Report Youth Exchange FUTURE ROOTS 2017

Report Youth Exchange

FUTURE ROOTS We Grow Together 2016 - Future Roots July 26 to August 6, 2017 - Follow up 2018-2019

FUTURE ROOTS Aftermovie to inspire you before reading the whole story of the FUTURE ROOTS Youth Exchange 2017

FUTURE ROOTS 10 days together, with 30 youngsters, their ideas & social entrepreneurship as key to create

a better life & future for young migrants by local projects, undertaken by & for young people to contribute to inclusion, with No One left behind!

Why FUTURE ROOTS ?

With 4 NGO's - IFTE/Austria, Youth Spirit/Romania, YEA/Albania, ONE WORLDcitizens/Netherlands - and 30 young people from the 4 countries we organised the first Future Roots Youth Exchange that will be followed up by more Future Roots Youth Exchanges in future, because ...

Young people and young migrants can mean a lot FOR each other and WITH each other! Together they can create good ideas and projects that contribute to the feeling of being welcome, the feeling of home, creation of a better life and future perspective of young migrants and by this: betterment of inclusion. Together they (young locals and young migrants) can make change towards a new togetherness and cooperation by creating awareness and understanding of different backgrounds, cultures, life situations and needs of young people in general and young migrants in special. And very important: young people (as youngest generation and world citizens) see innovative solutions and are willing to take action to make change by local and international projects and cooperation!

The idea of the Future Roots project arose during the OWC event "Youth for The Global Goals", that took place in the Netherlands in November 2016 and during the YouthStart European Entrepreneurship Award 2016 held in Berlin in December 2016. Conversations with young people from different countries showed that they wanted to work on inclusion and a better life of young migrants who have come in large groups to Europe in recent years. Some of the young people already had ideas for projects or already had begun to work out ideas into projects. These conversations inspired us as NGO’s, who work from passion on empowerment and entrepreneurship of youngsters, to jump in the adventure of the Youth Exchange FUTURE ROOTS!

Introduction In 2016, Powered by ONE WORLDcitizens, an international network of proactive young people started the movement We Grow Together, seen from the starting points: 1.

2.

3.

We are one world, when we work and grow together as one world citizens we can create a better world and future for all.

Since 2016 we have 17 Global Goals for Sustainable Development, giving us 17 common goals to work on together. Let’s make it happen by & for young people from all over the world!

Global Goals + Youngsters + Social Entrepreneurship = Sustainable Change + Inclusion + (new) Youth Employment!

To find out how to continue and increase the We Grow Together Movement with young people from Europe and beyond, we started organizing youth exchanges, applying for Erasmus+ grants in 2016 and 2017 with European project partners successfully. By doing this in 2016 and 2017, we started development of a long term youth exchange program that will be followed up in 2018-2020. With this complete program we aim to contribute to a solid base of inclusion in Europe and future perspective for young people in their home countries all over the world.

In this report we will share all about the experiences, outcome and follow up of the Youth Exchanges we organized until now to inspire you and invite you to join the We Grow Together Movement and Future Roots program!

With regards, Project team Future Roots

2015-2016: growing awareness within the int. OWC youth network from Global Goals + We Grow Together (2016) + YOUth For the Global Goals Event (2016) to … Future

Start in September 2015

17 Global Goals for Sustainable Development.

Let’s make it happen by Daily Action with No One Left Behind. Because we can’t succeed if half of the world is held back!

1 week in April & 1 week in August 2016

Social Entrepreneurship is the way to make the world a better place, while enjoying your business at the same time. It’s a chance to stand up and fighting for other dreams and principles.

Roots 2017!

Event on November 9-10-11, 2016

We can only achieve the Global Goals if we can work together from the Grassroots and the Power of Communities. The thing is that nothing is impossible, everything is possible, but We must Grow Together!

#WeGrowTogether: We need each other to make change together!

By sharing & helping, from the Grassroots with Social Entrepreneurship as key to Daily Action for Sustainable Development …

So since 2016 we had the mission: We contribute to change by Daily Action for Sustainable Development, With No One Left Behind!

Therefore, our focus became: working with & for youngsters in rural areas, with young migrants and youngsters in their home countries.

That’s why we choose for the Erasmus+ project Future Roots 2017, as start for a global program, named:

Future Roots: a better life & future for young migrants!

This is how we announced the project & it’s objectives in the Erasmus+ KA1 application in February 2017: The idea of the Future Roots project arose during the OWC event "Youth for The Global Goals", that took place in the Netherlands in November 2016 and during the YouthStart European Entrepreneurship Award 2016 held in Berlin in December 2016. Conversation with young people from different countries showed that they wanted to work for inclusion and a better life of young migrants who have come in large groups to Europe in recent years. Some of the young people had already ideas for projects or had already begun to work out the ideas into projects.

With 4 NGO’s – IFTE/YouthStart Austria, Youth Spirit/YouthStart Romania, YEA/YouthStart Albania, ONE WORLDcitizens/YouthStart Netherlands – who participated in the event in the Netherlands and the European Award in Berlin, we decided to organise a Youth Exchange together in which young people and young migrants could meet each other to exchange ideas/views about inclusion of young migrants in their area and a better life and future for young migrants in Europe. And to inspire and motivate each other to undertake activities/projects that contribute to the feeling of being welcome, education, entrepreneurship and employment of young migrants.

YEA, the project partner from Albania, where young people leave the country because they see no future in their own country, will add the theme "preventing migration of young people’ which will make the Youth Exchange more interesting!

