The director of development and international programs of SYC, Lilit Simonyan was hosted in InterEchange (France) for two weeks. The visit aimed to enhance the exchange of experience and development of cooperation between two organizations.

Stepanavan Youth Center hosted representatives of InterEchange (France) and Barcelona Voluntaria (Spain) in Armenia with the aim to work together on development of new ideas and initiations for cooperation among Armenian, Spanish and French young people.

Web-site:
http://www.barcelonavoluntaria.org/docebo/doceboCms/index.php?mn=news&pi=56_131&id=243

The Armenian group during the project was represented by Alenush Kirakosyan, Ani Zakaryan, Tigran Madoyan, Tamar Grigoryan, Anna Avanesyan, Valentina Yenokyan, Lilit Simonyan and Arsen Simonyan.

The project was hosted by the Social Center of the Blessed J. Matulaitis in Zarasai, Lithuania. Music connected young people with different backgrounds, nationalities and personal characteristics. Stomp was a new genre of music for almost everyone and it enabled the participants to discover new elements, new rhythms, and more than that, to practice it by starting from a din and a loud rattle and finally finishing by rhythmic, harmonious and passionate beats. Practice made it perfect! The participants from Armenia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Denmark and Slovenia impressed the public during the final concert in Zarasai with their enthusiasm, energy, and of course, music!

An extract from the report of Alenush Kirakosyan

Web-site of Zarasai, Lithuania:
http://www.zarasai.lt/apsstalas/index.php?kas=430

The program brought together participants from the following countries: Georgia, Spain, Belarus, Latvia, Lithuania, and Armenia. It aimed at familiarizing the participants of the program with the problems around gender issues, which exist in their countries. The program also had an aim of helping the participants to reflect upon women's condition in today's world and the tangible progress related to the target topic, which has been achieved so far in the target countries. Furthermore, the youth exchange program intended to help the participants to come to creative solutions to the issues related to gender equality, which were discussed during the program as those solutions could be applied both locally and globally, that is to say, both in the participants' home countries and elsewhere. Moreover, one of the most important goals of the program was to bring young enthusiastic people from different countries together with an aim of promoting intercultural understanding and learning.

The program consisted of many interesting activities, such as games and discussions, which helped the participants to exchange their understanding and knowledge about gender equality with each other. This helped everyone to see how the representatives of the target countries react to certain aspects of gender equality, which helped participants to better understand each other's cultures and the possible ways of promoting intercultural learning and gender equality.

The process of making posters as a community project was itself a unique one, as we all were trying to come to creative and laconic definitions, which could explain to anybody that men and women should be given equal opportunities. Some posters promoting equality between countries were also made, and this was an interesting point to consider as well.

The participants of the program were also given an opportunity to visit Vanadzor, where they were given an opportunity to discover the city and the character of the Armenian people on their own. The participants were broken into small groups and told to perform different tasks, such as coming up to unknown people in the streets and telling them about their own culture, or finding out, which the symbols of Armenia are from people whom they would meet in the streets, and taking photos of those symbols. The participants were very enthusiastic about this game, and, at the end of the youth exchange program, they were all given Armenian symbolic gifts, and those who performed the target tasks in the best way were given special presents.

The cultural evening enhanced the intercultural learning of the participants through folkloric songs and dances, tasting national dishes. This was the best way not only for learning more about each other's and one's own cultures, but also the best way for learning to appreciate diversity and to understand the value of intercultural learning and gender equality.

An extract from the report of Susanna Sargsyan

An Indian proverb says “The healthy person has many wishes, the sick person only one”.

Ten days in a beautiful city Villanova, Spain was full of discussions and reflection among youth from Spain, Italy, Poland, Ukraine, Georgia and Armenia in the matters of health, healthy lifestyle and health issues in general. Starting with energizers every day generated new ideas and discussions on various aspects of health.

The event aimed at uncovering health issues in participating countries, exchange of experiences, projects, ideas - all of the good practices to improve the awareness of health issues among youth, as well as increasing the will to live a healthy life. Differences between nations and cultures helped the participants look on their experiences from specific points of view and discover some other perspectives.

