The project ‘Increasing Intercultural Competences and Awareness of Youth Workers’ aims to address the following NEEDS that the consortiums of 10 youth organizations active in the field of international youth work identified to be essential to them:

-the NEED to provide their youth workers who were involved so far in local, or national activities the opportunity to develop their competences to work in international settings  as participants, but also as youth workers delivering activities;

-the NEED to gain needed intercultural competencies, to increase their intercultural awareness enabling them to work with mix-cultural groups at the local, national level. At this moment, youth workers work mostly with groups that include young people coming from the same backgrounds. Their need is to develop their competences to be able to deliver more quality activities for groups involving young people from diverse cultural backgrounds;

-the NEED to increase their capacities to create their own projects with the support of the Erasmus + Programme. Youth workers are motivated to take work more actively with the Erasmus + Programme, especially with youth exchanges, training courses and youth participation activities. They need to increase their understanding of the Programme and project management of youth projects

Project Objectives

Objectives of the project “Increasing Intercultural Competences and Awareness of Youth Workers” are the following:

-to raise knowledge of directly involved participants, youth workers, on several theoretical approaches to intercultural learning, including ‘Model of Intercultural Sensitivity’, ‘Dimensions’ of Cultures’;

-to develop skills to practically apply these approaches at their work with young people with the aim to increase their intercultural competencies and awareness;

-to analyze the challenges, obstacles of delivering youth work activities in intercultural settings and to equip the participants by skills needed to address them;

-to provide the participants an opportunity to experience tools, methods, especially based on using creative writing and storytelling, and encourage them to apply these methods and tools at their work with young people and developing their intercultural competences;

-to facilitate the exchange of good practices in the field of intercultural learning, development of intercultural competencies and awareness;

-to increase participant’s knowledge of the Erasmus + Programme and to support the participants to develop new project ideas tackling the issues and elements of intercultural learning;

-to mainstream lessons learned on intercultural learning through visibility and dissemination activities targeting youth workers, educators, not directly involved in the activity;

-to prepare 5 video tutorials carrying the lessons learned and targeting youth workers, educators, not directly involved in the activity;

-to prepare a description of 8 activities, identified by the directly involved participants as the most useful in their learning process, and published them on SALTO YOUTH website – TOOLBOX;

-to hold 3 live streaming sessions on Facebook, Instagram in the follow–up period to present the results of the activity, to share lessons learned, and to tackle any questions from the audience;

-to organize 1 follow-up 1-day online training open for the representatives of participating organizations and beyond to increase intercultural competencies and awareness of youth workers, educators, leaders.

Working Method

– Learning by doing method
– Ice-breakers and team building games to get to know each other.
– Workshops will leave room for guided but controversial discussions.
– Simulation games, practical work, brainstorming, interactive presentations etc.

We plan to implement one activity – Professional Development Activity targeting 30 youth workers representing North Macedonia, Serbia, Bulgaria, Austria, Turkey, Greece, Romania, Italy, Spain, and France with the following profile:

– At least 18 years old, preferably in the age group 22 – 32, we would like to involve youth workers who have 1-3 years’ experience in the field of youth work. It means those who gain some experience in the field, can relate to them, can analyze the challenges that they are facing in the youth field. As we mentioned above, newcomers, youth workers, who are just starting with their work in the youth field can become part of the group, as well. But we will discuss their involvement individually to ensure group cohesion;
– Are able and ready to work in English, to communicate comfortably, to express their ideas, thoughts, to contribute to group work;
– Are ready to work on the objectives of the project;
– strongly interested to develop their competencies in the field of intercultural youth work, to increase their intercultural awareness;
– Ready to work on brainstorming of new project ideas in the framework of youth work;
– Motivated to transfer lessons learned in the follow-up period and to act as multipliers after the activity to increase the quality of youth work at local, national, and international levels.

About Graz, Austria

Graz is the capital city of the Austrian state of Styria and second-largest city in Austria after Vienna. As of 1 January 2021, it had a population of 331,562 .Graz is known as a college and university city, with four colleges and four universities. Combined, the city is home to more than 60,000 students.Its historic centre (Altstadt) is one of the best-preserved city centres in Central Europe.

Graz is situated on both sides of the Mur river in southeast Austria. It is about 150 km (93 mi) southwest of Vienna (Wien). The nearest larger urban centre is Maribor in Slovenia, which is about 50 km (31 mi) to the south. Graz is the state capital and largest city in Styria, a green and heavily forested region on the eastern edge of the Alps.

Graz is also easy to get to by train and coach. Graz is located on the A2 and easy to get to: about 2 hours from Vienna, 4 ½ hours from Munich and 3 hours from Udine, there is direct Flix bus from Bratislava.

The airport in Graz is also known as Thalerhof airport, and is located 10km south of Graz city center. It is a minor international airport in Austria and mostly offers charter flights to European holiday destinations and some city- break destinations. Traveling to and from the airport doesn’t take much time, due to it’s vicinity. There are two types of public transportation lines between the airport and the city center: bus and a train.

In both cases, the price of the ticket for single journey is 2.20 euro, and 1- day ticket costs 4.80 euro.

You can also arrive on the airport in Zagreb, Ljubljana, and Salzburg. On the picture above, you can check the average time needed to reach Graz by bus or metro.

