The Consortium

The organisation coordinating the DO-IT project is Ecepaa (European Center for Economic and Policy Analysis and Affairs). It is specialized in the development of European Union projects in the fields of social inclusion, education, youth and migrant. 

Associazione Joint is a youth association based in Italy, the work of which mainly focuses on providing learning opportunities to young people through international experiences, such as European Solidarity Corps, International volunteering, Work Camps, local and international Training Courses, Youth Exchanges and Capacity Building Projects.

AMECE (Association Maison d’Enfant pour la Culture et l’Education – Italy) is based in Turin. Its activities aim to understand and address the needs of children, teenagers and young adults with migrant backgrounds, most of them originally from north African countries. 

Fundacion Red Incola is a Foundation composed by nine religious entities. Its mission is to support the immigrant population in risky situations of exclusion, in the promotion and defense of their rights so that they can have a dignified life.  

The 2nd Vocation High School of Katerini is a school in Greece that serves around 600 students, aged 16 – 19, with 80 teachers and comprises four different sectors (Informatics, Healthcare & Welfare, Agriculture/Food Technology/Nutrition and Business/Economics). 

The Project

Complying with the general Erasmus Plus policy and the Call for Proposals in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the overall objective of the DO-IT project is to develop an innovative practice in the digital framework, while committing to a greater social inclusion of students with a migrant background by tackling the early-school-leaving phenomenon. On such a perspective, giving a transnational dimension to the project means to allow a deeper understanding and examination of the digital education sector, strong of a comparative analysis.

Moving forward, the specific objectives of the project are:

• Identify, develop and disseminate good practices and innovative digital tools to provide teachers and trainers with skills that make them able to address the needs of youth with a migrant background, arised as a consequence of the Covid-19 pandemic;
• Promote the recognition of digital competences and soft-skills acquired with youth with a migrant background while participating in informal activities;
• Increase the capacity of 50 teachers and trainers on digital competences by providing them with a training on the 5 competences framed in the “Digital Competence Framework 2.0”;
• Increase the capacity of 50 teachers and trainers to recognise the digital competences and soft-skills acquired by youth with a migrant background during informal experiences. 

The background

Given the above, the DO-IT project takes its origin from a general consideration over the consequences of Covid-19 towards the most disadvantaged young people (with a migrant background) in the education sector. 

In fact the lockdown restrictions over Europe, made compulsory by governments, have had different effects, depending on the family income. This establishes huge issues with respect to how to ensure access, equity and inclusion in the learning environment. 

From this perspective, and a consequence, while the indirect beneficiaries of the DO-IT project outputs are young people with a migrant background, the direct ones are the members of the organizations participating in the project itself, i.e. teachers, trainers, researchers, youth workers and associations of migrants and their children.

DO-IT implementation

The DO-IT project is expected to reach several results. The partners, bringing together their expertise in the field of reference, will be creating 5 questionnaires to deliver to 5 different categories of stakeholders:

• Youth workers;
• Trainers;
• Teachers;
• Researchers;
• Migrant associations members.

In addition to that, the consortium will be working on building 5 additional questionnaires for in-depth interviews. After collecting the data, the final result will be a digital publication over several topics, such as school dropout, lack of digital skills to cope with the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and the good and best practices to address in order to mitigate the negative effects of the pandemic on the education and learning of young people with a migrant background. 

DO-IT therefore represents an innovative way to address the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic on education, with a focus on the needs of youth with a migrant background and the wide range of professionals working with them.

Read also

Case Study: Youth Education in Post-COVID EU

Study on Youth Work in the EU

L'articolo How To Tackle Covid-19 Effects On Young Migrants’ Education proviene da Youth Networks.

For this reason, the European Union gives non-residents the possibility to get a EU Blue Card.

EU Blue Card To Work In Europe

High-qualified workers from non-EU countries can apply for a Blue Card that allows them to live and work in the European Union.

There are some requirements to meet in order to get a Blue Card. Applicants must:

• Own a valid work contract or binding offer of highly qualified employment for at least six months;
• Have an offer of a gross annual salary that meets the threshold of the member states;
• In case of regulated professions, it is necessary to fulfill the conditions to exercise the profession itself;
• For unregulated professions, it is necessary to have relevant higher professional qualifications;
• For IT workers, it is necessary to have higher professional skills.