Objectives of the project are: ● Young people and young migrants from the four countries learn more about each other's cultures, backgrounds and life situations, get better understanding of themselves and others, which arise understanding, respect and a stronger bond from both/all sides. ● They immerse themselves in the lives of young migrants, in what they need to feel at home, to build a good life and to get faith into a good future. ● During the Youth Exchange the participants inspire and train each other in empowerment, entrepreneurial skills, inventing ideas and launching activities / projects that contribute to a better life and future of young migrants. ● At the end of the Youth Exchange the participants stay connected in the ONE WORLDcitizens network for further development of ideas and projects, to help each other, to share experience with each other and to inspire more young people and migrants to join in the local projects and activities they undertake.

This is how we started after receiving the project grant!

And 4 great group leaders from Albania, Austria, Romania and The Netherlands

Alfonz

Alex Alice

George

With 6 European project - & 3 local partners as supporters of the 30 youngsters who were invited.

Working together with 1 special guest from Nepal & a team of volunteers, willing to take the lead of everything!

Our special guest from Nepal: Pradeep Sapkota, Founder and Director of Change Nepalese Mission

And the best can do everthing’-team!

‘we

f

And 4 country teams!

10 days together in this wonderful group accommodation in Oirschot

a 10-day program based on these themes

a 10-day program based on this schedule

5 days: inclusion & ideation based on stories & inspiration of young migrants

&

5 days: from idea to project based on interactive YouthStart workshops/training

Every country team contributed to the program

Outcome: 4 projects!

Future Roots team ALBANIA YEA Hub: Stay - Trust - Achieve

Future Roots team ROMANIA Youth Spirit: Health classes & Art workshops

to help you be a better version of yourself

by youngsters for young migrants

*The video can’t be shown, because it contains copyright images.

Outcome: 4 projects!

Future Roots team AUSTRIA Supporty: Home is not a place - it's a feeling

Future Roots team Netherlands Mirror:

to a buddy system to connect young migrants with local youngsters

an app to connect young locals and young migrants

The last day: evaluation about 2 questions What happened to you this week? What was your biggest eye-opener?

The last day: evaluation about 2 questions What happened to you this week? What was your biggest eye-opener?

The last day: evaluation about 2 questions What happened to you this week? What was your biggest eye-opener?

The last day: evaluation about 2 questions What happened to you this week? What was your biggest eye-opener?

Amazing things happened in Shkoder/Albania in August-September!

After coming back home, the Albanian team took action to start preparation of the YEA Hub!

The Hub was opened on September 28!!

These things happen when young people get & take the lead.

Future Roots 2017: a better life & future for young migrants! ●

The outcome of Future Roots: the 4 projects, the personal growth of the participants and their willingness to continue collaboration, made Future Roots 2017 a very promising start of the long term FUTURE ROOTS program we will develop in 2018-2019.

●

On the next 2 pages we share about the follow up with Future Roots 2, 3 and 4 we will organize in 2018-2019, to create a long term program for young locals, migrants and youth workers. Because we believe we can make big impact inclusion, by making this possible:

More and more young locals and young migrants work together, undertaking projects for a better life, future perspective, inclusion of young migrants & prevention of migration by future perspective in home countries. ●

To achieve this impact by cooperation with more partners in Europe, we (ONE WORLDcitizens and NGO’s of the YouthStart European Entrepreneurship Network) participate in the ‘Becoming Part of Europe’ project, undertaken by 9 Erasmus+ Agencies.

Follow up Future Roots 2017 in 2018/2019 Future Roots 1 (2017)

Future Roots 2 (2018)

Example/basic format of a 10-day program for young locals and young migrants to start working together on local projects, contributing to a better life, future perspective and integration of young migrants รกnd prevention of migration.

To enable, empower and train participant-teams* who joined the Future Roots 1 program to continue/ strengthen the local projects they started in 2017, to support each other online and to organize/give the Future Roots 1 program to young people and young migrants in their city/village themselves.

Future Roots 3 (2018)

Future Roots 4 (2019)

To enable participant-teams* who joined Future Roots 1 + 2 to become local coordinators of the Future Roots projects, undertaken by youngsters in their city, through development of leadership skills, coach/support skills and use of social media for community management.

To enable participant-teams* who joined Future Roots 1+2 + 3 to start their local NGO or CBO (Community Based Organisation) as base for local projects on inclusion, done by young locals and young migrants; to develop self-sufficient Business plans for their NGO/CBO and to work together in the global OWC / Future Roots network.

*Youth Workers / Teachers from youth centers and schools in the cities/villages of the participant-teams are invited to join the program.

Thank YOU for your contribution to ... ● ● ● ●

● ●

First of all: All participants!

SLMM people for organizing the wonderful ‘Migrants Experience & Dialogue’ day!

Johannes Lindner for being part of the whole 10-day program and for the wonderful 317 pictures you made!

Sean Campbell (Foroige/Ireland), Arlon Den Teuling (YouthStart NL), Andreea-Maria Duda & George Bufan (Youth Spirit/Romania), Valentin Mayerhofer (IFTE/Austria), Peter Geeroms (YouthStart Belgium) for taking part in the 2-day YouthStart European meeting we organized during the 10-day program.

Gernot Scheffknecht (YEA/Albania) for visiting the last two days and support of your team!

Jermain Bridgewater for your Masterclass Global Goals Rap Challenge!

And Special Thanks to ... ●

The S2M Strijps and S2M Den Bosch Team, for sharing the location in Eindhoven on July 31st for the ‘Migrants Experience & Dialogue’ Day and the S2M Den Bosch location for the 2nd day of the YouthStart EU meeting.

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Stefanie Vatta and Rob van Mierlo for supporting us with the Cat. A grant to organize the ‘Migrants Experience & Dialogue’ Day with SLMM and the room & lunch at the Town hall for the 1st day of the YouthStart EU meeting.

FUTURE ROOTS A better life, future perspective for young migrants!

We / Let’s make it happen! to be continued ‌.