OUR RECOMMENDED ROUTE: CATCH FLIGHT TO VIENNA AND THE TAKE TRAIN FROM VIENNA TO GRAZ

HERE IS THE LINK FOR VIENNA-GRAZ TRAINLINE

Veni Apartment is nearly 3.7 km from Rathaus.

The accommodation is placed within a 10-minute drive from the 1,000 – yar – old castle atop Schlossberg Cave Railway Hill. The centre of Graz is 4 km away. Zum Stern and Restaurant Tafelzimmer with different delicacies are about 400 metres away. Take a few minutes’ cab ride to see the large Stadtpark.

This unit features a flat-screen TV with satellite channels, a seating area and smoke detectors as well as a kitchen. Down pillows and linens as well as showers and towels are included in the rooms. Contact information of the hotel: http://veni-apartments.styriahotelsweb.com/en/

The participants will have 3 meals per day and 2 coffee breaks.

Please, inform us in the application form about your food needs and preferences (fast, vegetarian, vegan, food allergies)!

Budget for travel from Spain is 245 €

NOTES:

The cost given is a limit in total PER PERSON, for both ways.

– Please remember that according to Erasmus+ rules money for travel will be reimbursed according to the real cost you spend, up to the amount given above per country, but not more (which means that if you spend less – you will be reimbursed the money you actually spent or if you spend more – you will get only limit)
– Before buying your ticket, please remember your cost limits, EVERYTHING THAT WILL BE MORE THAN THE LIMIT WILL BE YOUR OWN COST.
– Before booking the flight, please, make travel arrangements CONFIRMATION with us!
– PCR test if needed will not be covered by the organiser

Please note that only public transport is subject to reimbursement. If you travel by airplane only economy class, taxi is not covered. Please consult us!

We need you to buy round trip tickets and send us a copy by email before arriving here, so our accountant knows and adjusts the budget.

We advise you to buy your tickets as soon as possible so that it fits in our limited budget for 100% reimbursement.

We kindly ask you to save all documents (Original tickets, boarding passes, invoices or bills with the ticket price) which are related to your travel, since the documentation background is obligatory for reimbursement.

We kindly please you to buy all travel tickets for both directions – return tickets (plane tickets, train tickets, bus tickets and etc.), because we will be able to reimburse only REAL EXPENSES.

IMPORTANT: We cannot refund any travel costs done by taxi. Reimbursement of travel costs will be done AFTER SENDING your tickets and boarding cards.

Please note if you buy your tickets in a currency other than EUROs, we will convert to EUROs according to the exchange rates from the official European Commission web-site: http://ec.europa.eu/budget/inforeuro/index.cfm?Language=en

Participants must travel from the country of the sending organization, and back. Following the guidelines of the Erasmus+ programme the travel back must be realized by the participants in a direct way within a maximum of 2 days. Contact us and we will assist you or prolong this where needed, only in special cases.

(You have the possibility to arrive in Austria up to 2 days in advance and leave up to 2 days later. The stay for any additional days is not covered from the projects’ budget, and it can be characterized as tourist travel and we will not be able to reimburse your tickets)

IMPORTANT! We reimburse the transport money ONLY if the participant will ACTIVELY take part during the whole project. This is an international project with non-formal education that is granted from European fund. Participants should be aware that they are not on holidays!

Don’t buy your travel tickets before getting our confirmation!

The accommodation is covered in http://veni-apartments.styriahotelsweb.com/en/Graz, Austria only for the days of the activity. In case of longer stays or indirect travelling (holiday travel etc.) there is no chance of reimbursement of travel costs. You are not allowed to arrive after this date, or leave earlier than the date of the departure day. Please keep in mind when booking the tickets. For any other questions consult with the group Leaders form sending ngo.

IMPORTANT: Traveling sometimes requires an additional day for catching a flight and staying for an additional night at the city where the airport is situated. We are aware of such situations, but organizers can not cover these costs, participants should cover themselves.

– Passport or ID
– Travel insurance or European health card
– Please bring clothes according to the weather forecast
– Please bring some nice clothes as well and check the weather channels before arriving
– Personal care products: shampoo, toothpaste etc
– Slippers or flip flops
– Camera, laptop etc.
– Pills and medicines
– Positive attitude

Health and travel insurance

We kindly invite you to make health insurance, especially the participants who aren’t EU citizens. The health insurance is not provided and will not be reimbursed by the hosting organization.

Participants’ Task: You must care for the scheduled time, be kind, respect, be positive, destroy the borders, have maximum fun, be cheerful and try to be part of the solution. Be on Time in the meeting Room always, be respectful and friendly to the other participants. To see a problem and to criticize something is so easy. So do the difficult one and tolerate people always, be a positive example for others.

To publish an article about the project on your organization web page. To collect all the boarding passes and send it to us by post.

To make sure the project aims and objectives are fulfilled

Intercultural evening – Participants are expected to create interesting, interactive and creative intercultural evenings. The intercultural evening gives us a unique opportunity in a creative way to promote your country and culture. Show us what you eat, drink, what are your traditions, music, culture, stereotypes … so prepare yourself to surprise us.

Be aware that there are no kitchen facilities available (don’t bring food that requires cooking).

Bring food, drink, promotional materials and whatever else you want to present.