A particular attention was drawn to the definition of health, which was not only the physical and mental health but also the social health - the ability to easily deal with different people, in this way expanding the social circles. By means of brainstorming we differentiated between “reactive” people and “proactive” people and tried to come up with definitions to these two types of people, which was the following: “Reactive people are often affected by their physical environment; if weather is good, they feel good. If it is not, it affects their performance, but proactive people can carry their own weather with them”.

Extract from the report of Venera Martirosyan

Project web-site:
http://www.barcelonavoluntaria.org/docebo/doceboCms/index.php?mn=news&pi=56_131&id=184
http://www.barcelonesjove.net/barcelona/enews.php?var=4373

The project was implemented in collaboration with “Kenguru Skola” (Latvia). The seminar unified youth organizations dealing or interested to deal with various environmental issues in local communities from European Union member states and Eastern Europe/Caucasus with the aim to provide a platform to develop ideas for new joint projects, enhance quality of projects and assist in future cooperation on environmental issues between groups from various parts of Europe. Young people and youth leaders from fifteen European countries participated in the event.

The training was organized for youth workers and young people from Armenia, Moldova, Belgium and Spain on the development of project management skills. The SYC was represented by Ruzanna Azroyan, Shoghik Frankyan and Lilit Simonyan.

The project is cooperation with Kenguru Skola (Latvia), as well as Youth Association Droni (Georgia) and an Italian youth group. Seven members of SYC participated in the project representing youth of Armenia: Arsen Simonyan, Artak Manukyan, Anna Martirosyan, Karine Matinyan, Anush Suleymanyan, Gayane Grigoryan and Haykuhi Sekhposyan.

Main aims: to encourage the active participation of young people in the development of the local community, providing platform for exchanging experience, skills and information; developing leadership skills; meeting outstanding young leaders from different sectors of the society, initiating small projects during the exchange in international teams and practice team work.

Context: Active citizenship is about taking part - it may be as straightforward as helping a neighbour or as challenging as orchestrating a major campaign to effect positive change. For some, active citizenship comes naturally - a family tradition, an accidental meeting, and an inspirational teacher. For many, it needs to be encouraged, practiced, developed and informed. In today's ethnically diverse, fast moving and complex society, education for citizenship is increasingly important. If we know our rights, duties and responsibilities and understand the nature of democratic government, and if we have practised some of the skills of participation and joined in reflective discussion, then we are much more likely and much better equipped to play an active role in the wider community. We think that youth has a great potential to promote social change, young people are important actors and not just factors in social change processes.

Educational contents: The main topic of the exchange - “Be active, be involved!” Participants had the opportunity to make personal experience in this field and discuss these experiences after the activities and at the end of each day. Participants were strongly encouraged to transfer what they experienced and learned during the exchange to the young people in their towns, schools, universities, free time groups etc.

Objectives:The youth exchange “Be active, be involved!” gives young people the opportunity to meet in an international environment and to:

• Promote active participation in society;
• Share the experience of young people opportunities to participate in society and give their impact in processes in different countries;
• Develop knowledge, attitudes and skills to play an active role in the wider community;
• Work in groups, taking on different roles such as leader or organiser, taking responsibility for carrying through a task with others, facing up to challenges and taking decisions democratically;
• Develop a value for sensitivity towards individual differences;

Information about youth work, possibilities to participate in the process of society.

The international youth event was organized by Charnwood Racial Equality Council (UK). Susanna Sargsyan was the selected participant from SYC during the project.
“The spirit of multiculturalism and intercultural learning never left participants during the whole training. It was a new great opportunity for to learn more about other cultures and to feel their spirits wandering in the corridors of the Ramada Hotel where the training was taking place as if telling, “We are all different, we are all equal!” The participants came from many different countries to learn, to share, to value, to understand, to become more “multicultural”. Those young people came from Spain, Austria, Russia, UK, Ukraine, Belarus, Armenia, Portugal, Turkey, Poland, Georgia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, and France.
They were all very enthusiastic about this program and eager to learn about the possibilities of future cooperation between the organizations and the countries that each of us was representing. The training was both interesting and productive. It made the belief about the importance of “mainstreaming intercultural learning in youth work” even stronger observing how important it is to learn about and value other cultures, and to represent your own culture in an adequate way. I also felt the importance of looking at people without stereotypes which very often make bright pictures dark. This training so vividly demonstrated that we are all human beings, and our differences should become the basis for becoming one in the dynamic process of globalization rather than viewing each other as separate elements existing in this world.”

