Local Youth Councils on an international scale

ended

Starting from the idea that young people are the driving force of society, able to influence decision-making processes and shape the future of their reality, from local to global level, this project aims to foster the potential of young people to be active citizens and actors of real social change in their local communities. The project focuses on quality of youth work at the international level in terms of analysing and increasing capacities and possibilities of youth workers from civil society organisations and municipalities to engage young people in decision-making processes at the local level through local youth councils, and equipping young people with the skills and competences for quality participation. We believe that local youth council is a model that can have a huge potential in reaching out to marginalised youth that has something to say and can bring different perspectives of local issues, but is usually not in involved in such structures. Therefore, the project will focus on establishing and improving the existing local youth councils in the participating municipalities in Italy, North Macedonia, Morocco, Tunisia, Palestine and Portugal by developing a Quality charter on participatory and inclusive local youth councils and training modules, together with a series of trainings and capacity-building activities that will help capacitate the members of the youth councils to act as multipliers in creating an inclusive and representative democratic structure for youth participation in decision-making processes corresponding to the needs of their communities. Altogether, over 500 participants (youth workers, young leaders, young people, municipality officers) will be directly involved in the project activities. Due to the online dimension of part of the project actions, the project will reach far beyond the original partnership and aims to have a world-wide impact.