"Influence YOUth (I-YOUth) is a 24-month strategic partnership for innovation in the field of Youth aimed at empowering youth and social workers/operators who work with young people at risk of radicalisation, equipping them with efficient instruments and methodologies aimed at fostering critical thinking as well as preventing radicalisation phenomenon.“Youth radicalisation and the associated use of violence have become a growing issue of concern in Europe and its neighbouring regions. There has been a notable increase in hate speech, incidence of hate crimes and attacks on migrants and refugees, propaganda and violent xenophobia, as well as a rise in religious and political extremism and in terrorist attacks in Europe and its neighbouring regions. All of these emerging concerns have highlighted the need to work with young people in order to identify and address the root causes of extremism and prevent their radicalisation, as well as strengthen young people’s resilience, prevent marginalisation, promote equality, emphasize alternatives and reinforce the cohesion of communities in which they live.” (Youth Work Against Violent Radicalisation, 2017 – Partnership between the European Commission and the Council of Europe in the field of youth). The publication underlined the limited impact of youth work within the wider social, political and economic context, the lack of in-depth understanding of the phenomena of violent radicalisation, and the need for further training and networking as well as the necessity of devising new approaches to working on the topic.I-YOUth will explore the potential of Non Formal Education combined with Forum Theatre and Critical Thinking Methodology as a new pedagogical instrument aimed at preventing radicalisation among youth.The target groups involved in the project will be:Youth workers aged 25+ who work with young people at risk of radicalisation for the Joint Staff; Young people aged 18-25 years old (both locals and migrants) for the Blended Mobility of Young People; Young people aged 13-20 years old (both locals and migrants) for the Local Activities. Youth workers/operators and Trainers for the Local Seminar.Expected results:- Research Report “Educational challenges and best practices to prevent radicalisation among youth” which will be constituted by a) national and international existent best practices regarding Forum Theatre and Media Literacy and Digital Storytelling methodologies b) data gathered from national focus group sessions with target group and stakeholders. The Report will be made widely visible on project Web Platform and partners' Websites as well as promoted on multiple levels through offline and online means.- ''Youth Work Preventing Radicalization Among Young People'' Training Course Format based on a brand new joint educational approach of Forum Theatre, Media Literacy and Digital Storytelling methodologies conceived as a term of reference for stakeholder institutions and NGOs to put in place a specific educational offer aimed at training youth workers and operators working with the youth target. The partners will create a draft methodology of training using the results of the Report “Educational challenges and best practices to prevent radicalisation among youth” and their previous experience and expertise with the above mentioned methodologies.- One International Piloting Joint Staff successfully implemented with the involvement of youth workers/Trainers from partner organizations.The Joint Staff will serve as a testing of the Training Format. Participants to the training will be invited to submit their feedback for further improvement and finalisation of the Format. The outcome of the Joint staff will be the draft of the Toolkit ''Educational Pathway to Prevent Youth Radicalization''. The finalised version of the Toolkit will be available in the Web Platform.- One International Piloting Blended Mobility of Young People successfully implemented with the involvement of young people from partner countries. The BMYP will serve as a testing of the Toolkit “Educational Pathway to Prevent Youth Radicalisation” which will be finalised by the consortium after receiving participants' feedback. The outcome of the BMYP will be the educational series ""New GenerAction!"" which will be one of the contents of the Web Platform.- Local Activities implemented in each partner country with the involvement of local and migrant youths. During the local activities young people who participated in the BMYP will replicate the learnt workshops acting as New GenerAction Ambassadors.- Local Seminars implemented in each partner country (1 per partner country) with the involvement of 10 youth workers/trainer from other youth associations, NGOs and institutions that will be trained on how to successfully exploit project outputs in their activities targeted at young people."

