"Title: ""Youth work 4 life"" Subtitled: ""Youth work - a profession or lifestyle?"" Countries: Poland, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Moldova, Ukraine, Georgia, Lithuania, Armenia. Dates: 02/10/2017 - 08/10/2017 (+ 2 travel days: 1/10/2017 - arrival day, 09/10/2017 - departure day) Participants: Russian speaking youth workers, youth specialists, social workers, teachers, trainers, managers and employees of youth organizations. Group per country: 3-4 people Venue: Poland, Krakow. Project description: The idea of organizing this project is based on an analysis of several problems that the youth workers from the Institute for Eastern Initiatives (IWI) encountered throughout their youth work. Based on own experience, we believe that youth work in different countries has many distinctions, different level of development, social value, methods and sometimes meaning as well. At the same time, youth work is an important tool for solving many social issues related to youth. The next problem in our opinion is a deficit of information and training programs for youth workers in Russian. Although the Russian language is not the official language of the European Union, there is a large number of Russian-speaking people living in the countries of Erasmus + program, as well as in the partner countries, and of course some of those people also work in the areas of non-formal education, social work and youth work. We believe that organizing a project in the Russian language promotes the development of youth work with the Russian-speaking society in the EU, as well as cooperation between the countries with the most numerous Russian-speaking population. Aim: Development of quality work with youth in the participating countries of the project and raising public awareness of the role of youth work. Objectives:. • Develop the competence of youth workers • Spread the non-formal learning methods • Develop an international youth work and cooperation between youth organizations • Create an educational media about youth work • Discuss about the problems and issues of youth work in different countries • Improve of the status and quality of Russian-speaking youth workers’ profession • Motivate youth workers to do new initiatives in the Erasmus + program • Self-reflection on each stage of the project for the learning recognition process The main activity of this project is the ""Youth work 4 life"" seminar in Russian that will be held in Krakow. To make this seminar youth workers, youth specialists, educators and social workers from ten countries are invited to discuss the differences, similarities and current problems of youth work, to exchange experience and knowledge, to create new platforms for cooperation between Russian-speaking youth organizations. We hope that this seminar will also motivate youth workers to work further and actively participate in social activities. Seminar`s events will be recorded on video as well, participants will be able to give interviews that will be used to create a promotional video materials about youth work in Russian and English. At the end of the project all participants will have a new partner base for further cooperation, as well as new methods and materials for promoting youth work at the local level in their countries."