EU Blue Card: How It Works

The applicants will receive a notification of the decision over their request within 90 days from application.

Concerning the validity of the permit, each member state decides on a standard validity period for EU Blue Cards, with a mandatory minimum of 24 months.

The Blue Card is issued for the duration of the contract plus 3 months.

What Rights You Earn with the EU Blue Card

The good news for anyone willing to work in Europe, is that with the Blue Card you will earn specific rights that align yourself to any other EU citizen.

The owner of a Blue Card indeed can:

• enter, re-enter and stay in the territory of the EU country issuing the card;
• access high qualified employment in the member state issuing the card;
• request family reunification with permits with the same duration as the Blue Card;
• align to EU citizens in terms of working conditions, education and training, social security and access to services;
• accumulate period of residence in different member states to be eligible for an EU long-term residence permit.

Mobility with the EU Blue Card

The Blue Card holders have the right to move, through:

• Short-term mobility: meaning that they can travel to another EU country for a business activity for a short period;
• Long-term mobility: meaning that, after 1 year in a EU country, they can enter a second member state and apply for a new card via a quick and simple procedure.

The regulation of the EU Blue Card goes under the Immigration Policy of the European Union.

Read also

EURES: New Incentives with the Targeted Mobility Scheme

How To Get The Vaccine In Italy as a Foreigner

L'articolo EU Blue Card To Work In Europe proviene da Youth Networks.

An educational group travel to explore European migration societies

The Schwarzkopf Stiftung is a German Foundation that pursues a Europe of openness, solidarity and democracy and a tolerant, open-minded and pluralistic European civil society. Their purpose being to empower young people from all backgrounds to be active European citizens. In this sense, contributing to a pluralistic, democratic society and mutual understanding.

They are calling for ten young Europeans to join them for a trip through Postmigrant Europe.

The Background

The corona pandemic creates distance in Europe, as existing inequalities are rising as a result of the pandemic. Fundamental values such as respect and openness are increasingly being attacked by anti-democratic and authoritarian groups. Media and political debates reject migration and consolidate discrimination. While in fact we have been living in migration societies for a long time. Indeed alliances against migration’s criticism show an inclusive understanding of living together.

The Project: Postmigrant Europe

The question of how we want to live in the future lies primarily in the hands of a young generation and their pluralistic perspectives. In order to find answers for the future, Schwarzkopf Stiftung has organised an Europe trip.

In which Europe do you want to live?
How can young voices be heard?
And what do we mean when we speak of a migration society?

During the educational trip ten young people based in Europe (5 from Germany, 5 from other EU countries) will meet organisations, initiatives and associations. The purpose is to make migration societies visible. Plus enabling the participants to pass their knowledge and experiences on to others.

Requirements

In order to apply for the educational trip “Postmigrant Europe” you have to be:

• between 18-26 years-old;
• willing to go on a group travel to Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands;
• socially or politically active, engaged in cultural or neighbourhood work or in political education;
• interested in topics such as (post) colonialism, alliances against racism and discrimination, European history and present;
• interested about education and media, or already with your own (educational) social media channel;
• ready to share your knowledge with others during and after the trip, and interested in co-developing concepts and modules for the classroom together;
• willing to travel ten days through Europe at the end of August/ beginning of September, either on site or digitally, and learn together.

Applications welcomed from all young people, regardless of their gender, nationality, residence status, sexual identity, religious affiliation or educational background

The Roadmap Across Europe

From Berlin via Amsterdam, Antwerp to Brussels, you will get an overview of the manifestations of inequality from an European perspective, and you will enter into direct exchange with actors, organisations and associations. 

Information and Application

Costs for accommodation, main meals and travel expenses are covered. The trip is funded by the German Federal Agency for Civic Education (BpB).

In accordance with the current developments of the Covid-19 pandemic, the trip to the different locations will alternatively take place as a hybrid or digital trip.
On-site travelling period: 22.08.-01.09.2021
Digital or hybrid travelling period: 23.08.-03.09.21

In the application form you will be able indicate whether you would prefer to only take part in one trip on site, only digitally, or in both formats. We will decide how the trip will be planned at the end of the tender period.

The application deadline is 30th April 2021.