An extract from the report of Susanna Sargsyan

The training was organized by Stowarzyszenie Inicjatyw Mlodziezowych Polish group. During the training course SYC was represented by Hermine Andreasyan. The aim of the training course is the research and discovery of all the factors involved during the BEFORE, DURING and AFTER stages of the realization of an intercultural youth project, their connection to the principles of Total Quality Management and the focus on inclusion issues. The innovative methods incorporated the principles of experiential learning while encouraging reflection and cooperation. Participants used their “hands, heads and hearts” for the maximum learning out of the training course. “It [the training] was my first experience in intercultural youth work and during the 8 days that I spent in Poland I gained valuable information on developing partnership, on implementing our own projects and the importance of working with the people with fewer opportunities. Overall the training course was really very informative both for the beginners and already more experienced people”.

An extract from the report of Hermine Andreasyan

The Contact Making Seminar “Europeans Meet in Caucasus” is an initiation of SYC partner organizations, Association DRONI (Georgia) and Future Worlds Center (Cyprus). The seminar was a possibility for youth organizations from various European countries to meet, learn more about the experience and projects implemented by each group, as well as to develop ideas for future cooperation and joint projects. Two members of SYC, Hasmik Arakelyan and Vanuhi Gabrielyan participated in the event.

“Connecting Cultures for Positive Change” is a cooperative project of Stepanavan Youth Center and InterEchange (France). This project aimed to provide a platform to youth from developed and developing European countries to work together using art and culture as tools to promote intercultural learning; extend mutual understanding, respect and tolerance; increase European awareness; exchange of culture and experience, as well as develop partnership between Armenian and French people. This project provided a unique possibility for Emilie Alland to volunteer at Stepanavan Youth Center for eight months building bridges among two nations.

The aim of the long-term project (2007-2009) is to train youth workers from various European countries in conflict management and conflict resolution and to establish a Trans-European youth network to use the Youth Programme in European youth work. The project is a partnership with Academy for Peace and Development (Georgia) and Minorities of Europe (UK), as well as Association of Young Azerbaijani Friends of Europe (Azerbaijan), Academic Centre of European Information and Education (Poland), Mostar Friedensprojekt (Germany) and Stepanavan Youth Center. A training of trainers, two multiplying training courses for other European organisations, two Contact-Making-Seminars focusing on cooperation between European Union and Eastern European and Caucasian countries about conflict management and three youth exchanges will be organized during those two years. These project elements will be accompanied by the set up of an internet platform, which will function as a youth portal for European youth organisations by informing about youth even ts and as a place for partner finding and exchanging of ideas. Furthermore, two training manuals and a final report will be published and a video clip informing about the project, particularly about the conflict management training will be produced.

This project fits to the needs and working priorities of our organisations, because all are involved in conflict resolution and integration of minorities and foreigners into their local communities. All of us work on an intercultural understanding and on the reduction of xenophobia as well as on the promotion of tolerance and mutual understanding between people from different ethnic, religious and cultural backgrounds.

Project web-site:
http://www.apd.ge/Projects.html
http://alldifferent-allequal.info/node/537

Download:
Project flyer
Mid-term project flyer
Manual on conflict management

The role of young people is crucial in the development of civil society, through their participation, activeness and involvement. Efforts to encourage youth service/participation are one of the best ways to ensure youth are viewed by the community and by themselves as resources and solutions rather than problems and victims. Stepanavan Youth Center recognizes the importance of information accessibility for increasing the opportunities of youth involvement, youth participation and development at large. On a regular basis Stepanavan Youth Center spreads information though SYC-info e-group on opportunities in Armenia and abroad for Armenian youth, such as conferences, events, training, grants, scholarships, job opportunities, fellowships and internships. To join the e-group, click here