SDA organized a lot projects and activities in the past. To give you an idea about the atmosphere of the activities, we will illustrate a few activities that happened in the past.
Poland, ‘aiming peace’ (Training Course)
In today’s world full of tensions, with unpeaceful relationships between people and within and between countries, there is a deep need of developing strategies aiming at peace, fundamental freedoms, human rights, and democracy. As a tool to achieve this goal peace education aims at making us understand the nature and origins of violence in order to encourage the search for alternative, nonviolent skills and to create frameworks for achieving peaceful and creative societies.
Looking at the present one of the great challenges seems to be the dialogue between religions. Too often the cultural diversity and multi-religious character of our societies are presented as a danger and a cause of conflicts. Too often the history of nations is presented as a continuum of conflicts, and we want to positively change it. Taking the city of Wrocław as a case study and visiting some of its religious communities, we want to show that cultural and religious diversity can be explored as a source of cultural richness and tolerance.
In this project the participants of different countries learned about the possibility of developing and getting to know new approaches on the topic of intercultural learning, conflict resolution and peace education in an international constellation of people.
The participating countries in this project were: Germany, Poland and Egypt.
The programme was divided into three parts looking at the past as separating as well as connecting the countries; at the present as not being only full of intolerance and violence and at the topics of peace education and conflict resolution as being essential for the future.
Participants of this project were people from countries sharing a common history (especially with regard to World War II). Visiting historic places and speaking with eye witnesses of World War II will gave them the possibility of having a closer look on history and the culture of remembrances in Poland. But the background and history of the other countries had the same importance. We looked at our school books in order to compare the way of teaching history in the different countries. By imparting the knowledge of the existence of different points of views, we enabled the participants to develop a critical view on history itself and the way it is taught in their school books. The participants looked at the aims of teaching history in different countries. Is it a matter of patriotism? Are other countries always seen as the enemies? Or is history regarded as tool supporting intercultural exchange? They spoke about the conclusions youth workers from different countries can draw from the handling of history and the culture of remembrance in their own and in different countries for their work in the area of peace education, intercultural learning and interreligious dialogue.
Other activities: Active discussions, workshops, simulation games and a lot of time for personal reflection will impart concrete methods to them and give them the possibility of developing, improving and using interpersonal as well as intercultural skills.
Reactions of participants:
* This training course was amazing. I met a lot of nice people and I learned so much about other cultures. This trip definitely changed my opinions about the worlds.
* It was very interesting to talk about topics in the world with people from other countries.
* I definitely increased my leadership skills after this project. I was amazing and very useful.
Germany, ‘step to’ (Youth Exchange)
“Step To” is a curriculum that aims at increasing and deepening co-operation between European and Mediterranean partners in youth work.
The training course was designed for youth workers and youth leaders (professional or volunteer) from both sides of the Mediterranean Sea experienced in the (Euro-Med) YOUTH program to extend their competencies to develop a Euro-Mediterranean co-operation strategy within their organizations.
The training course approached a variety of subjects, such as deepening participants’ knowledge on Action 5 (Support Measures) and how to use it to develop their co-operation strategy, working in a multicultural team and exploring common values of both sides. Special emphasis was put on a common project development.
Main aims of the projects were:
* To support the professional development of youth workers and youth leaders by extending their competencies to implement Euro-Med support measures projects;
* To reflect on how to use the Euro-Med YOUTH program, and in particular Action 5, as support for a regional and/or national strategy.
* To develop co-operation and to prepare the building of partnerships between participants
Participating countries: A total of 25 participants plus 4 trainers from both of EU and Mediterranean Sea countries.
The course was based on the principles and practises of non-formal education and was conceived to allow a learner-centred approach taking into account the needs, motivations and the experiences of participants. They needed to take a personal responsibility for their learning process, supported by a strong group dimension and a collective approach. Participants were supported actively to work on concrete projects for future and enabled to apply and transfer what they learned to their youth work practise. Room was given for regular feedback and evaluations.
Reactions participants:
* I’ve gained better knowledge & more practical experience of Action 5 of Euro-Med program and how does it work, which will help me much to benefit my organization in planning & running Euro-Med program, and also it will help me to transfer and explain this experience and knowledge to beginners from other organizations from all over Egypt in any coming training course or workshops.
* The image of Euro-Med program in my mind has been cleared very much and my thinking about using actions of that program has been changed into deep way of thinking to link these actions together, and I can say now I can optimize using these actions as tools by building up strategic plans for applying for projects.
* It was a great opportunity to meet real good partners and make new contacts with other organizations who could be reliable partners in coming projects in the future, and also it was a good opportunity to express myself, my organization & my country Egypt as a real good partner for them in the future to be called for coming projects.
* Improving my skills as a youth worker (volunteer youth leader & trainer)such like:
o Presentation skills.
o Working with multilateral and multicultural teams.
o Communication skills
o Teamwork skills.
* Learning about other cultures and expressing the Egyptian culture to them too.
* Sharing and exchanging different experiences and knowledge with both of the trainers and the participants from the other countries.
Turkey, ‘taste the different cultures’ (Youth Exchange)
The objective of this youth exchange was the following: ‘To bring young people from different countries together in order to enable them to explore the differences and similarities in their cultures through traditional food of each country.’
There were 30 participants from 6 countries involved in this project.
The participating countries were: Turkey, Egypt, Cyprus, Italy, England, Spain.
The objectives were:
* To have information about the cultural differences in traditional dishes, drinks and deserts of different countries and to explore the factors that cause those differences.
* To have a general information about the dietary habits in different countries.
* To enable the participants to learn how to cook the traditional food of different countries in the course of the program.
· To create a creative program of activities that will give the participants an idea of the Turkish culture, nature and lifestyle.
To discover the differences and similarities of cultural differences through our food habits lead to certain themes such as:
- The Traditional Food: The influence of culture and religion on food & the history behind the food,
- “Dietary Habits of the Young People”: The comparison of the different cultures about meal. (Breakfast culture, amount of food and tools change from one culture to another)
- Meal times and the effects of time limitation on dietary habits (fast food culture).
- The main factors that effect food habits:
Health Tradition
Economy Politics
EU Restrictions Religion
Climate Trade
Politics Food Offering Habits
Some reactions of the participants:
§ It was really great experience for me personally and for the rest of my group, we learned a lot from each other inside the group itself before we learn from the other groups, and we found that there are many elements in our life that we can use to express our cultures as the Turkish though about the food.
§ I believe that most of the aims and objectives of that youth exchanged has been fulfilled, and every one of the partners in that exchange has met both of his aims and also our common aims of participation in such a project.
§ There were few mistakes in the organization from the Turkish group but that was positive for us to learn from these little mistakes to avoid them when we organize any projects in the future as a hosting country.