"""INTEGRATION BY SOCIAL AND DIGITAL LEARNING""CONTEXT/BACKGROUNDEuropean countries have to support the integration of third-country nationals (non-EU citizens) much more than they did in the past half a century. In 2015, the number of asylum applications in Europe reached 1.3 million, three times what it was in 2013 and twice what it was in 2014. These numbers have diminished in 2017–18, due to increased control imposed by the EU Member States. However, the question of how to provide knowledge, information, and education that can support the integration of those who are arriving or are already in Europe, remains a glaring priority.The increasing number of migrants and asylum seekers arriving in Europe places new demands on European education systems. In this context, the role that free digital learning (FDL) could play in fostering inclusion has attracted renewed interest of NGOs.It is important that adult migrants seem to participate more in less formal types of education: individuals between 25-54 years old, born outside of the EU, tend to participate more in lifelong learning activities than individuals of the same age living in the EU Member State they were born in (Eurostat, 2016).Various studies have found that learning is critical for migrant inclusion subsequently, the importance of providing education for migrants and refugees has been recognised by governments and national and international organisations. This vision goes beyond access to formal education, and recognition of prior learning, and also recognises the importance of less formal types of education.Our project aims to develop innovative practices in the use of ICT in the effective teaching of Literacy to migrant adults (refugees, newly arrived migrants, asylum seekers, young adult migrants and migrant women), by testing and implementing innovative practices, including the creative use of ICT for language learning in the field of formal and non-formal adult educationEMERGING NEEDSMigrants and NEET have to increase the knowledge and skills about: (a) enhanced culturаl sеnsitivity in order to be more integrated in the society (b) active citizenship in order to feel part of a larger and new context where to live in (c) digital literacy to increase the employability and also extend the adult education thanks to ICT toolsPATHWAYExchange and transfer of Good Practice examples with practical details about its possible use and effective implementation.The Open Educational Resources outputs are going to be used by educators of adult migrants and NEET persons.The seven selected TOPICS are:[1] active citizenship and community building[2] cultural awareness[3] open government[4] urban sharing lifestyles[5] social communication methodology[6] digital literacy[7] digital educationOUTPUTS/RESULTSThe project aims to:(i) Produce a PRELIMINARY REPORT about the state of art of the integration and employment policies in partners' countries;(ii) Explore and discover successful GOOD PRACTICE examples about European cases of integration by social and digital learning (covering all the above-mentioned topics) – available in all Partners’ national languages;(iii) Stimulate a change in the adult education thanks to the EXPLORATION OF INCLUSIVE AND INNOVATIVE APPROACHES to the social and digital inclusion;(iv) Transfer the knowledge about effective methodologies and approaches during a JOINT STAFF TRAINING EVENT;(v) To train selected staff (adult educators from partner's institutions) about some interesting topics: active citizenship, creativity in urban areas, social communication methodology for the integration, digital education and community building;(vi) Create a WEBSITE integrated with Blog and Social Networks containing MATERIALS TRANSLATED into all partners’ National languages to promote and encourage extensive exploitation and dissemination;(vii) Disseminate the project outputs and results throughout EU with a database of OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES available through open licences;(viii) Create a NETWORK at international level aimed to share and compare ideas, practices and methodologies.PARTICIPANTSEach partner organisation is going to be involved with some participants as follows:· one per Transnational Project Meeting (adult educator)· two during the Joint Staff Training Event (adult educator and/or trainer)· five or more during the Dissemination activities as adult educators (adult educators, trainers, trainee and volunteers).IMPACT ENVISAGEDThe partnership will bring together partners coming from several countries and their stakeholders, with the synergic power to reach a very large and diverse audience, thanks also to an intensive dissemination campaign.The results, made as Open Educational Resources, will be rea he results, made as Open Educational Resources, will be ready for a large exploration"

