We recently wrote about a visit to Finland , where as part of the Inclusion is on project, we shared the results of research on youth inclusion in each country, and based on these, we came up with new ideas and insights. The research was conducted in the countries participating in the project (Finland, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Italy and Estonia), in which experts who work with young people presented their reflections on the difficulties in organizing activities for young people, what obstacles affect their participation and how to make these activities accessible to different groups.
The point of the workshop on youth inclusion
Workshops like this help us to understand more easily how different we actually are in our approach to young people, from country to country, from organization to organization. Some organizations spend less time thinking about how to make their activities accessible to various youth groups. Other organizations already have clearly established standards and written manuals on this topic.
We moved further activities on this topic to Estonia, to the city of Tartu.
What was the youth inclusion training like in Estonia?
This time, we continued training on youth inclusion in Estonia, in the city of Tartu, organized by the Tartu Youth Work Center . The training was attended by 14 experts from the field of work with young people, from different organizations, who work on the IncOn project: Nuorten Akatemia , The Finnish Youth Association , Radio R , Federation of Children’s and Youth Municipal Councils , Le Discipline and HUKI . In addition to international partners, other experts from Estonia who are involved in working with children and young people also joined.
Three days of training were filled with various activities:
✔️ Lectures by expert workers of Youth Centers of Estonia.
✔️ Familiarization with the functioning of the youth work system in Estonia.
✔️ Visits to centers for informal education of young people: Tartu Nature House and Shate Creativity Center.
✔️ Visits to youth centers in the city of Tartu.
✔️ Workshops where we discussed as a team what values we should nurture when working with young people.
✔️ Agreements on further steps and setting deadlines for the same for the IncOn project.
Keypoints on youth inclusion from training in Estonia
▪️ Openly approach the problem without drawing conclusions in advance.
▪️ Active listening to the interlocutor (without thinking about the answer).
▪️ Empathetic approach with understanding.
▪️ Individualized approach to young people considering different nationalities, religions, sexual orientation, marginalized groups, etc…
▪️ Have a high level of patience.
Given that HUKI implements Erasmus+ projects in which we collaborate and work with young people, projects like IncOn and trainings of this type are a step up for our development, as well as for the implementation of programs in which young people are involved.
