Call for Participants — Another Peace

Training Courses on comprehensive conflict analysis and innovative tools for peacebuilding

Youth Peace Ambassadors

6 min readMay 23, 2023

For the “Another Peace” project,

we are looking for 25 participants based in France, Germany, Poland, Spain and Tunisia.

When: first training 27 September — 04 October 2023 (including travel dates);

second training 10 January — 17 January 2024 (including travel dates)

Where: First training in Tunisia and second in Germany;

Deadline to apply: 15th of June2023;

Link for Applications 👉 HERE

Why does this project take place?

Europe is experiencing conflicts that affect the social and political agenda, including human rights issues such as lack of integration of minorities, territorial conflicts, ethnic conflicts, hate speech, lack of socio-economic opportunities, unemployment and discrimination. Many young people are struggling with unemployment and lack of opportunities in the pan-European region and its neighborhood. Tunisia’s democratic transition post-2011 has caused economic crisis and instability, impacting youth with high unemployment, lack of opportunities, and apathy towards politics. Youth in conflict areas face even greater challenges. The EU’s “Europe Strategy 2020” aims for inclusive growth to address these issues. However, young people lack formal education in conflict analysis and transformation, hindering their ability to be active peacebuilders and influence policy-making.

“Another Peace” aims to educate as many young people as possible on conflict analysis and innovative tools for peacebuilding. Our aim is to empower young people to become leaders in peaceful conflict transformation and break the cycle of violence. To achieve this, we plan to provide knowledge and skills to young people, youth workers, and activists for the use of nonviolence in their daily lives, work, and activism. Additionally, we hope to promote European values of peace and equal political participation by fostering exchange among youth workers from diverse backgrounds.

AIM: To empower 25 youth leaders to act as new changemakers in the local and regional conflicts in Europe and in the neighborhood countries, by using human rights and peacebuilding mediation and strengthening their skills in conflict transformation and community building that includes all opinions and leads to the participation of all society (including people with less resources).

Objectives:

To develop participants’ competences in conflict transformation by exploring perspectives of human rights, peacebuilding and democratic participation.
To improve participants’ skills in data analysis and research to map violent conflicts and how they affect young people.
To empower participants to be actively engaged in transforming the violent conflicts that are ongoing or may appear in Europe and in Tunisia at the behavioral, cultural or structural levels.
To explore tools for nonviolent conflict resolution and foster peacebuilding, such as community meetings, non-violent communication, dialogue, deconstruction of the image of “the other”, intercultural learning and the principle of inclusivity.
To equip participants with know-how on innovative peace-building tools, such as: media literacy, combating hate speech, critical thinking and visual arts for peace;
To plan local actions in the participants` communities in the format of community meetings in order to provide the counternarrative preventing the escalation of tensions.
To plan at least 5 follow-up actions and promote a culture of peace in participants’ local communities;
To enhance international cooperation of youth workers in the area of conflict prevention and transformation, by planning cross-border actions focusing on community building as a counterbalance for violent conflicts.
To strengthen the sustainability of the network of young changemakers who will bring awareness for the citizens and policymakers in the EU and neighboring countries on the existing conflicts and ways to transform them, as well as the foster culture of peace.

Profile of participants:

young people aged between 18 and 35 years (exceptions are possible if duly justified);
able to work in English;
available and fully committed to take part in the whole duration of the project;
curious, open-minded, appreciate diversity and learn about each other’s realities;
motivated to learn and to apply the gained competences in their work
involved in youth or community projects in their community and be motivated to implement youth initiatives for peace- building following the project;
youth workers and youth leaders working in the field of human rights and peacebuilding;
staff, youth workers and professionals involved in education, training of youth and willing to improve their competences in teaching, training and youth work by expanding them with conflict analysis and conflict transformation skills;
Young people working with minority groups and in diverse environments where different worldviews are frequently presented.

HOW DO WE WORK? 💡

The project “Another Peace” will be based on the principles of non-formal education.

We will implement the basic elements of non-formal education, such as the education being voluntary, organized with educational objectives, participatory and learner-centered, about learning life skills and preparing for active citizenship, based on involving both individual and group learning with a collective approach, holistic and process-oriented, as well as based on experience and action (we will plan the follow-up activities) and starts from the needs of the participants.

Basically is a peer-to-peer (you teach & learn from others) approach. 😊

COSTS? 💳

Access to free education and empowerment is one of our main principles. That’s why, through the support of the ERASMUS + program, we are able to provide this training for you for FREE.

We will reimburse your travels to Tunisia with the limit of:

Poland -360 Eur;

France, Spain, Germany — 275 Eur;

Tunisia — 23 Eur;

We will reimburse your travels to Germany with the limit of:

France, Poland — 180 Eur;

Spain, Tunisia -275 Eur;

Germany — 23 Eur.

If you choose green travel (train, carpooling, boat, bus, etc.), we will try to support you with a higher reimbursement.

And a bit about ourselves 👇

Youth Peace Ambassadors Network

The Youth Peace Ambassadors Network (YPAN) is an informal network of 118 young peacebuilders from across Europe who work with and in conflict-affected communities.

The majority of the members of the network are trained on human rights, non-formal education, and conflict transformation by the Council of Europe in the long-term project (2011–2014).

Our Mission: The YPA Network wants to develop a culture of peace by empowering young people, and promoting human rights, dignity, equality, and respect for diversity through education, advocacy, and other non-violent actions through projects at the local and international levels.

Peace Up! — Verein für Friedenspädagogik und gewaltfreier Konflikttransformation

Peace Up! is an organization established in 2020, with objectives to promote the theory and practice of peace education, non-violent conflict transformation and reconciliation work at local, national, and international level and to raise public awareness of the ideas of peace work and non-violence. Peace Up! is engaged in organizing and implementing seminars, workshops, training courses and further education and scientific papers and cultural products in the theory and practice of peace education, youth work, non-violent conflict transformation and reconciliation work.

DEADLINE — 15th June 2023

✨CLICK HERE TO APPLY ✨

CONTACT 📧

Write to this e-mail with the Subject: ”Another Peace” — lydia@ypan.org and/ or nevena@ypan.org.

“Another Peace” is a project financed by the European Union’s Erasmus+ Programme.