Report from the InterCity Youth conference ”InterAction for Action”,
Nov 2-4, 2015 Gothenburg, Sweden
Monday 2 November
Opening ceremony and plenary speeches
InterCity Youth together with the Swedish network KEKSarrangedthe international conference INTERACTIONFORACTION2-4 November2015 inGothenburg, Sweden. The conference was co-financed by the Swedish Agencyfor Youth andCivil Society–MUCF,and JUGEND fürEuropa, the GermanNational Agency.
The openingspeakers were:
Jonas Agdur, Chair InterCity Youth and KEKS, who talked about youth work as the art of releasing the force within young people and making them part of the solution.
Mariya Voyvodova, Deputy Mayor of Gothenburg, informed about youth work in Gothenburg and the importance of youth participation and influence.
Roger Mörtvik, State Secretary, Swedish Ministry of Education and Research, focused on learning and the importance of giving young people access to different forms of learning opportunities.
Ellen Durst, Policy Officer at the European Commission, was talking about European cooperation in the youth sector and different support systems. She also highlighted InterCity Youth as a good initiative for future cooperation.
The first key note speaker was Claudius Siebel from JUGEND für Europa who presented the project ”Municipality goes international” and what it takes to create a sustainable and successful international work at local level.
The second Key note speaker was Dr John Bamber from Center for Effective Services, Ireland, who was ”Speaking evidence to youth work - the case of non-formal learning and employability” and was providing illustrative examples of practice from across Europe.
(Dr Bamber spoke on Tuesday due to flight delays.)
Link to John’s presentation
The conferencehadover 200 participantsfrom 17 different countrieswho hadthe chanceto go to 13 different seminars and learnabout youth workfrom various parts of Europe and tomake new contacts for future common project within the InterCity Youth network.
Dynamic exercise
The first day ended with a dynamic exercise where the participants discussed “the contributions of youth work” in relation to “developed attitudes”, “soft skills”, “practical skills” and “contributions to society”. The answers were documented on a banderol that was displayed in the conference hall.
Being in a dynamic mode the participants then went to the conference dinner where day also were entertained by local youth!
Tuesday 3 November- Seminars
The day started with Claudius Siebel and Jonas Agdur giving a plenary introduction to InterCity Youth and Erasmus+ as a platform for future cooperation. They also stressed the idea behind the seminars as starting points for new projects and presented a sheet where these ideas could be documented.
Link to presentation
Then followed the seminars:
1. Youth work and quality development
Jonas Agdur, Chair of the European expert group on youth work quality systems, presented the expert group’s report and introduced a discussion on future cooperation on quality development.
Link to Jonas’ presentation
2. Learning in youth work
Lasse Siurala, Adjunct Professor of the Aalto University (Helsinki) and lecturer at Tallinn University discussed how we could further develop and promote youth work as a field for learning. He gave examples of recent conquests of non-formal learning and pointed out the threats and possibilities of validation and certification of non-formal learning.
Link to Lasse’s presentation
3. Working against violent radicalisation/extremism
Elisabeth Modée, Deputy director at the unit for democracy and civil society, Ministry of Culture, talked about actions to make society more resilient to violent extremism. Zan Jankovski and Haisam A Rahman, coordinators against violent radicalisation, city of Gothenburg, talked about how the city of Gothenburg works with radicalisation/extremism and the challenges and possibilities youth workers face in this.
Link to Elisabeth’s presentation
Link to Zan’s and Haisam’s presentation
4. Empowering young migrants
Rebekah Tegene, former Peer Advisor, shared her conclusions from IOM's ACCESS Project which was conductedsimultaneouslyin five different European countries, all aiming to empower migrant youthto actively participate in decision making and influencing issues most important to them.
Link to Rebekah’s presentation
5. European Youth Capitals
Representatives from the cities of Thessaloniki, Varna and Braga told us how they worked together with young people and other stakeholders to become European Youth Capitals and how this have affected the youth work in their respective cities.
Link to Thessaloniki presentation
Link to Varna presentation
Link to Braga presentation
6. Municipal youth work strategies
Soultana Stamouli from Thessaloniki, Stefan Fischer from Munich and Tommi Laitio from Helsinki presented their respective municipal youth work strategies and opened up for questions and debate on the subject.
Link to Soultana’s presentation
Link to Stefan’s presentation
Link to Tommi’s presentation
A. Youth work in Sweden and KEKS
Jenny Anderson, manager of KEKS, talked about youth work in Sweden and presented KEKS quality assurance systems, its rationale, tools and effects on youth work.
Link to Jenny’s presentation
B. Youth work in Flanders and VVJ
Kaï Van Nieuwenhove, director of the Flemish federation of local youth officers, VVJ, gave an overview of youth work in Flanders, Belgium, and how over 300 municipalities cooperate around the development of professional and voluntary youth work. He focused on the local level and the main tasks of municipal youth officers.
Link to Kaï’s presentation
C. Youth work in Bulgaria
Giorgi Simeonov, director Sustainable Development and European integration, and Mircho Hristov, Youth Center Manager, from the city of Stara Zagora spoke about youth work in Bulgaria integration of roma youth.
Link to Mircho’s presentation
Link to Giorgi’s presentation
D. Ideas in Action in youth work – linking theory and practice
Dr John Bamber helped participants to see how theory can inform youth work as a field of practice. It also showed how theory could be developed in their own work as part of an evidence-informed approach.
Link to John’s presentation
E. “Municipality goes international”
Claudius Siebel, JUGEND für Europa, presented the pilot project “Municipality goes international” and held a discussion on which role Learning mobility can play in youth work and how municipalities can act to strengthen Learning mobility.
Link to Claudius’ presentation
F. Working with LGBT-youth
Tanya Charif, youth worker and member of Gothenburg City LGBT-council, presented GIA, Gays in Angered, a youth centre for LGBT-youth and initiates a discussion on future cooperation on LGBT-youth work.
G. Youth work in Finland and the Kanuuna network
Annina Lehtiö-Vainio, director of youth services, City of Turku, talked about youth work in Finland, the Kanuuna network and its work with peer evaluation.
Link to Annina’s presentation
After seminars Jonas Agdur summoned up by saying that this conference once again showed the power of networks and of cooperation. It had never been possible without the voluntary help from different members of KEKS. He then invited them all on stage to have a small gift and a big applause!
While the seminar hosts still remained on stage Massimo Capano from Italy joined Jonas on stage and proudly announced that the InterCity conference 2016 will be held in his hometown Cinisello Balsamo! Then, as a surprise, the first honorary participant was selected through lottery among the seminar hosts.
Wednesday 4 November
The third day was dedicated to study visits mainly for international participants, but many Swedish youth workers attended the study visits as well.
The conference ended with a common lunch where the experiences from the study visits were discussed and plans for the future were made!
Wish you where there? Remember how it was?
See the film from the conference here!
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