YOUTH COURAGE - You are part of the solution!Empowering young marginalised youth to reconnect with their social support system and facilitating personal growth to enable more active citizenship and solidarity.

<< Background >>The needs addressed can be grouped according to the two target groups in Youth and the stakeholder groups, including professionals and experts, as follows:(1) marginalised youth:Identification of the post-covid situation of mainly marginalised youth and by providing them with easy-to-use activities related to four main categories (health, empowerment and inclusion, mobility, and solidarity). Furthermore, a two-levelled and easy-to-use escape game was developed for further encouragement of the target group thus fostering active citizenship and (re-)connection to support systems.(2) youth workers:Innovative tools and strategies were provided to support the target group in their daily work cross-institutional action to foster the process of (re-)connection to the supporting systems and to offer alternative ways to reach out for young people on multiple levels.(3) stakeholders, professionals, and experts:A policy paper to promote the specific conclusions, recommendations, experiences, and lessons learnt was provided to allow for exchange on multiple levels.<< Objectives >>The three objectives addressed were:(1) to provide ways to to (re-)connect with marginalised youth(2) to empower adolescents and marginalised young people(3) to provide innovative survey tools to capture the current situation of marginalised young people and their support workers in transnational reports to further strengthen the link with policy makers and research centres across Europe.The project partnership achieved the following goals during the project for the following target groups:(1) young people, mainly marginalised:The post-covid situation and the connection of support systems of marginalised youth were identified (R1) to develop a low-threshold interactive toolkit (R2), and consequently an additional resource for empowerment (R3). Furthermore, the target group supported the re-implementation of the survey (R4). Additionally, active citizenship and inclusion were promoted (R2/R3).(2) youth workers:those were supported in motivating the target group in their daily work by providing tools, activities, and measures (R2/R3). Additionally, they supported the outcome of both surveys (R1/R4).(3) experts and stakeholders on different levels:That group was provided with a policy paper (R4) on multiple levels.<< Implementation >>Several activities centred on the four project deliverables were carried out during the project, including four transnational project meetings (TPM1-4). There were several additional informal online meetings at key stages of the project to ensure good and transparent communication and to maintain the good workflow.An LTTA (C1) was conducted in April 2023 in Brussels with young people and youth workers to actively involve them into the feedback of the R2 resources and into the development of the R3 outputs. Additionally, there was a series of interactive workshops (E1-E5) to develop new and target group friendly methodologies.Finally, there was the final conference in Brussels in May 2024 involving important key-note speakers from notable institutions to conclude the project.<< Results >>The concrete results of the project are as follows:The concrete results of the project are as follows:(R1) European Youth Survey:A two-perspective survey was conducted to investigate the post-covid situation of marginalised youth and the level of connection to their support systems, also setting the focus on social life.The transnational report including conclusions and guidelines for youth workers on how to conduct the Kahoot-survey for young people formed the basis for the development of the further project results.(R2) Outreach for Active Citizenship:Based on the findings, results, conclusions, and recommendations of R1, the project partners produced social pedagogical guidelines and an interactive toolkit to (re-)activate marginalised youth during and after crisis. A low-threshold online collection of resources was set up to be implemented on two levels, namely, to reach out and connect with marginalised youth on the one, and for reactivating and empowering young people who are already (re)connected to their support system on the other hand. That project result was supported by the C1 activity (LTTA) and a broad implementation phase. (R3) Escape the Gloom:Complementary to the second project result(R2) the project partners developed a low-threshold escape game on two levels to empower marginalised youth to reignite their courage, with close involvement of target group representatives of marginalised young people in the development process.(R4) Youth Courage Policy Paper:As the European Union emphasises the importance of exchange beyond practitioners, experts, and policy makers, the project partners therefore developed a policy paper based on the re-implementation of the survey with marginalised youth and youth workers and specific conclusions and recommendations to strengthen the collaboration between frontline youth workers, research institutes, and policy makers to further investigate the situation of marginalised youth in Europe.