Report of the Greek Séminar

Arrival day (10/10/2005)
Some participants had already arrived the day before. Arrivals took place at different times during the day so the organizers had to arrange the picking up and transferring to the venue very carefully. The venue is 1 ½ hours drive from “Makedonia” airport of Thessaloniki..
The seminar took place on the east side of the Olympus Mountain, Old Skotina, an abandoned village that has recently started to be re-inhabited. It offers a wonderful view in the Thermaikos golf and an almost dominating presence of the mountain. Besides all, it offers the necessary isolation for successful team development and focus on the works of the seminar.
Nightfall brought most of the participants together for the welcome dinner where the first cross-cultural discussions took place.
Trainers from the “Kids in Action” team kicked off the evening with a “getting to know you better” activity to refresh the tired participants.
The last participants arrived in the early hours of the morning the next day and it was only at 4.00am that the last members of the night-watch team were able to go to bed.

Day 1 (11/10/2005)
Waking up successfully took place at 08.30! Breakfast gave the necessary energy to the participants in order to follow the hard daily programme adequately.
It started with the presentation of the YAP project.
Most of the participants already knew about “YAP” because they had participated in the feasibility visit that took place in May 2005 in Marseille. However this presentation helped to refresh their memories.
The existence of the workshop for the young people is explained by the concept of YAP.
YAP is a large-scale project borned by “ADDAP 13”, one of its main objectives is to provide social and professional support to young Europeans with fewer opportunities who wish to organise “Youth” projects for themselves. It was therefore necessary to present and explain the content of the Youth programme to the young people at length as well as how to prepare an application dossier and how to carry out this sort of project.
Following this presentation, “ADDAP13” and “Kids in Action” introduced their profile and activities to the participants through different mediums (brochures, short speeches and videos).
Participants’ presentations followed so the atmosphere hard an intense European character as we were “travelling” between the 7 countries taking part in the seminar. Gradually, everyone started to feel more comfortable around each other, which allowed questions to be raised about the presentation and also for extra information to be exchanged.
“Kids in Action” organised energizers in between presentations in order to maintain a degree of concentration and to keep the participants awake and fresh.
Team building and development are crucial elements of every project organised by “Kids in Action”.

To conclude the morning’s work and to relax at the same time as working on the cohesion of the work group, the participants and the organisers met up for a walking “adventure” close to the venue.
It was only after a well-deserved lunch, at approximately 4pm that the two workshops started their work.

Workshop with the young people
Giorgos Georgiadis, founding member of “Kids in Action” and SALTO trainer (http://www.salto-youth.net/find-a-trainer/461.html) was responsible for the management of this workshop.
The subjects of the 1st day included the presentation of the “Youth” programme. Participants had the chance to go through the most important elements of the programme’s guide but were also given some useful practical tips. This workshop was always interactive in order to offer the necessary space for questions and examples of “Youth” experiences to be exchanged.
Besides the “Youth” programme, the Giorgos Georgiadis briefly introduced the participants to other major programmes supported by the European Commission; “Leonardo da Vinci” and “Socrates”. In this way, they had the chance to become aware of the European reality in relation to youth mobility. This work allowed them to understand that the Youth Programme is an element of a wider European policy for young people to which formal education and professional internships are connected.

Workshop with the professionals

Sakis Krezios, (http://www.salto-youth.net/find-a-trainer/681.html), was responsible for the running of this workshop.
The primary objective was to agree on the subjects that would be approached throughout the seminar. For this reason, the following diagram was presented:

2 STEPS

1st STEP: 2 WORKSHOPS (YOUNG PEOPLE – PROFESSIONALS)

2nd STEP:	SIMULATION
	REAL PROJECTS

• SPORT
• CULTURE
• ENVIRONMENT

OUTCOMES
1) LIST OF RESPONSIBILITIES
2) 3 PROJECTS BEFORE SEPTEMBER 2006
3) GOOD PRACTICES
A short explanation:
• 2 steps simply mean that the seminar is constructed in 2 steps.
• 1st step. As has already been referred to before, the group was separated into 2 different workshops; one for the young people and the one of the professionals.
• 2nd step. The two workshops reunite to work on the project simulation. They are divided into three workshops assisted by the staff on site, who provide basic information and an explanation of the project outlines. It was highlighted during the presentation that it is important that the project ideas are derived from the formal and informal discussions.
• Real projects means that what was simulated before hand, could be put into real-life practise, however, some of the participants had to discuss the these with their organisations on their return home. So with the simulation we had already a dynamic group/collective approach to ideas and the establishment of the necessary background/rationale for the procedure. It was also explained that due to the “YAP” project’s parameters, the projects to be carried must include the themes of sport, culture and environment.
• Outcomes. Meaning what we really seek to achieve within the works of the seminar.
• List of responsibilities; what each organization has to do after the end of the seminar.
• 3 projects before September 2006; the “YAP” network members have to carry out 3 common youth actions before September 2006.
• Good practices; the participants must make the most of this visit together to exchange their knowledge in order to enrich their collective knowledge about this network and to make the techniques of each member more productive.