Organisers: Schwarzkopf Foundation Young Europe, funded by the Federal Agency for Civic Education (bpb).
Contacts for questions:
p.sombetzki@schwarzkopf-stiftung.de
a.altintas@schwarzkopf-stiftung.de

Read also

Online Course (MOOC) on Digital Youth Work

L'articolo Call for Educational Trip Across (Postmigrant) Europe proviene da Youth Networks.

Which are the differences between formal and non-formal education?

There are two ways to establish the difference. The first relates to the concept of hierarchy: in formal education, this is clearly recongnisable – and accepted. The teacher, to whom one refers as “sir” or “miss”, provides you a lesson, a lecture, a seminar, on topics officially set by curricula. Digressions are allowed, but not recognised as part of the cultural baggage that learners are expected to acquire. In non-formal education, on the contrary, there is no hierarchy: teacher and learners sit at the same level, in a non-frontal position, and the contributions from the learners matter as much as the ones from the teacher.

Pro: formal education is granted and recognised as fundamental virtually all over the world, without any discrimination based on race, gender or ethnic group reasons, and gives to everyone the opportunity to get a basic knoweldge to be exploited during lifetime.

The curricola are the second characteristic. Formal education foresees defined programmes with a set of subjects, that may or may not be of interest of the learner, although their value is officially recognised. In the end, there is always a test. In non-formal education, instead, the choice of what to learn is up to the learner. It’s the case of sport lessons, hobbies courses, language classes and so on. The final outcome doesn’t matter: the important thing is that the learner has developed something more, that s/he feels enriched.

Pro: it enables everyone to focus on his/her favourite activities, to develop personal skills according to what comes natural. He feels empowered, making NFE easier for him/her to succeed.

How is non-formal education important for Europe and EU programmes?

It’s not a case that youth workers are particularly familiar with the concept of non-formal education. It perfectly adapts to the flow of youth exchanges, intercultural dialogues and the exchange of good practices. People taking part in Erasmus+ Programmes in fact usually match the identikit of the non-formal learner. They make the first step, proving themeselves with new challenges – also and above all when it comes at learning.

Non-formal education turns out to be really helpful even when facing difficult situations, such as the integration of adult migrant to a new host country. It’s what the Council of Europe underlined as regard to language courses for adult migrants. “At a time when many Council of Europe member states are receiving large numbers of adult refugees, the distinctions between formal, non-formal and informal learning help us to formulate radical and cost-effective responses to questions that have previously been answered in traditional ways”, we read on its website.

After all, the Council of Europe officially recognised non-formal education in 2000, with a reccommendation of the parliamentary Assembly. As it’s stated in the document:

• The Assembly recognises that investment in education and welfare is an effective measure for the promotion of active citizenship and the prevention of social exclusion.
• The Assembly acknowledges that formal educational systems alone cannot respond to rapid andconstant technological, social and economic change in society, and that they should be reinforced by non-formal educational practices.
• Non-formal education is an integral part of a lifelong learning concept that allows young people and adults to acquire and maintain the skills, abilities and outlook needed to adapt to a continuously changingenvironment.

L'articolo Non-formal education: an opportunity for the future proviene da Youth Networks.

The projects will be evaluated by the Programming Committee on Youth, the co-managed body taking decisions on the programme of the youth sector (including the grants awarded by the European Youth Foundation).

Access to rights

The first goal is supporting young people and youth organisations in accessing their rights and advocating education for human rights and democracy.

The steps through which accomplish this priority are:

• A roadmap on the dissemination of Committee of Ministers’ Recommendation CM/Rec(2016)7 on young people’s access to rights;
• Support measures to member states, local authorities and youth organisations to follow-up the conclusions of the review of Committee of Ministers’ Recommendation CM/Rec(2015)3 (access of young people from disadvantaged neighbourhoods to social rights);
• The continuation of the Human Rights Education Youth Programme;
• Indentification and remedies for the shrinking civic space on young people and youth organisations. Young people’s access to rights requires the removal of legal, political and social barriers.

Youth participation and youth work

The second of the youth priorities is the empowerment of young people and youth organisations. They shall be given the chance to develop youth policies and youth work, as well as to get involved and make an impact in the community they live in. Hence, any barrier or obstacle should be removed. This can be achieved through:

As for the young people:

• Supporting young people to access their rights to assemble and freely form, join and be active in associations; enhancing young people’s meaningful participation in political processes;
• Supporting youth participation in internet governance processes;
• Promoting the Revised European Charter on the Participation of Young People in Local and Regional Life and supporting member states and youth organisations to implement its principles;
• Further disseminating the “Have your say” manual to public authorities and the non-governmental sector.

