European Footprints: project description

EUROPEAN FOOTPRINTS

# WHATDOYOUCAREABOUT

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“European Footprints” is a multimedia project on the Sustainable Development Goals showing young Europeans’ viewpoints on sustainable development: what do young Europeans care about?

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MISSION

W

e strive to raise awareness among all who share European values about the footprints we leave behind and empower them to cultivate a more responsible and sustainable lifestyle ecologically, socially and emotionally. We go by 3 main values:

Europe, Sustainability, Stories.

We believe “European” is an attitude; not by taking a geographical or political stance, but by uniting diversities and striving towards common goals of stability, well-being, and community-building.

We think the best way to live your life is to take only what you need, without causing any harm to your social and natural environment.

We rely on storytelling as a medium to reach across borders and inspire identification with a common European cultural space.

STORY

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n October 2018, a group of trainees of the European Commission Blue Book traineeship started to produce a short educational video to raise awareness on the SDGs, under the mentorship of Director General of EAC, Ms Themis Christophidou, and in collaboration with the World’s Largest Lesson - an NGO introducing the Sustainable Development Goals to school aged children.

They launched an open call to involve other participants and the outcome turned out to be unexpected: there were so many young Europeans out there caring about many different things concerning their future and sustainability. A short video simply wouldn’t have been enough to collect all their personal stories, amazing projects or grass-roots initiatives connected to the Goals.

That is how the European Footprints initiative came to life.

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The project covers perspectives from all 28 EU member states, involving former European Commission trainees who have come to share their stories both on camera and on paper. There is Monika from Lithuania sharing her experiences with gender equality, Diego from Spain who is part of a music project striving to promote cultural inclusion, Stefanie from Austria who shares her responsible nutrition choices, Giulia from Italy talking about her work as a chemical engineer.

The project’s title “European Footprints” summarizes it all: it is undeniable that we all leave some traces behind us, but we have the power to choose to leave a responsible footprint, one that takes into consideration the world we live in and one that perhaps others can follow!

OUR TEAM COORDINATION TEAM

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Elena Carloni | Eveline Seghers | Maja Lay | Marii Väljataga

VIDEO SHOOTING and EDITING

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Eoghain Ó Ríagáin

PARTICIPANTS

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Kief Albers | LUXEMBURG Ginevra Papi | ITALY Joseph Damamme | FRANCE Miriam Peters | GERMANY Lylah Davies | UK Ana Rita Gonçalves de Pinho | PORTUGAL Rosaleen Dillon Espinosa | IRELAND Diego Quintanilla Campos | SPAIN Julia Erdelyi | HUNGARY Stefanie Roithmayr | AUSTRIA Maria Gkountouma | GREECE Oļegs Sedjakins | LATVIA Anna Kuokkanen | FINLAND Niya Shekerova | BULGARIA Virág Kemecsei | HUNGARY Pavol Škulavík | SLOVAKIA Vida Tehunen Salehi | SWEDEN Bogdan Talianu | ROMANIA David Klepej | SLOVENIA Vida Tehunen Salehi | SWEDEN Francesca Lampidoniti | CYPRUS Marii Valjataga | ESTONIA Roberto Mangion | MALTA Denis Van De Kerckhove | BELGIUM Giulia Marzetti | ITALY Jara Verkleij | NETHERLANDS Lea Motzfeldt | DENMARK Mirjana Vila | CROATIA Katarzyna Nowicka | POLAND Monika Zavistanaviciute | LITHUANIA Radek Oborný | CZECH REPUBLIC 2

THE PROJECT The European Footprints project has rapidly grown into 2 complementary sub-projects.

Videos

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We have produced 3 videos, grouping the participants’ contributions into 3 main thematic clusters: EDUCATION

and

WELL-BEING

NATURE CLIMATE

and

ENVIRONMENT

SOCIETY

The videos are available online in a dedicated Facebook page and YouTube channel.

The language of the videos is English, but subtitles are provided in 20 EU languages: English, Croatian, Czech, Italian, Spanish, German, French, Slovak, Slovene, Finnish, Swedish, Maltese, Greek, Dutch, Hungarian, Polish, Lithuanian, Romanian, Bulgarian and Irish.

Our aim is to provide subtitles in all 24 EU languages and new subtitles will be directly uploaded on our YouTube channel.

Storybook

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The “#What DoYouCare About” storybook has been created as a teaching tool to be used in classrooms or educational workshops for students (13 - 18 yo). It combines the participants’ personal stories with additional teaching resources, such as facts, questions, did you know on sustainable development, EU institutions and programmes.

The stories can be read all together as an introduction to sustainable development, but also function as independent examples of citizens’ initiatives.

Download the storybook HERE

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WHAT’S NEXT

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he European Footprints initiative started with the aim to produce a video showing young Europeans’ interest in SDGs. The project now wishes to connect young people all over Europe through the medium of personal narratives and provide them with accessible, inclusive and imaginative spaces to take their own steps towards more sustainable societies.

As of December 2019, we are sourcing funding and support in order to continue our work as a non-profit association and further develop the future basis for our project. This includes developing a visual identity, new materials (new videos, translation of the storybook into other EU languages) and a website. The latter will also function as a platform to disseminate the project’s resources.

CONTACTS Email: european.footprints@gmail.com

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Facebook: @European.Footprints

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YouTube: European Footprints

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