UDBC Youth Meeting
"Understanding Discrimination, Building Community: Exploring Europe's Past and Present to Create Our Future Together" was a week-long youth exchange focussed around issues of discrimination and European community.
The project brought together 30 participants and 6 group leaders from Greece, the Netherlands, Romania, Slovenia and the UK. The 8-day programme took place between the venues of Rog Social Centre and Metelkova City Cultural Centre in Ljubljana, Slovenia.
The project aimed to explore issues of discrimination and prejudice in past and present Europe, and to learn campaigning and community skills to create a more tolerant future. Using non-formal and popular education methods – such as role-playing, paired listening, small and large-group games, activities and discussions, and group presentations – participants shared their past and present experiences of discrimination, identifed and challenged their own hidden prejudices, and developed new skills for civic-engagement from the local level through to EU policy-making.
Groups participating in the project each organised a follow-up meeting or training session on their return home. These sessions were diverse in their aims, according to the wishes of the participating group. Some organised for the purpose of raising awareness around issues of discrimination within the local community, others aimed to share further with their peer-groups the knowledge and skills gained during the project.
The project benefited from and could not have happened without a grant from the Youth in Action programme of the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency, European Commission.