Expand your Frontiers in High Technical Skills and Public Speaking is a Project dedicated to increase to public speaking competences and reduce public speaking phobia among VET trainers and other teaching professors.The COVID-19 pandemic phenomenon and its ongoing second wave has disrupted nearly every aspect of our lives. Even before the onset of the crisis, public speaking competences of youth was a constant challenge. Now, unless urgent and effective action is taken, young people are likely to suffer from the severe and lasting effects of the pandemic. This has been particularly hard on young women, young migrants and youth in low-income countries. Young people care about the future and their place in it.Epidemiological surveys and statistical manuals of psychopathology (DSM-5, ICD 10) recognize that social phobias has a prevalence of 7% across general population and 13% of had at least one episode. Social phobias affect significantly the work of educators which faces different audiences and public situation in the daily work, reducing significantly their performance at work and satisfaction for life. Morever, to practice a public speaking situation with a real audience is very stressful for educators with social phobias, it involve a serious risk for the psychological condition of the educators or also discourage their involvement in future work in education. Our project has the goal to increase the competences of VET trainers and reduce their public speaking phobia through the Virtual Reality Therapy (VRT), an innovative approach that has been demonstrated to be effective for reducing phobias through gradual exposition to phobic stimuli.We have planned this project, after intensive and extensive research of this problem, having considerable academic and practical experience in this field, accumulated cognitive and organizational resources. Now, having consulted with all Partners and taking into consideration national peculiarities, we will try to combine most effective ICT methods with an emphasis on VR technology and necessary offline training in order to bring back and advance public speaking competencies for young people in need.The partnership is composed by 6 organisation from France, Italy, Romania, Russia, Portugal and Turkey. The partnership includes 2 associations, 2 VET chools, 2 SMEs.The partnership will produce 3 Intellectual Outputs in 7 languages (EN, IT, PT, RO, FR, RU, TK) open and accessible 24/7 for the following goals- increasing public speaking competences- decreasing public speaking phobiasO1 - Manual - a 300 pages manual translated in 7 languages designed to help VET trainers and all target groups to improve their skills in public speaking and reducing anxiety.professions. O2 - E-learning Platform - a web-based Platform including 10 hours of public speaking lectures, translated into 7 languages about public speaking techniques, phobia reduction techniques, stress and anxiety management, exercises for increasing the attention. O3 - VR System - an immersive VR system which simulated scenarios of public speaking at increasing difficulty allow self-evaluation of psychological states and gives tailor based suggestions on phobia and anxiety management The participating organisations will moreover organize:- 5 transnational project meeting, including 5 brief workshop dedicated to experts- 6 multiplier events (120 participants)- at least 12 multiplier events (200 participants expected)During the project's implementation:- at least 30000 people will be informed about projects results- at least 3000 people will access to intellectual outputs- a dissemination plan involving VET centers, school educators, policy makers, decision makers, association representative of professionals included in the target group, press will be involved at broad level in order to promote the adoption of the intellectual output at local, regional, national and international level- a massive plan of online communication will be performed through the joint action of several channels: official website of the project, e-mail services, autoresponders, social media marketingAn impact study will be performed in order to measure the desired outcomes- increased competences and resilience of VET trainers- reduced negative states of educators (phobia, stress and anxiety)- effectiveness of the model in VET centers, Schools and EducatorsThe Impact Study will be used in order to promote the adoption of the intellectual output and possible transferability in all fields of education.The Sustainability Plan ensures that all functionalities and materials will be kept open and accessible to all after the EU funding. Moreover, it includes several strategies to extend thecontent with: exploitation strategies in other countries, extension of project's content, transferability in different sectors.

