The goal of the project is to develop the capacities of our organisations to improve the effectiveness of civic engagement of youth and youth’s capacity to champion social inclusion in service-learning (SL) projects. Our specific objectives are to:O1. enhance the skills of 191 youth workers to use SL with youth. O2. boost leadership skills of 104 youth aged 13-17 years old to do SL projects in their communities.O3. improve the toolkits of 4 partner organisations to effectively support civic engagement of youth in SL with a focus on championing social inclusion in their communities; Our countries share common challenges with youth’s civic engagement, participation in non-formal learning and social inclusion. Results of the 'Youth Study Southeast Europe' showed similar trends accross the region: 79 % of young people in the region, on average, have not engaged in any unpaid voluntary activity in the last year; furthermore, compared to the FES 2015 survey, the trend is in decline (Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES), Youth Study Southeast Europe, 2018-9). FES concludes 'these results are upsetting considering the importance of civic engagement for building social trust, reproducing civic values or contributing to a society’s democratic fabric.' Other international organisations (World Bank, UNICEF) also call for creating opportunities to enhance adolescents’ participation and meaningful contributions (BiH, UNICEF), increasing the percentage of time youth spend in civic activities (KS, World Bank), the need to change the value system of young people to enhance their civic engagement (MN, UNICEF). The project objectives are aligned with European policies in the field of Youth, especially with EU Council recommendations for actions that 'maintain and acquire skills that allow full participation in society and successful transitions in the labor market...[where] entrepreneurial, social and civic competences [are] becoming more relevant in order to ensure resilience and ability to adapt to change. From our direct experience with youth, we know their need to be engaged in meaningful actions whereby they not only develop their competences, but also contribute to making their community a better place. This gives them a feeling of accomplishment and boosts their self-worth and sense of belonging to their local communities. Service Learning (SL) is the approach that we intend to employ to support the development of these competences and attitudes in youth. Such type of involvement calls for highly skilled youth workers and effective toolkits. We will therefore increase our organisations’ capacities to address civic engagement of youth more effectively and to support the youth in championing social inclusion.

Despite abundant information sources, especially online, recent studies conducted by the ERYICA network reveal that young people across countries find it hard to access reliable and understandable information. In the context of mass disinformation, young people are more than ever in need of assistance in selecting and processing information to make their decisions. Information is a right and in the transition to adulthood, this right is key to shape the future. The essential aim of Youth Information and Counselling (YIC) is to assist young people in all aspects of their lives and their autonomous decision-making.While some specialised information services can be found in the Western Balkans, there are no national structures for generalist youth information services ensuring universal access of young people to quality information and counselling. Young people, especially those with fewer opportunities, significantly lack information on services and options related to essential aspects of everyday life such as healthcare, participation, mobility, education, employment, special support, protection, and so forth. With this project, we seek to set the basis to develop and expand YIC services in the Western Balkans (in the Programme Country North Macedonia and in the Partner Countries Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro) and to promote the integration of the right of young people to information in national youth policies. Under the coordination of ERYICA (Luxembourg), The consortium is composed of CSOs operating in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro and of ERYICA Members in Programme countries (Slovenia, North Macedonia and Spain).

“EduGaming” project was developed based on the premise that educational games (used in youth work, communities, workshops, trainings, etc.), which are approaching urgent issues related to social exclusion, disempowerment and radicalisation of young people, as well as various global challenges, are making a very big contribution to including young people (because they are innovative, attractive, user-friendly), raising awareness and engaging diverse target groups.The main goal of the project was to build capacities of youth organization to contribute to a cohesive and active society, through developing specific competencies in designing educational games addressing social and global issues. More specific objectives were:• To increase the level of knowledge in topics like: social exclusion, intercultural dialogue, social and global justice, climate change, sustainable lifestyle, and other global challenges;• To develop practical competencies in designing and applying new educational games in youth work;• To develop pro-active attitudes to approaching excluded young people;• To increase the level of creativity, innovation, self confidence and trust in educational games;• To understand the importance and be able to empower and motivate young people to create new educational tools; • To enable youth workers to act as educational games multipliers in their communities;• To develop abilities to facilitate educational games in diverse settings and youth work contexts; • To contribute to a long term change in educational approach in youth field;• To motivate youth organization to implement and mainstream the motto “think global, act local” , intercultural learning and human rights education in their work;The project gathered 29 participants from 13 countries: Serbia, Romania, Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Slovakia and Slovenia. Participants were supported by their sending organisations and accompanied by 3 trainers and 1 external expert. The structure of the project was as follows: 1. First residential training course for developing basic competences in creating new educational games connected to social and global issues, which took part in Sremski Karlovci, Serbia, between 24th of February and 5th of March 2017; 2. First playtesting of the games in each community, which reached 613 young people in total; 3. Mid-term evaluation (online);4. Second residential training course for advanced competences in educational game design and involvement of young people, for the same group of participants, which took part in Busteni, Romania, between 12th and 21st of August 2017; 5. Second playtesting of the games, which so far reached around 100 young people;6. Evaluation; 7. Dissemination of the project results; 8. Follow-up and new initiatives in each community and on the international level. The main tangible outcomes of the project are educational tabletop games, which are now in the digital format and can be used by anyone for free. There is an editable version of each of the games, so other youth workers can customise it to their needs. The games are:- Arthiefact: https://goo.gl/tdz5Sd - EUtopia: https://goo.gl/4RPLaj - Factics: https://goo.gl/YZhb4F - Hello Effect: https://goo.gl/AJjuJn - Reaction: https://goo.gl/w8qLEh - Troubles: https://goo.gl/e64vFW - Wheel of Change: https://goo.gl/wFzoSq - World Balance: https://goo.gl/8kqtqJ In addition, participants developed 12 other games, which are still in different playtesting stages, but can be found here: https://goo.gl/nEcfFR.