As for the youth work:

• Pursuing the dissemination and implementation of Committee of Ministers’ Recommendation CM/Rec(2017)4 on youth work, developing and promoting a European youth work agenda;
• Supporting the quality development, sustainability and recognition of youth work and non-formal education and learning, notably through the use of Council of Europe instruments in the member states (e.g. through the Council of Europe Quality Label for Youth Centres and the Council of Europe Youth Work Portfolio).

Inclusive and peaceful societies

The third priority aims at supporting young people and youth organisations in their work on peace building and social cohesion, to prevent and combat discrimination and exclusion. This will develop in two directions: first, by promoting social inclusion, fostering active participation, gender equality and combating all forms of discrimination on the grounds of Article 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The specific targets are:

• Roma youth and other minority groups;
• Young refugees and their transitionfrom childhood to adulthood;
• Young people with disabilities;
• LGBTQI young people;
• Young women and girls.

Secondly, by enabling young people to promote peaceful societies by providing them with opportunities to play an active role in:

• Intercultural dialogue/learning;
• Peacebuilding and conflict transformation;
• Challenging the rise of nationalism and populism;
• Co-operation with neighbouring and other world regions.

Read more about the Council of Europe priorities on their dedicated page.

For an overview of the funding possibilities and calls by the CoE, click on the following link (or have a look at ournews section).

L'articolo Youth priorities: the document of the Council of Europe 2020-21 proviene da Youth Networks.

The main issue at stake is inclusion, in all of its shades: how to foster it in the democratic life of young Europeans, how to guarantee the participation of people with fewer opportunities in such process, which tools, activities and actions are better to implement. The main point of the dedicated report (“A sit at the table for everyone”, by Salto Youth resource center) is to propose effective actions, on the base of what has been done until now.

Engage

First of all, the main issue is to reach out to every young person. Here it plays a fundamental role the difference between youngsters with fewer opportunities and unorganised youngsters. The first group may be unorganised, or may be not; but, for sure, its members face difficult situations (due to physical disabilities, economical problems, geographical distance, lack of facilities, etc) that make harder for them to create and get involved, even after trying to organise themselves.

The second group instead may be composed by people in difficulty – or may be not. The only thing that characterizes the group is the fact that they are not properly ogranised under the umbrella of a private or semi-private body. The difference is important because it set the target of the inclusion mission: not the unorganised people that, potentially, have the possibility to stand up and fight for themselves; but rather the people with fewer opportunities, that are the ones who may not be in the practical contitions of make up a group and raise their voice.

Empower

People with fewer opportunities are the ones that need to be empowered most. The risk of marginalisation can be prevented by giving the people more at risk the right tools to be at the forefront of European policy making process. Fostering the democratic participation of young people in the political life of the community they live in can in fact be itself and instrument of social and civic development. But an interesting focus is where Europeans stakeholder can improve and the moments when it has not been done before. Where can the system be improved? How? The report tries to answer to these questions by proposing a set of services, activities, actions and awareness raising tools.

Connect

So, the strategy wants to get to a better involvement of young people by enhancing the already existing European programmes, together with the new ones – as the European Solidarity Corps intiative. The report provide four main strategies to foster inclusion:

• the combination between the three key actions of the Erasmus+ programme;
• reducing the complexity of the application process;
• more Key Actions (in order to overtake the idea of just the KA3 as the “participation Key Action”, ofr example);
• the creation of Youth Goals.

There ideas are described in more details at p. 11/12 of the report.

The report

The main goal of the report, released in the last weeks, is not only to raise awareness on the inclusion challeges that every organisation and project has to deal with – indeed, everyone is pretty aware of the situation. It focuses more on which actions and activities to enhance or implement to tackle the situation.

L'articolo European Youth Strategy 2020-27: new SALTO report on inclusion proviene da Youth Networks.

The aim of the project

The call aims at promoting global citizenship and strengthening the active citizenship’s skills of youth diaspora. Not only they should be recognized, but they must also have the possibility to contribute to the peace-building process in Europe and to create a more inclusive society.

