality of youth work and non-formal education. Improving capacities of youth workers in reconciliation topic also contribute to topic-based diversification inside the youth work field. Youth workers are the key element of this process and they are the first to be addressed. They are ensuring active, systemic, and meaningful participation of youth in issues of peace and security is a demographic and democratic imperative. Project consortium consists of organizations with portfolio in quality youth work, reconciliation, youth activism and participation, advocacy.Main of this project is to improve the quality and foster the innovative approaches and development of youth work efforts through European cooperation and capacity building of youth workers in the field of reconciliation. We will achieve this through 4 specific objectives: - To enhance socio-professional development and international cooperation of youth workers and trainers by strengthening their capacities in the field of effective reconciliation in post conflict regions and providing them with space for exchange of good practice. - To increase capacity of youth workers to design and lead the processes of development of social innovations in reconciliation field by using cross-sector approach and methodology developed by Regional Social Innovation Lab for peace and reconciliation aimed at young people.- To empower and support youth organizations to cooperate, advocate and take an important role in reconciliation process providing them with competences and space to implement innovative ideas on local and international level and involve young people as active actors.-To promote and mainstream Erasmus + programme as one of the most effective ways for youth workers and youth organizations in Europe to receive quality capacity building, advance their efforts in topics of interest and strengthen sustainable relationship between WB and EU.The project consortium consists of 10 partner organizations from Programme and Neighboring Countries (SEE region connecting WB and EU countries) from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia, FYROM, Turkey. During 24 months, the project will be implemented through following activities: Partner meeting, Online learning platform, 4 Training Courses, Practical activities, Methodology Development HUB.

The past year has been marked again by rising instability in the Western Balkan (WB) region. This ranges from large scale ongoing protests in Serbia and Bosnia, increasing tensions over borders, trade disputes and the closing of markets and unsanctioned violence against journalist. All of these factors pose significant impediments to the economy, democratic processes, the wellbeing of individuals and also to the process of joining the EU. One of the key underlying reasons behind the tensions plaguing WB is an ever-increasing torrent of nationalism that characterizes local and regional politics and the relations between neighboring countries. Extremism based on national, ethnical or religious background is one of the most evident destabilizing factors both in the EU and in the WB. Thus, the consortium designed Understanding and Challenging Nationalist Extremism — a project that uses a bottom-up approach to tackling nationalist extremisms through educating youth workers (from the EU and WB), designing a toolkit and developing non-formal education methods, through which youth workers from partner countries will empower youth to address cases of extremism. Many large-scale top-down initiatives overlook the fact that virulent nationalism is entrenched in culture and the most effective long-term strategy for diminishing it is to make it culturally less acceptable and for this to succeed, the key target group is youth. The consortium includes 11 organisations from 10 countries coming from the EU and neighboring regions.Objectives:- Increase the level and intensity of cooperation between programme countries and partner countries from WB. - Create a robust youth anti-extremism platform focused on the WB but working with a decidedly inter-regional and trans-sectoral perspective- Increase the capacities of youth organisations based in WB.- Increase the competences of youth workers in WB, the EU and beyond.- Educate youth about recognizing and opposing extremism.- Design a toolkit for educating youth about nationalist extremism and enable youth leaders to better do this.Activities: - 2 transnational project meetings- 3 mobilities of youth workers (at least 24 participants per activity)- 1 youth exchange (at least 58 participants)Outputs:- toolkit- 1 international conference- 3 webinars- webpage- 5 cultural events / public interventions- 4 press conferences

<< Objectives >>In this project, we are aiming to create an opportunity for all the participants to learn about media influence, to help them to learn how to analyse and deconstruct media content, and engage through social media platforms, under the umbrella of freedom and critical thinking. The research and home tasks each national group is asked to make before the youth exchange will help the participants to learn more about media in their own country and how critically people are acquiring its news, and whether it has freedom of speech. Sharing what they have learned with other groups would give each group better understanding to their own country’s media situation and would be introduced about it in other participating countries. By then participants would be ready for sharing the influence of media and social media in each country and the world, obtain knowledge on engaging in media / social media platforms, get empowered to acquire social media narrating skills, and enhance democratic engagement using the accessible social media platforms. One of our main objectives and the easiest to attain, through our thoughtful arrangement, is the process of learning about other countries and gaining intercultural and inter religious understanding and tolerance.<< Activities >>The three main activities are the virtual exchange (VE), advanced planning visit (APV), and the youth exchange itself (YE). The VE would be held three times; the first before submitting the application, to debrief a collective decision among all the groups to the main objectives that the project will attain and to get introduced to each other (already done). The second would be held before the YE after the APV where the leaders have met and the VE aims to introduce the participants to each other. The third VE would be held after the YE and where each national group started working and implementing what they learned in their organization and community, and it would be a success-stories-exchange meeting.The APV held in the same place of the YE will bring together the national groups from all 6 participating countries. The leaders will discuss the best activities to attain all the objectives, engage participants using the best ways, and to get maximum use of the time there through fun activities and enriching experiences. And the leaders will sure discuss their cultural backgrounds to help the hosts and other group leaders act upon that during the YE.The Youth Exchange, which is the core purpose of the project, will have all the activities, learning, exchanging, fun and personal relations that we would have been working on through our whole preparation of the project. Participants involved are one group leader and 5 participants from each one of the 6 participation countries making it sum to 36 participants overall. Participating countries are three from Balkan region - Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Slovenia and other three participating countries are from Arab language regions Palestine, Lebanon and Tunisia. Participants involved in this activities have different backgrounds, they come from countries with peaceful and prosperous society and from post war/conflict countries and from countries conflicted in present day. All participants no matter how different share some lines of similarities which will be the key to bring them together to help each other to progress to better.<< Impact >>The main result that we expect is to attain all the objectives that we have for this project. We expect to have a broader image to the world for all participating youth especially those who have - for the first time - travelled, participated in Erasmus+ project, or have never met Balkan/Arab people before. We expect the participants would acquire global citizenship concept, and would care more about events happening in their country and other countries as well, and get to know their power in the change and their active responsibility and role. One of the things we will emphasise in the project especially during the second half of the YE is the importance and responsibility of the participants to educate people they know back home, about the topic, and actively implement projects regarding the topic aiming for better media practices in an atmosphere of freedom of speech and journalism dignity.

Despite abundant information sources, especially online, recent studies conducted by the ERYICA network reveal that young people across countries find it hard to access reliable and understandable information. In the context of mass disinformation, young people are more than ever in need of assistance in selecting and processing information to make their decisions. Information is a right and in the transition to adulthood, this right is key to shape the future. The essential aim of Youth Information and Counselling (YIC) is to assist young people in all aspects of their lives and their autonomous decision-making.While some specialised information services can be found in the Western Balkans, there are no national structures for generalist youth information services ensuring universal access of young people to quality information and counselling. Young people, especially those with fewer opportunities, significantly lack information on services and options related to essential aspects of everyday life such as healthcare, participation, mobility, education, employment, special support, protection, and so forth. With this project, we seek to set the basis to develop and expand YIC services in the Western Balkans (in the Programme Country North Macedonia and in the Partner Countries Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro) and to promote the integration of the right of young people to information in national youth policies. Under the coordination of ERYICA (Luxembourg), The consortium is composed of CSOs operating in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro and of ERYICA Members in Programme countries (Slovenia, North Macedonia and Spain).