HOW TO DEVELOP INCLUSIVE SOCIETY

It was the title of the training course that took place in a picturesque location not far from Kaunas (Lithuania) at the beginning of June under the international FUTURE project "Shaping the diverse common FUTURE - Wide dialogue to create and methodologically support a network for involving migrant youth into a civic society - of the EU ERASMUS + program.

The training, which is the third major activity under the project, was coordinated by the Dnipro University of Technology, provided by a partner organization – Inseptus - participating in the Consortium from Lithuania and attended by 20 young people, including migrants and internally displaced persons, from Ukraine, Lithuania, Italy, Poland and Georgia.

The project belongs to the K2 category - Capacity Building in the Field of Youth and aims to bring together experienced higher education professionals (teachers and managers of higher education institutions) and representatives of youth NGOs to strengthen everyone's potential by sharing best practices in involving and adapting young migrants into and for the civil society through formal education and civic engagement beyond the learning hours.

Thus, the 9-day Inclusive Society training course was of strategic importance, as its sub-purpose was to bring to the youth the problems of young migrants, some of whom are studying at universities and some of whom are only seeking their own way in life.

Through a specially formed pool of activities and exercises, discussion clubs and psychological problems-dilemmas, the participants of the training discovered the essence, concept and characteristics of an inclusive society, its value for each citizen, got acquainted with specific practices of helping young migrants to adapt to new conditions, find their own ideas of how to combine learning environment and public space to facilitate migrant youth's own involvement in the local civilian community.

Particularly valuable result of the training in the process of intercultural dialogue was the exchange of participants’ own experiences, visions and creative decisions of young people from different countries, who now share common European social values and are ready to be tolerant to others, able to conduct basic social surveys, filter information and get rid of psychological biases towards migrants, are ready to help young migrants to combat with their own shocks arising from displacement and adaptation.

The creative work of the international youth team of the project formed the basis of the recommendations for the adaptation of immigrant youth and the formation of an inclusive society, which will be issued after the project completion in 2020.