“Cultural effects of migration” was the Erasmus+ Key Action 1 Project – Youth Exchange aiming to raise awareness on migration issues and create space for open dialogue, inter-cultural understanding, mutual respect and acceptance of diversity between young people in our countries.
We aimed to empower European youth, by enabling them to raise their cultural awarenesses through a mix of methods of Non-formal learning and using different tools for learning and sharing information.
This Youth Exchange provided space and time to our participants to share their life stories and experiences to enhance their mutual understanding, better inter cultural communications, networking, and friendship.
Project objectives were:
- To learn about problems resulting from mass emigration;
- To identify best practice in integration and inclusion of migrants, particularly with reference to East-West migrants;
- To share examples of successful integration projects for young migrants implemented in EU countries;
- To address negative portrayal of migrants and migration in media and public opinion;
- To develop future projects for young migrants using Erasmus+ Programme opportunities.
The needs that were addressed in this project were:
information on migration issues among young people in Europe, inter-cultural understanding among young people in Europe, raising tolerance and solidarity, using new methods and tools for sharing the information and learning, enhancing life skills and competences among young people to support growth and innovation for the future of European community.
Groups of 7 participants plus one group leader were selected in each partner country. Project was organized during 10-18 June 2017 in Baku, Azerbaijan. The daily program was designed for 7 working days plus 2 travel days. Using non-formal education methods offered participants wide variety of interactive workshops, presentations and discussion platforms comprising blogging, graphical designing, and video production shared information targeted at our local communities and European citizens in general, raising awareness on migration issues all over Europe.
The working methods included:
small group discussion, group presentations, individual presentations, multimedia presentations, media content analysis, theatre methods, energizers, ice-breaking activities, outdoor activities, team-building activities, exchange of experiences, guest speakers, discussion platforms, cultural activities, social media skills, on-going evaluation.
The information about the project were disseminated widely through Online platforms like action blogging, facebook, youtube, pinterest, twitter, instagram, partner organization’s web pages. The outputs and overall results of the project were available to anyone – all over the world.