"<< Background >>Within the Europe 2020 Strategy, our project contributes to entrepreneurship education and training for young people from rural areas, young migrants, young people with reduced opportunities, in our project are called young CAZE.The young people in our target group have finished their studies, some of them have small businesses but the share on the sales market is still difficult, they have more access through fairs, they sell products to other distributors, sometimes they stay with their products in stock. The CAZE project helps CAZE young people and youth workers to learn entrepreneurship with all modern and digital tools.The young CASES will be trained by experienced youth workers who are entrepreneurs themselves nowadays and share their current knowledge and experience with them. The intellectual result will be that both CAZE young people and youth workers will develop their basic skills and confidence to create and develop their own business and will know how to use digital tools for this.The target groups of our project are young people aged between 18 and 35 from rural areas, immigrants, young people with reduced opportunities, youth workers, youth organizations.In our project, we stimulate and practice the use of digital skills in 21st century e-commerce, including literacy skills such as 3D printing, virtual reality, website and store design, and media literacy through e-learning and publishing, learning such as conceptual and creative thinking by collaborating in a team and with other independent professionals and communicating through modern channels.<< Objectives >>The project is a strategic partnership aimed at promoting social integration and inclusion by retraining youth Caze facing social exclusion and who can capitalize on their basic skills in EU countries and develop activities that lead to improved practical skills through an innovative educational format. Through the project we will develop tools to provide integrative support for cross-cutting, entrepreneurial and trade skills through an electronic platform to sell their handmade ethnic and traditional products.For about two years, the coordinator of theAsociación de cooperación al desarrollo ABARKA project has focused its activity both locally and at EU level, on what is the process of social inclusion for people with integrative difficulties and the promotion of entrepreneurship, being in a continuous development at the same time being noticed at local level thanks to the Erasmus projects. Our project aims to start a way of integrating youth at local / national and European level, meant to increase the value of cultural differences. According to the need identified by the experts of our organization, namely that the vast majority of youth come to Europe with a set of valuable but unused craft skills. The cross-cutting and entrepreneurial skills of “CAZE” TARGHET GROUP will remove barriers to entry into the EU labor market by providing educational alternatives and digital tools to help them capitalize on finished products.We appreciate that the transnationality of our project and the online media coverage of digital tools, the idea of entrepreneurship, will transcend the boundaries of the consortium being a plus for youth from target group from other EU countries that are not involved in the partnership.At the moment of identifying the partners for the establishment of the consortium, the common vision of each potential country to be part of our project was analyzed and the analysis of the situational context was started.In the past year, there was an improvement both in internet user skills (at least basic digital skills) and in advanced skills (ICT graduates and ICT specialists). In 2019, the percentage of people that have at least basic digital skills reached 58% (up from 55% in 2015). A large part of the EU population, however, still lacks basic digital skills, even though most jobs require such skills. In 2018, some 9.1 million people worked as ICT specialists across the EU, 1.6 million more than 4 years earlier. Nevertheless, there remains a shortage of ICT specialists on the labour market: 64% of large enterprises and 56% of SMEs that recruited ICT specialists during 2018, reported that vacancies for ICT specialists are hard to fill. The problem is even more widespread in Romania and Czechia, where at least 80% of enterprises that either recruited or tried to recruit ICT specialists reported such difficulties. There is also a gender balance issue as only one in six ICT specialists are female.The purpose and objectives of the project:1. Developing the capacity for self-entrepreneurship for youth from target group a sustainable and independent life;2. Promoting the social inclusion of youth target group “CAZE” in EU countries by empowering them to enter the labor market through newly acquired skills.3. Development of digital skills in the field of new technologies, promoting interaction between participants and specialists-mentors in the digital field;4. Enhancing the capacity of organisations to work at international level by implementing a European projectTarget group and needs addressed:Young people from rural areas working in crafts, migrant, young people with limited opportunities, all of them form our target group ""CAZE"".Youth workers and specialized staff in the field of integration of youth, especially at the local level of the participating organizations, specialists in the digital field<< Implementation >>19The project partners will produce the following intellectual outputs in the 24 months period of the strategic partnership. The methodology of the creation of each project result is explained below.PPR1 - Ethnicraft training format for up-skilling youth CAZEDescription: partners will organize an international seminar