Inclusion is Fusion!

Here are some inspirations to get creative for Christmas. Instead of buying new things (that are going to be wasted) we can just upcycle materials and get these beautiful results out of them: The products are made by people who are part of the project StartUpcycling (Starkmacher e.V.).

Mischa is currently doing an internship at "International Young Nature Friends" (IYNF) in Prague. Together with Henrique from IYNF, he did some research on the current situation of refugees in Czech Republic and the attitudes of Czech people towards them:  Since the start of the refugee crisis in 2015, the arrival of refugees in Central and Eastern Europe has been generally received with anger and hostility by the majority of the population. The Czech Republic is no exception. As of September 2015, 69% of Czechs were against accepting refugees from the Middle East & Africa, and only 4% were in favor of accepting any refugees permanently, and these figures are probably even higher today. This attitude is mirrored at the political level. The Czech people joined Hungary, Poland and Slovakia in voting against the EU’s plans to impose refugee quotas to distribute asylum seekers across member state, putting the Prague government on a collision course with Brussels. The UN

Future Lab - Krizevci Croatia Stefan Stosic is inspired by meeting new people from different countries. He participated at the project Future Lab in Croatia in the summer of 2017 and got motivated to make a change on local and global level. The project aims at empowering the young generation in the Danube region to rethink and reflect their role in this society and to create new ideas of shaping their future and life sustainably. Stefan is sharing his experience with us:  It was the first time for me to be in project like Future Lab and it was really exciting to meet new people from Germany, Croatia,  Bulgaria, Ukraine, Italy and Serbia.  It was my the first time to be in Croatia too.  All week we were talking about the future, ecology, today's problems and how to change something, how to make a better future for us. We have visited the farm, kindergarten, Development center and technology park Krizevci. Our cordinators were very cool and professional so we learned

Sometimes it is just hard to think of cool activities to do with youth and friends. Now, we are close to Christams, it is the time of consuming and relaxing. The winter can get quite cold and daunting. If you want to talk about sustainability, Christmas and Advent can be quite challenging. The Sustainable Advent Calendar can give you some positive and creative ideas of how to deal with this! It is completely the opposite of any other chocolate or plastic figures calendar: The Sustainable Advent Calendar actually presents 24 inspirations of how to sustain our wonderful environment. Each day from 1st until 24th of December, there is one new idea of sustainable life style which protects the environment, enriches your life, is fun to do and is very easy to put into pracice. The initiative started in 2016 and will now be running every year in Advent. Being in this time of gratitude and celebrations, it is the best time to actually give something back to our Planet Earth! So, go on

Daniel is a passionate musican from Argentina. He decided to change his life, stoped working as an engineer in Argentina and came to Starkmacher (Germany) to develop social projects. He is a real changemaker that you need to get to know! During the third meeting of the project Inclusion is Fusion , he offered a percussion workshop. It's an approach that you can use in your own youth work, especially with intercultural groups when people are having different language skills.   Here is, what he wants to share with us: *Why did I do these percussion workshops? It was really fun for me when I saw some percussion ensembles, and also taking part in some of them made me notice that I wanted to share music with other people. I've studied music, and during my studies I faced really different kind of teachers and ways of teaching.  I'm a theoretical guy, and need every explanation to understand something, but when I started teaching, I realized that there are many ways o

Prologue This text is for e xperienced grant writers, but also for the beginners with patience to dig information as for them it will help to feel more secure in their practice. What can you find here, why to read it? Text will define the theory of change, and then it will compare it with the logical matrix/logic of intervention (as the widespread existing practice), concluding with what is going on there in field of grant writing science and practice, and how to react on this “new” thing in project development and project preparation. Before you read the text way down below, here’s the homework you need to do. Read the following links: What is the Theory of change? https://blogs.worldbank.org/publicsphere/what-theory-change-and-how-do-we-use-it More about Theory of change? https://blogs.worldbank.org/publicsphere/four-principles-theories-change-global-development Debate about Theory of change? https://blogs.worldbank.org/publicsphere/where-have-we-got-theories-

These movies are great to watch with a group of young people and discuss some parts of it afterwards: Real value Real Value is a documentary that delivers a discussion on how business can be used to create value beyond profit; connecting motivational stories from social entrepreneurs working in agriculture, apparel, insurance, and biofuel. It also talks about the science behind our perception of value and our behaviour related to economics. Watch HERE  (Watch for free with prime) Sustainable A vital investigation of the economic and environmental instability of America's food system, from the agricultural issues we face - soil loss, water depletion, climate change, pesticide use - to the community of leaders who are determined to fix it. Sustainable is a film about the land, the people who work it, and what must be done to sustain it for future generations. Watch HERE   (Watch for free with prime) Inside the Garbage The film busts the myth o

What do we mean with "inclusion"? We are not only talking about including people with disability. In the project "Inclusion is Fusion", we are generally talking about social inclusion of youth which means we focus on actively including people with fewer opportunities.Here is a quick overview of the most relevant facts speaking about social inclusion in the European Union. According to the European Commission, 47,3% of projects in the Youth in Action project indicated that they addressed the priority of inclusion and one in four participans had "fewer opportunities". Now, in the Erasmus+ projects, do you think it has changed? Social inclusion was a key priority of the Youth in Action programme and the subsequent Erasmus + programme as well as an indirect goal of the ‘Youth Guarantee’ approach. The more recent Erasmus+ Inclusion and Diversity Strategy is trying to push further measures in a more strategic way. It is sometimes hard to define, who is