Following these two workshops, the participants met at the end of the day to put their different work together, raise some final questions and suggest some initial ideas for projects and cooperation. There was also some more time given for the best presentation of the participating organisations with the focus on their connection with the overall “YAP” idea.

After the first full work day, everyone could finally relax during the intercultural evening.

Day 2 (12/10/2005)
Although getting up was extremely difficult, it did not prevent the workshops from starting on time.

Workshop with young people
The theme of the days was Action 1 of the “Youth” Programme. This Action was studied in detail, principally regarding its practical application. Different tips and tricks were given to the participants in order to allow them to carry out their first Action. As the method of presentation and explanation had more of an open space dimension rather than the form of a rigid lecture, the group had the opportunity to raise questions throughout the session. The answers could be given by the group itself, which lent an interactive characteristic to the session. After the presentation and analysis were finished, the group was asked to go through an exercise, practising what they had learnt from the previous section. Thanks to this session, the participants are now more ready to carry out a real project.

In the afternoon, the theme was project management in youth exchanges. What should be done – and how – during the planning, preparing, implementing, evaluating and following up stages of a youth exchange. The work structure included a short presentation on project management, focusing on practical elements, a group discussion and a group exercise, the results of which had to be presented in plenary session.
Through this session, participants understood that a youth exchange involves a lot work behind the scenes in the background; there is a lot of work to be done before, during and after the project.
A short session devoted to intercultural learning was held and it was very interesting to see what the participants understood by the term culture.

Workshop with the professionals
In this workshop, the participants had to go through an important process; the exchange of good practices.
For this reason, the Giorgos Georgiadis provided the national questionnaire and a work paper.
In brief:
• What is the state doing for youth work?
They had to write down the legislation concerning the professional running of youth work. The first reaction was one of surprise: “How am I supposed to know about the laws? Is this my job?” However, by the end, an interest in the legislation was acquired by everyone: “Yes, this is my job, or better, this is part of my job, I have to know about the laws, I have to know about the juridical background” and even “discussing with my partner in an out-of-work context brought out a lot of things that we both know but we never discuss”.
• How does the society perceive our work?
An open question that was more of an opportunity for the participants to write down how they believe society perceives their work rather than bringing out possible research or studies connected with this subject.
• What do we do in our local contexts that can be considered as good practice?
A brief description was needed on that including the aims of the project/s, target group/s, methodology used, outcomes and follow ups.

The results of a completed questionnaire about their work were presented on A0 (board) paper. This work session was characterised by a large enrichment from all the participants. They brought together their respective knowledge. Through discussions and interaction, they were able to put their respective knowledge into concrete form. The collective knowledge of the group was developed and more importantly, many ideas emerged.

In the afternoon, discussions concerning networking and what still needed to be done within the network too place. How can we keep this network alive? What are the improvements which should be made concerning project YAP? What are the next stages? What more do we want? An agenda came out from this discussion (see Annex 6).

The working part of the day was finished with the daily evaluation. At night, we held the so-called Organisations’ Bazaar where participating organisations had to present, in an interactive way, their organisations and their work. As we are working in a network context, it is more than important for everyone to know each other. Trust and mutual respect were developed in an informal setting.

Day 3 (13/10/2005)
This day brought the group back together. It was the simulation and real projects. After the extensive discussions that took place on a formal and an informal level the previous days, the group ended up with 3 projects; sports & street animation, Circus pedagogy and young journalists. The first (sports & street animation) was more successful than the others since “Addap13” had already worked on it.

During the 2 sessions (morning, evening) the sub-groups had to prepare and present the projects in the hope that they would be put into practice in real life.
The first (sports and street animation) was to be carried out in May 2006 and the Spanish project (Circus Pedagogy) seemed to be foreseen for summer 2006. As for the latter, it is hoped it will be carried out before October.

At the end of the day and after the projects were presented, there was a short session dedicated to the “YAP” network (final references, work agenda) and to a brief introduction to the web site (http://www.ec-network.net/yap/)
Evaluation of the seminar took place after.

Day 4 (14/10)
Departure day…
The luckier participants had the chance to visit the city of Thessaloniki. The “YAP” introductory seminar was officially finished after a promising beginning for this networking.

Conclusion
From the point of view of the organizers and the results of the evaluations, the seminar was considered a success. All parties involved did their best and it now remains to see how and if the agenda will be followed.

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