in Turkey to develop a new training format for the up-skilling of youth CAZE with handicraft skills in basic and transversal skills the lack of which constitute a barrier to entry to the EU labor market. The partners will organize a meeting with stakeholders working with youth at the local level by the hosting organization, carrying out a needs analysis. The training format will be based on the identified needs of youth and it will contain a methodology of teaching that will take into account intercultural differences starting from the current skills of learners. Furthermore, a strong innovative character will be put on the creation of a new methodology of teaching transversalskills with a strong focus on intercultural issues. Stakeholders working in cultural mediation will also be actively engaged during the seminar.The methodology applied for the creation of the output:1. Elaboration of a draft training format by participants to the seminar;2. Sending the draft to all partner organizations and receiving feedback from them;3. Collection of the feedback from partner organizations and refinement of the training format.Turkey will create a final version of it basing on the draft produced by participants, with the collaboration of all partners.The methodology applied for the outline of the contents:For the elaboration of the training format, Turkey and the other participating organizations willprovide all their acquired knowledge in this field and adapt it to this upskilling path ofYouth CAZE.Methodologies about the upskilling, best practices and feedback from their own participants will all be integrated into the Ethnicraft training youth.Project partners will also involve external stakeholders already working with youth that could provide them with data and analysis related to the topic of handicraft produced by target group.Cultural mediation associations will be engaged in order to give the training format a peculiar intercultural character and to ensure that the language of the guide will be meaningful for the targeted audience. NGOs working with upskilling youth will be contacted in order to provide a contribution in terms of educational methodologies, needs analysis and best practices.PPR2 - E-commerce platform: Integrare Europeana Ro.Description: The project partners will create an e-commerce platform directed to youth handicraft products. This platform will also be used during the mobilities so that youth will get used to it and effectively use it after the project completion. The platform will be multilingual and easily meaningful both for customers and for youth. The platform will be inspired by the principles of easiness-of-use and efficiency.Methodology:1. Creation of the web architecture by the partners;2. Feedback from project partners on the final structure of the e-commerce platform; 3. Creation of the demo platform to be put online with the upload of a limited set of sample products from youth CAZE;4. Asking for feedback from youth crafts by the mean of NGOs working with them and during the blended mobilities;5. Definition of the final version of the platform, uploading the handicraft products and market launch.PPR3 - E-commerce toolkit for youth CZAE.Description: The platform comes with a toolkit containing instruments and guidelines to guide youth CAZE in their e-ommerce self-entrepreneurial path. It will contain:- Marketing and communication strategies useful to manage a simple e-commerce business;- Multilingual video tutorials with a technical explanation of the use of the newly created platform.<< Results >>* Project results:PPR1: An educational format tested and validated to teach basic, transversal and entrepreneurial skills applied especially in the field of craft;PPR2: An e-commerce platform “CAZE”PPR3: A comprehensive set of digital tools to support the e-commerce platform;* Learning / teaching / training activities (LTT1):The training within the learning activities organized at the level of our project, will contribute to the testing of the methodology developed in the training format (PPR1) in a real learning environment with the targeted end users.Young people will also use the preliminary version of the e-commerce platform (PPR2) and the toolkit (PPR3), validating their functionality and effectiveness. Therefore, learning activities are a process of validating project results, and where necessary, improvements will be made in order to achieve SMART and QUALITY results. After training in the learning activities, the results and user feedback will be integrated back into the intellectual results.A short-term learning event for young people will be organized, which will result in the training of participants' skills and competences in several directions: creativity, capitalization of their own products and development of digital skills.The expected results:* increase self-esteem and self-confidence;* increasing the chances of integration and social inclusion;* greater dynamics of the relationship between youth;* each participant will discover and learn about different aspects of manufacturing in the country of each participant and partner countries;* will exchange experience and good practices;* development of language skills;* Multiplication events:8 multiplier events will be organized (1 in each country) which will contribute to the dissemination of the project results.The multiplication events of the project results will aim to raise awareness at local and international level about the potential skills of youth with lower posibilities and how they can be used to contribute to social integration, capitalization of culture, customs and traditions of other peoples. The multiplier event will show the path of improvement carried out within the project during the learning activities. In addition, there will be a presentation of the three intellectual results produced and a workshop about e-learning platform.