   ROOTS AND ORIGINS „If you want to make small changes, Change how you do things If you want major changes,   change how you see things! “                                        Don Campbell (holistic management)     Agriculture, as known in these days, is closing to its end. Conventional production, integrated, even eco-organic can’t return the soil in its original state. Because of usage of standard agricultural techniques, soil have lost most of its original purpose and powers: to grow plants, holding water, collecting sun and to feed animals and people. Usage of chemicals and inorganic fertilisers for decades caused dramatic reduction of fertile alive soil stratum. Even production on organic principals didn’t show results. Aldo eco (organic) production is positive and not causing further damage, can’t influence on soil regeneration and restoration of fertile stratum. All numbered is causing growing inputs in agriculture, but because of non-regenerative soil p

Jakub from Cieszyn is telling us: The October meeting of organizations within the Inclusion is Fusion project was attended also by Fundacja Laja. I was an EVS volunteer in Laja in 2016 and I´d like to share my point of view about what we do. We are a young organization. It's only five years since we were born and since then we are constantly developing and expanding our activities. The emergence of the organization arose from the need to give expression and face to our common idea that it is possible and necessary to improve the world - at least the part we can influence - through education, play and cooperation. We focus on ecology - because we want future generations to experience the world green and clean; culture - we try to raise the human spirit, because not only food is the living; social responsibility - we show people that each of us is responsible for his decisions and can be a good farmer in his small part of the world if he realizes their consequences and contex

"Inclusion is Fusion" is the title of a European youth worker exchange that started in 2017. This blog was born during the project meetings and compiles the main outcomes, stories and best practice examples. It invites everyone to join the network, to contribute to the blog and help spreading the word for sustainable approaches in youth work. The project "Inclusion is Fusion" aims at merging sustainability, diversity and employability for young people. We want to link those three aspects to further promote a sustainable lifestyle among youth and support their employability in the green sector. The project “Inclusion is Fusion“ responds to three major concerns not only present in many European countries but in countries all over the world: environment, exclusion of newcomers and youth unemployment. Its approach is to find ways to link sustainability, diversity and entrepreneurship for youth. The project gives space to talk about how we can promote the i

H 2 O +  is an  Association created in 2010 by a team of active young people, is strongly dedicated to its mission of supporting the creativity and critical thinking of people from various age groups.  Through its projects H 2 O + promotes awareness towards important issues such as environmental sustainability, natural resources, renewable energy, energy use, waste management and sustainable transportation. The activity in which our Association is mainly investing its time and resources is a series of training and teaching sessions in schools of all grades, from elementary schools to high school. We believe that growing up with the concept of sustainability is one of the most efficient ways to become a responsible adult and citizen. To reach our public, we organize various types of interventions such as workshops and meetings in schools; workshops on active learning around Trentino for children, youth and adults; information and awareness-raising open sessions; cultural ev

Cooperativa Puntozero is a non-profit entity located in Udine, operating since 2011 as an official entity and since 2008 as a working group. The associates actively participate in the promotion of numerous cultural projects, and aim to spread the idea of participating in social urban life through the means of art. Cooperativa Puntozero assembles professionals from various disciplines  –  photographers, architects, designers, video makers, economists, philosophers and anthropologists – who decided to invest in a common business project. Together they promote the challenge of establishing relations and collaborations between professionals in the cultural and creative eld. Puntozero is involved in various projects in different areas: video production and photography, set-up and furniture of urban and wooden spaces, installations and workshops, development and realisation of cultural projects, festivals and artistic exhibitions. For all projects and types of work, creativity functio

The Association UEZ is a non-profit non-governmental organization working in civil sector  creating programs for human and social development in the field of economics, togetherness, environmental care, health, education, sports, communication, personal development for kids and youngsters. The special aspect about this NGO is that it follows the principles of the  Economy of communion, a culture of giving constructing ethical goals and values in business. From 2015, the association recognized sustainable living, ecology and social entrepreneurship as topics that need to be imposed to youth and society through non-formal learning activities. Realizing new projects based on these topics, the association has expended its scope of action, target group and stakeholders and gained new members, mostly organic agriculture farmers. Find out more here.

Since 2010, Starkmacher  (est. 2006) started to invest more into projects in the fields of sustainability and environmental education. This direction has been promoted because of the sector related skills of two employees and the desire to make a change in society as far as these issues are concerned. The first project implemented was a Grundtvig Learning Partnership: Eco Navigation , a project with European partners on the trail of sustainability and sustainable lifestyles. Other activities comprise workshops in adult education on themes like sustainability or also more specific topics such as agriculture, permaculture and urban farming. In the last 2 years, the issue was combined with the question on how to enhance employability of disadvantaged youth and ecological themes were linked with employment projects. Most of the projects are international in order to boost intercultural and global learning at the same time. The most current projects in the field of youth employbility, sus