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Nowadays in Poland there are over 100 local youth councils (Młodzieżowe Rady Gmin- MRG), consisting of active, young people. They represent a great potential of enthusiasm and willingness to take actions in the area of public affairs which- adequately used- can constitute an important factor augmenting the participation of young people in the decision-making processes and -in a broader perspective- can improve Polish people's activity in the political life.
In contrast, most of today's actions of the local youth councils focus mainly on the implementation of projects connected with charity events, entertainment or students' exchange programmes while consultative actions- which according to the article 5b of the Commune's Local Government Act (Ustawa z dnia 8 marca 1990 roku o samorządzie gminnym) are the main aim of local youth councils' work- are only a margin of their activity.
That is why, in order to ensure the educational effect consisting in the preparation of young people for taking part in the decision-making processes and engaging into public affairs, in our project we want to take actions which will strengthen the consultative function of the local youth councils so as to make them a space of youth's real participation in the decisions concerning their local community.
We are especially interested in the strengthening of the consultative function of the local youth councils by creating and promoting a model of consultative procedure, that is- preparing a list of decisions which are worth being evaluated by young people, proposing methods of such evaluation and convincing the local authorities to introduce it.
During our project:
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We will recognize the barriers which make it difficult to proceed with the consultative actions of the local youth councils and find the possibilities of overcoming them.
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We will work out- by the work of our group of experts- a model of consultative actions which can be taken by the local youth councils.
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We will create a web-portal of knowledge about the local youth councils:
www.mlodziezowarada.org.pl
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During 5 months we will be testing our model of local youth councils’ consultations in 3 local communities. The stage of testing will be ended by a seminar summarizing it and having an aim to work out the methods needed to promote the model of local youth councils’ activity among the local authorities and NGOs. Both local authorities and NGOs will be encouraged by us to put the idea of local youth councils into practice.
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We will be promoting our model of local youth councils' consultative actions among NGOs and the representatives of the local authorities as these are their decisions on which the conducting of the consultations with the local youth councils depends.
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We will prepare a special guide for the local authorities and NGOs giving practical information about how to create a local youth council and how to consult decisions with it.
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We will promote the consultative role of the local youth councils.
The most important effect of the project will be the creation of specific propositions of the methods and themes of the consultative actions taken by the local youth councils.
We hope that on the example of local communities in which our procedures of consultations between the local authorities and the local youth councils are introduced, we will show that this type of cooperation is possible and reasonable. We expect that our project will encourage other local communities to introduce the consultation procedure.
Financing: The project is co-financed by the Stefan Batory Foundation (Fundacja im. Stefana Batorego) within the Democracy in Action Programme (Program Demokracja w Działaniu).
For additional information, please contact: Joanna Pietrasik and Miłosz Ukleja
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