Youth exchange YOUth for RefuGeneration

Many refugee camps, official and unofficial, exist nowadays throughout Greece. Since the spring of 2016, some of them are being hosted in region of Epirus. Youth Center of Epirus provides recreational activities to the children, youngsters and some parents of Doliana refugee camp. 

Therefore, we decided to host an international youth exchange which included 30 youngsters from Greece, Estonia, Bulgaria, France, Lithuania and Spain. The project took place from 1st to 11th of November 2016 in Greece, Stavroskiadi village of Ioannina and Doliana village- the place where the refugee camp is located. Youngsters, together with their team leaders and facilitators, lived together in one house and participated in activities of the project like discussions and presentations about the refugee situation in their countries, preparation and implementation of games, sports and crafting activities at a refugee camp, volunteering to paint a sports/activity hall of the refugee camp, making cultural presentations for the other participants, working on gathering materials for a website about this project and more.

Volunteering at the refugee camp was an amazing event because it brought people from the refugee center and from the EU community toegther. It was great that they could work together to improve the refugee camp. You can read about the welcoming, help, sharing and life stories of refugees in the Testimonies chapter of the website of the project. 

The project YOUth for RefuGeneration aimed to bring together society of EU and refugees in Europe by using positive images and promoting background stories of refugees to the public. The project not only aimed to promote tolerance and inclusion of refugees in EU society, but also to raise awareness regarding the support that refugees need in their host country. YOUth for RefuGeneration focused on preventing radicalization, while promoting diversity, intercultural and inter-religious dialogue, sense of EU citizenship, political awareness among the citizens of EU and solidarity towards the refugee “generation” of Europe.

Read more about the project, about the volunteering in refugee camp of Doliana and see video and photos abut the project in the website www.youthforrefugeneration.jimdo.com.