* The final conference of the project includes:-presentation of informational material and products translated into the languages of each partner country;-meeting field experts and professionals, who will interact with youth;-social and media campaigns;* Results of project management, dissemination, monitoring, evaluation and coordination:-the project management plan includes: administrative activity, financial verification, time management, distribution of tasks and responsibilities at the consortium level, quarterly / final reports;-evaluation and quality assurance of the project: they will be developed in the initial phase of project implementation and also developed continuous measurement tools during the project implementation;-dissemination plan: a general dissemination plan will be elaborated at the level of the consortium and at the same time each partner organization will elaborate a dissemination plan at local level depending on the potential they have;-the plan for ensuring the sustainability of the project at the level of the consortium;"

Responding to the unprecedented challenges of COVID19, SMART VET will bring together a Strategic crosse-sectorial Partnership of VET organization, SMEs and YOUTH organizations aimed at preparing a high quality improvement program specifically designed to increase VET teachers, trainers and mentors’ ability to foster VET students' transition to the labour market. Despite being the most academically qualified generation ever and facing all this pressure to succeed academically, employers consistently report that young people are unprepared and unequipped to enter the workplace when they leave full-time education – lacking a broad range of soft skills. The project contributes to help VET students in increasing their employability skills, also during the suspension period as the lockdown due to the COVID-19 crisis. This will directly support “apprentices who are forced to take breaks in training in the workplace or are unable to work due to COVID-19 related prevention measures or illness” as allowed by the UK Department for Education, 2020”. For this reason, the 8 partners coming from different sector sand with different specialities, capitalizing on experience in VET services, employment services, skills development, formal and non-formal education, decided to share their expertise to develop new tools and support materials to support apprentices/VET students to enhance and foster transversal skills needed by the current labour market. The SMART VET training program and interactive tools aim at equipping VET teachers, trainers and mentors in +learn innovative mentoring and fostering techniques, based on non-formal education to tackle some of the challenges offered by the remote-learning situation +learn how use digital, interactive materials and tools to offer more engaging learning possibility to (ex) VET students +learn how to foster (ex) VET students’ soft skills via mentoring while on remote learning situations.The project will offer (ex)VET students a concrete way to prepare for employment and demonstrate to be proactive in their preparation. SMART VET materials can be used by VET students and job seekers with a VET background about to be enrolled in apprenticeship programs, to demonstrate their new / prospective employees they will be an asset to the company, not just a trainee. In particular, by introducing of serious games in in the process, the partners expect to increase both engagement and learning outcomes. The products will be digital to make them easily shared among young people, more used to online environment but also because, digital solutions will offer an easy way to deliver and transfer them, with a wider impact and easer possibility for implement follow up activities.The 7 partners from 7 countries involved in the SMART VET consortium represent a wide range of European diversity, as they are situated in different areas of Europe (UK PL IT CY GR RU TR) and represent different organizations and socio-economical contexts (towns of different sizes, economical environment, and culture) and most of all have different expertise, stakeholders, and audience with different backgrounds and needs. Public Employment Services or local and regional labour offices could also offer free guidance to support people in need for upskilling possibilities. The unemployed and job seekers can take advantage of the products as they provide a new method to facilitate employability skills improvement thus increase their change of employment. It is clear that education and training need to be adapted and linked more closely to the world of work, by bridging that gap between academia and labour market that now appears to be obsolete. Effectively anticipating which skills will be required in years to come by companies is crucial if workers with the right competencies are to be trained. The Consortium was assembled based also on the need of ensuring a comprehensive representation of the different national contexts facing the challenge of VET students facing the labour market for the first time, and of the trainers in charge for preparing them. All stakeholders are benefitting from the project’s results as have a useful program to help companies in identifying the gap between employers’ needs and expectations in terms of sustainable and responsible behaviors by employees: how to deal with a colleagues, how to solve a common problem, how to talk with superiors, but also more ethical and moral situations involving misbehaving / polluting companies, managers that do not respect basic labour rights, and other situation on that will push them to find a sustainable, responsible solutions to an issue.