The Belgian Presidency of the Council of the European Union (1/1/2024 – 30/6/2024) hosted the European conference ‘Local youth work and democracy’, with the aim of contributing to the goals of the Presidency in the youth and youth work policy area. The event took place from 20 until 23 February 2024 in Brussels.

The main thematic objective of the conference was to discuss the role of local youth work in enhancing youth engagement and participation in local communities. This event built on the synergies deriving from the Strategic National Agency Cooperation projects Europe Goes Local (EGL), coordinated by JINT vzw and Democracy Reloading (DemRel), coordinated by BIJ – the National Agencies of Erasmus+ Youth for the Flemish and French communities of Belgium.

Find out more about the outcomes of the conference in the report, as well as the advice based on the conference outcome to the Belgian Presidency.

Europe Goes Local will be launching a biweekly newsletter in the future. EGL will be using this new communication channel to send the latest news to the mailbox of interested people.

The themes of the newsletter will be:

EGL aims to launch the future newsletter in the fall, but you can already subscribe here.

EGL is running a webinar on the 9th of June about Fostering Meaningful Communication in Local Reality.

Dialogue is essential for better understanding diversity of voices in local realities. Dialogue is a space where those voices can come together as equals to listen and learn from each other. Through committing to dialogue, one can better understand the complexity of local issues, combat polarisation, and support democratic processes and participation, especially for those whose voices are often left unheard.

The session will take place on Zoom from 12:30 to 15:30 CET on the 9th of June (Thursday). It will include, a presentation by an expert, small group dialogue -experiments and plenary debriefings.

In this webinar you will:

If you are interested to take part, apply here: Application form latest on the 7th of June. Each participants will be notified on the 8th of June and selected participants will receive the Zoom link to join the event.

Europe Goes Local has been very busy in the last couple of months! Not only do we have our first European conference since covid next week, but we also launched a beautiful new website.

Take a look around! You’ll still be able to find everything you’re used to from us, but there are also new things to discover. Not only is the site prettier, if we may say so ourselves. But it’s also easier for you to send us good practices to share with all of us.

We’ve also revamped our general visuals to better match the needs of our platform, but we’ve kept our beautiful logo and name. We’ll start using our new visuals during our European event next week.

Our steering group had their first residential meeting in 2 years. It was great seeing everyone off screen in Brussels after so long.

JINT vzw is looking for a facilitator who will be part of a team that will take care of the overall moderation and facilitation of the 4th European EGL event.

JINT vzw is the Flemish knowledge centre for international youth mobility and international youth policy and is the implementing National Agency for the Erasmus+ Youth in action programme of the European Commission in Flanders, Belgium.

The project

The EGL project is a long-term strategic partnership between the National and their partners.

The core aim of the project is to raise the quality of local youth work in particular through enhanced cooperation between various stakeholders that are active at the municipal level. The Partnership currently involves about 200 members who represent around 120 municipalities in the participating countries.

Parameters of the Conference

The conference will take place on 17-19 May 2022 in Cluj-Napoca, Romania with 200 participants.

Deadline to apply for the call: 29 October 2021.

Details of the call: Call for a facilitator for the 4th European conference of the Europe Goes Local project

To support the coordinator of the European network project Europe Goes Local, we are looking for a project officer Communication Management for the period 1/09/2021 – 30/06/2023.
In consultation with the project coordinator, you will be responsible for the internal communication with/in the European network of National Agencies, for the cooperation with the communication agency and for the external communication resulting from the project, via social media, the EGL website, etc.
We are looking for a digital native who is passionate about communication and wants to use the know-how from a first work or internship experience to grow and make a difference. Someone who likes to work together but who also knows how to work independently. The ability to express yourself fluently in English, both verbally and in writing, is of course a must if you are going to take part in this ambitious international project.
Please, read the description of the vacancy about the details and about how to apply. And use the application form to apply.
Deadline to apply: 16 July (midnight, CET).
Do you wish to read about the vacancy in Dutch? You can find all information on the JINT-website.

‘Lobbying for Youth Work’ (LYW) is an European long-term training course, financed through Erasmus+ TCA and organised within the framework of the Strategic National Agency Cooperation ‘Europe Goes Local: Supporting Youth Work at the Municipal Level’. It addresses municipal youth officers and local youth workers who want to strengthen their competences to lobby for youth work in order to actively engage in and influence local youth (work) policy.

We are looking for a facilitator to join the implementing team, who:

Application & selection procedure

Candidates should send their application via e-mail to inez.adriaensen@jint.be (NA Belgium-Flanders) at the latest by 10 June 2021 including :

You will be informed about the selection by 25 June 2021.

Further details

Call for facilitator: European long-term training course “Lobbying for youth work“

Europe Goes Local is looking for trainers to facilitate a modular seminar on local youth work.

Europe Goes Local has so far offered conferences, study visits and seminars or training courses on specific topics both at the national and local level. This seminar is a step further on this path as it is a learning opportunity that provides a deeper insight to the themes of the Charter and concretely into enhancing the quality and better recognition of local youth work. It is planned to become a recurring offer at the European level in the framework of Europe Goes Local and it might serve as a model for developing national level training courses and seminars about quality development in youth work.

Themes and structure:

The modular seminar will consist of two residential modules and complementary webinars between the two residential modules.

The residential modules will be hosted by municipalities which will take active role in sharing their practices as a host to enable community-based learning throughout the seminar.

The themes of the seminar will be selected via a needs-analysis within the Europe Goes Local network to tailor the modules according to the needs of the participants. This needs analysis plays a crucial role in shaping the focus of the seminar.

Participants will be expected to start transferring the knowledge they gain to their community already after the first module.

Requested trainer profile

Further information: https://www.salto-youth.net/tools/call-for-trainers/call/europe-goes-local-quality-in-local-youth-work-a-modular-seminar-for-municipal-stakeholders-call-for-trainers.598/

Deadline to apply: 11 April.

Are you working at a municipality? Would you like to promote active citizenship in your community? Are you interested in European programmes, namely the European Solidarity Corps? Would you be happy to hear from colleagues how their municipality and community benefited from the European Solidarity Corps?

If you answered with a „yes” to all questions, this on-line seminar is designed for you!

What do we offer at the webinar?

  • Inspiring examples of municipalities and local organization which activated their communities through international volunteering or other solidarity projects
  • An insight about the European Solidarity Corps programme
  • Networking for future cooperation
  • Exchange of experience and views about the practicalities of project implementation at the municipality

When and where will this happen?

On-line, on 27-28 April 2021 (from 9:30 to 15:00 CET each day)

Application form and detailed information:

Through the following website: https://www.salto-youth.net/tools/european-training-calendar/training/activating-citizens-municipalities-making-use-of-the-european-solidarity-corps.9153/

The event is organized by JUGEND für Europa, the German National Agency of the European Solidarity Corps

Co-organizers: Finnish National Agency, European Solidarity Corps Resource Centre, Europe Goes Local