Waterford and South Tipperary Community Youth Service (WSTCYS) is a Regional Youth Service that supports over 4000 young people, aged 10 to 24, in the south east of Ireland. We believe in young people and value their association with each other for its rich potential to create meaningful and worthwhile learning experiences. There are over 100 staff members and 300 volunteers who work across the 40 Projects that are run by the Youth Service in both urban and rural settings. WSTCYS is affiliated to the national body Youth Work Ireland, and has excellent strategic relationships with other groups both regionally and nationally. The location of the work is typically in purpose-built, customized centres which are owned and/or managed by the service. There is an emphasis on community involvement in the operation and governance of the premises. WSTCYS Projects work from 16 premises situated in the hearts of the communities where we serve, across Waterford City and County, and the southern parts of Co. Tipperary, and these buildings are used by myriad community groups 7 days a week. The overall Aim of WSTCYS is to assist the positive personal, social, spiritual and educational development of young people. Our Vision is for a fair, equitable and supportive society that cherishes all young people, their potential and their abilities. Our Mission is to: - Cater for the needs of young people and local communities, particularly those experiencing marginalisation, disadvantage and social exclusion - Enable young people to become free active human beings who take responsibility for their lives and participate fully in the development of their community, environment and society - Empower young people to recognise inequalities in society and to work together to effect change. Our Ethos is that young people, families and communities will have access to services and supports which are: - Accessible, engaging and coherent - Volunteer-driven - Connected to other services and community resources - Created by young people and service users in association with others - Responsive to their needs - Delivered by interested and effective staff and volunteers - Culturally sensitive and anti-discriminatory.
“InMotion Armenia” is a youth non-governmental organization based in Yerevan, Armenia. While Youth Work is a relatively new discipline in the country, we believe very strongly that Youth Work can be a bridge between continents. The young people with whom we work are young people who don't have many opportunities, especially against the current background. They have significant challenges in the geographical and economic spheres, and we work with many refugees and migrants who are either coming from, or moving across, our country. Our main aim is to improve the lives of our young people through Youth Work. The mission - to promote the establishment of a modern, healthy and educated society, working mainly in the field of education on local and international levels with different target groups. We believe that education is a key to achieve a healthy and prosperous society. The activities - being a relatively young NGO we already have amazing youth workers who develop several projects concurrently. We implement educational, cultural and environmental training and different kinds of activities at local and international platforms, to promote youth development and support youth initiatives because we believe that empowered youth is the cornerstone of social welfare. We have experience working with refugees on the topic of social entrepreneurship, active citizenship and leadership. We have extensive experience on this topic and would like to share it with others.
Metsäkartano Youth Centre promotes international youth work in the region and develop non formal education through international activities. Metsäkartano aims to encourage youth organizations in East Finland to get familiar with EU ́s youthprogram and tries to support local youth and youth workers to take first steps towards the international youth work and its possibilities. Metsäkartano offers its expertise and knowledge about international youth work for those organizations and individual youth groups who have the motivation, but not yet experience and the international networks. Metsäkartano actively organizes international training courses, seminars and workshops for different purposes as well as youth exchanges with young people around Eastern Finland. Metsäkartano has European Solidarity Corps Lead quality label as well as Erasmus+ accreditation until the end of the current EU youth programmes. Metsäkartano has been very active on the previous Erasmus+ and Youth in Action programmes as well. Metsäkartano Youth Centre lies on a side of Tiilikkajärvi National Park in Rautavaara, in the Finnish Lakeland area and in the Nothern Savo region of Finland. Metsäkartano Youth Center was founded in 1982 having over 40 years of experience in organising youth camps, international youth exchanges, volunteer work, school camps, training courses for youth workers and other events. All youth group programmes are tailor-made according to the needs of participants. Metsäkartano is one of the 9 Finnish Youth Centres that are supervised and subsidized by the Ministry of Education and Culture. The work in the national youth centers is carried out by following the current Youth Act and The National Youth Work and Youth Policy Programme. We offer a safe and responsible environment for various camps, courses, training sessions and other events throughout the year and for any group interested. We, National Youth Centers in our network, are Finland’s most popular school camp organizer, with an emphasis on experiential education. In addition, all the Youth Center's offer Nuotta coaching which is famous tool in social youth work to support young people’s social and life management skills. Metsäkartano is a large complex in the middle of the nature, which can accommodate up to 180 people in its wilderness hotel rooms, holiday apartments and a forest cabins. In the Youth Center there is also a 200-seat restaurant in the main building, lecture and meeting rooms in several different buildings, yoga room with a forest view, equipment rental services, big gym hall and in total 11 saunas. Main users of Metsäkartano Youth Center are youth groups from the region and from all over Finland.
Region de Murcia Limpia Association is an non-profit organization that uses non formal education techniques to rise awareness on environmental issues: waste separation and management, circular economy, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), good environmental practices, biodiversity, water scarcity, air quality, pollution, microplastics, climate crisis, climate change, etc. Our main objective is to communicate environmentally friendly attitudes to people. We use non formal education methods and traditional games and use social networks as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, etc. We recover waste, so that people can use it to express their creativity through upcycling techniques. Some of our partners are painters, sculptors, and graphic artists, in addition to lawyers, chemists, engineers, etc. They are those who make workshops to show youngsters and physical and mental disabled youngsters’ different techniques to develop creativity from waste. We also work on the importance of separating waste and develop circular economy to produce quality jobs. We organize campaigns to pick up abandoned waste and use the info to make citizen science. Young people need to know the importance of saving raw materials when using waste as by-products. We work on various techniques to teach how to cook with leftover food and with rural women for their digital literacy. We own a farm in Campo de Sucina (Murcia) where we work on reforestation techniques with native species in arid areas. We have an agreement with Finca la Junquera (Caravaca, Murcia) where young ESC volunteers collaborate in regenerative agriculture activities. Although we are an environmental organization, we use Youth Work methodologies - we especially encourage the active participation of women, promoting parity, and we have always prioritized young people: • with fewer opportunities due to family problems, mainly economic • who must work to help support their families • with problems adapting to the traditional educational system • with minor health handicap • belonging to unstructured families • victims of domestic violence (gender violence in the family circle) We collaborate with companies by promoting projects that we find interesting (distribution of cigarette butt holders to prevent the abandonment of cigarette butts in the environment...) and we disseminate good environmental practices at mass events to reduce the negative environmental and social impact of the same (musical concerts, fairs, festivals, etc.).
University College Cork (UCC) is one of Ireland’s leading research-intensive universities. UCC has an active research community working on numerous areas directly related to this project. Specifically, aspects of community engagement, health promotion, sustainability and climate action. The university’s research strategy is focused on creating major institutes, centres and units of excellence for world-class research. It is closely aligned with key relevant Government and European Commission policies. The University's Research Strategy focuses on the key objective of encouraging trans and interdisciplinary research collaborations. UCC is the first University in Ireland to undertake a comprehensive mapping of its research to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As UCC’s research tackles some of the world’s greatest challenges, the university recognises the crucial role it has to play in achieving the SDGs by 2030. UCC has a longstanding partnership with Erasmus + and has been collaborating with European institutions for many years to support education, training, youth and sport in Europe.
