School and participatory youth work, are these two completely separate worlds? Not at all! Youth Coop, the local project partner of Generation Europe – The Academy from Sintra, Portugal, was invited to present its work at the colloquium ‘Pensar n(a) Escola: Como intervir com jovens que desafiam?’ (Thinking about school: How to intervene with young people facing challenges?) . The event brought together around 50 teachers, school psychologists and educators from the Sintra region for panel discussions and open exchange.
Building on three years of trilateral youth cooperation with partners in Weimar (Germany) and Budapest (Hungary), Youth Coop showed how its local youth group, organised within the Generation Europe network, creates inclusive spaces for young people. The presentation highlighted strategies for motivating young people who struggle in traditional classroom settings and helping them to re-engage with learning and community participation through non-formal learning environments. It also demonstrated the potential of international exchange programmes for empowering participants.
What youth work can do
During her presentation, project manager Edite Pereira shared Youth Coop’s experience in creating safe, non-formal spaces where young people can express themselves freely and develop civic engagement. She highlighted the value of youth work that operates alongside the formal education system but outside it to foster inclusion and personal development. She also emphasised the importance of cooperation between local youth workers and school staff to co-create measures for students who are sometimes labelled as “challenging”, but often are facing challenges themselves.
Combating educational exclusion
For Youth Coop, participating in Generation Europe – The Academy, a network of 42 youth organisations from 14 countries, plays an important role. The network and funding programme supports local youth groups in planning and implementing community-based projects while facilitating trilateral youth encounters in each partner location. It serves as a model for combining local youth empowerment with European cooperation, in which both areas depend on each other: without stable local structures, sustainable European involvement is not possible. At the same time, cross-border networking of youth groups enables mutual support, motivates young people, and also boosts local involvement. As Edite Pereira underlined at the event, the programme is also an important tool for combating educational exclusion, by reaching young people regardless of origin, parents’ income, and previous success in the formal education system.