Presentation of the DiverCity Project

The number of young migrants and refugees in Europe is constantly increasing every year: they represent today, according to the United Nations, 10% of the migrants in Europe. It is imperative to accompany these young people qualitatively in their new environment and to help them to appropriate their place in this society.

While citizenship education for young refugees is not new in European Member States, the DiverCity project focuses on several aspects :

- The importance of including non-formal education practices adapted to today's refugee youth, taking into particularly the most vulnerable among them;

- To do so by involving these young people in the entire process, from diagnosis to implementation, including the co-construction of practices;

- The focus on citizenship education outside of school settings;

- The promotion of horizontal peer-to-peer learning to encourage social cohesion among youth and social mixing among youth;

- The support of the local dimension of citizenship education for these young people.

In addition, the DiverCity project would like to bring together local non-institutional actors who are in contact with these young people outside of school on this theme, which appeared essential to further their work. This dialogue will allow them to enrich and improve their knowledge and practices.

The DiverCity project focuses on the three following goals:

1. In-depth diagnosis of needs: Include young migrants and refugees in out-of-school youth education policies

● Identify existing practices in partner countries regarding civic education for young refugees outside of school settings.

● Analyse the practices themselves, the legal and political frameworks and political frameworks in which they take place.

● Evaluate their effectiveness but also their feasibility and their capacity to be duplicated and disseminated widely outside the borders of the territories concerned.

● Assess the extent to which they use methods from popular education and non-formal education.

● Collect the opinions of the actors involved in the sector of civic education of young people to support their civic integration outside of school: youth workers, young volunteers, young refugees and the local authorities responsible for implementing these policies at the local level.

● In a logic of civic integration and encouragement of participation, this is for us the first step to include young refugees in the construction of citizenship education practices at local, national and European level: Consultation.

2. Develop and co-construct civic education practices for young migrants and refugees outside of school settings, including non-formal methods from various fields (art, culture, sport, etc.)

● Address local authorities, young people, volunteers, professionals, etc., and involve them in the construction of new resources to develop civic education taking into account the specificities of young refugees, especially the most vulnerable ones.

● Empower young people by allowing them to discover more opportunities available to them to become actors in their territory, as well as by discovering new ways of expressing themselves and gaining autonomy and self-confidence.

● In a logic of civic integration and to encourage participation, this is for us the second step to include young refugees in the implementation of new citizenship education practices at local, national and European level: Co-construction.

3. Training in non-formal education practices to promote the civic integration of young migrants and refugees

● Train in new civic education practices for young refugees outside of school settings

● Disseminate these practices as widely as possible to actors and people active in the field of youth, citizenship and/or inclusion.

● Creation of links between actors in the fields of youth, citizenship and/or education and partnerships at local and European level.

The project brings together a consortium of actors committed to citizenship education for young refugees and migrants, complementary both in their geographical location and their expertise: youth organisations Parlement Européen des Jeunes - France, led by and for young people, and AJ Intercambia in Spain, MSK Lodz, a public cultural centre for the local community in Poland, and the associations Le Tre Ghinee in Italy, involved for the inclusion of vulnerable people, and Hellas for Us in Greece, active on citizenship and inclusion.