Its specific objectives are:

• to provide knowledge and competences on Global Education;
• to map successful initiatives and policiesthat address diaspora youth’ needs and challenges;
• to strengthen the capacity of the participants to better understand structures, mechanisms and strategies of advocacy and decision/policy making at local, national and international level;
• to promote the use of the main international tools;
• to identify potential follow-up actions and proposals to influence policy and/or raise awareness on the topic of the training course.

A definition

Nowadays, within the context of new migration flows and routes, the issue of people fleeing from their home countries is particularly sensitive. Nevertheless, there are four main factors that make a movement of people recognized as a disaspora:

• dispersal to two or more location;
• relationship to an actual or imagined homeland;
• self-awareness of the group’s identity;
• multi-generational dimension.

The context

The training course will take palce within the framework of the 7th Mediterranean University on Youth and Global Citizenship (MedUni), and will be facilitated and coordinated by the North-South Centre of the Council of Europe in partnership with l’Observatoire National de la Jeunesse (ONJ) and other European and Southern Mediterranean stakeholders.

For further information on the training course, the application process and the actors involved, please refer to the following link. The deadline for this call is on 12 May 2019.

L'articolo Call for young leaders working with youth diaspora communities in Europe proviene da Youth Networks.

The proposal of European Commission

Last week MEPs voted for a set of contingency measures meant to safeguard the teachers, students and any other E+ participant currently abroad. Those were set out in the proposal that the European Commission put forward on 30 January 2019, available here.

Such proposal was issued by EU Parliament and EU Council, in order to prevent the risk that, due to the Brexit:

The current EU-27 and UK Erasmus+ participants would have to interrupt their learning mobility activities. Many students would lose their academic credits and could be obliged to repeat their academic semester or year. This would be a very disruptive impact for students themselves as well as for their sending and hosting institutions.

What will be the fate of the Erasmus+ Programme beneficiaries now?

With the time running up, the final vote of the EU Council secured the ongoing mobilities – and the ones due to start within 30 March, the “date of withdrawal”. Students, learners and people involved in any kind of E+ funded activity will continue to get European funds without any other prejudice. A big relief, considering the uncertainity of the situation.

This applies to beneficiaries of funding awarded before the date of withdrawal. And after that? Many British young people are seriously worried, and not without reason. In case of a no-deal Brexit, infact, the beneficiaries that have not started their mobility yet are still outstanding. As the Guardian reported, they can’t be sure about whether or not they will be able to count non only on scholarships (if Erasmus+ students or learners) or other types of financial support (for volunteering), but also on health insurance – the truth is that, as for now, UK citizens can’t even be sure if their driving licences will still be valid in EU-27, after Brexit.

What if a a deal will not be reached?

Actually, the funding for mobilities starting within 30 March were already provided for in the general EU budget. The issue at stake is rather that the Brexit will happen while the seven-year-period 2014/2020 of Erasmus+ Programme is still ongoing: the challenge, in a no-deal scenario, is to secure the mobilities until 2020.

The base of the proposal is the EU Regulation No 1288/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council, that governs the Erasmus+ programme for the above-mentioned period. Basically, the contigency measures adopted these last days fall under the obligations undertaken by the UK according to the general EU budget.

As for the rest, a technical note released by the UK government just states that:

There are a range of options for the UK’s continued participation in Erasmus+ and ESC, including programme country status, partner country status or another arrangement ². Partner country access to Erasmus+ varies between different regional groups ³.

Some solutions to continue to take part in the Erasmus+ Programme after 2020 are currently under consideration. They can be either through an arrangement between the UK and the EU, so to make the UK partner country of the EU-27, or with an implementation of a series of bilateral agreements between the UK and the member states.

L'articolo Erasmus+ and Brexit: what is it going to happen after 29 March? proviene da Youth Networks.

The call is open for non-governmental youth organisations, networks and other non-governmental structures involved in areas of youth work relevant to the Council of Europe’s youth policy. 

The activities will be held in co-operation with the European Youth Centres in Strasbourg and Budapest. They will be embedded in the study session for the first semester, starting on 1st October. 

Study sessions are international youth events lasting between 4 and 8 days which bring together members of youth organisations or networks and experts for discussions on a specific subject relevant to the priorities 2020-2021 of the Council of Europe Youth sector.

The deadline for applications (1^st semester 2020) is 1st April 2019.

L'articolo Call for co-operation study sessions between Council of Europe and youth organisations proviene da Youth Networks.