YL EUROPE

Since youth leadership (high impact projects by children and teenagers) is entirely new for Europe, YOUTH-LEADER’s focus in Europe is to nurture Youth Leadership with focus on the game changing sphere of schools, laying a foundation in primary school from age 8 through to high school year 12 and 13, rapidly improving quality of life in their communities, intergenerational collaboration and youth portrayal in news media.

Our projects help schools bring global issues to life, move From Protests to Projects, form amazing development partnerships with changemakers in low income and crisis regions, engage their town’s citizenry to raise stunning amounts of money, and add meaning to international study trips and exchanges.

We strongly engage with cities / districts explaining this cultural asset’s critial value for lively, libertarian democracy, active citizenship, social cohesion, peace and creative entrepreneurship, and we offer trainings for diverse user groups like students, citizens and key professionals (teachers, councillors, journalists, public librarians, civil society), as well as multi-month campaigns and year-long coaching for student leaders.

As European natives headquartered in Berlin we tour Europe to activate regions with a rich programme, we report on young and adult changemakers and outstanding schools, map allies, learnspaces and -scapes, launch project partnerships, new ventures and grow our community to develop a powerful continental ecosystem of partners for youth and schools to operate in for their next fifty years together.

Learn more on particular potentials and obstacles to Youth Leadership in European contexts and select a program to help us activate Youth Leadership in your region.

Youth Leadership in Europe

Youth Leadership (youth doing high impact projects) is practically unknown in Europe. Active citizenship is considered to be the job of civil society organizations. The only relevant youth-led initiatives known to the European public are of youth calling at government to better protect their lives using 1970s style street protests; FFF Germany’s national core crew however is made of twen uni students, not teens.

After four years of street and talkshow protest, escalating die-off, melting, heatwaves, fires, pandemic and government inaction, conscious youth feel despair, psychotherapists report rapidly rising mental health issues and teachers and policy makers have finally come to realize that something new is needed and respond well to our offer to help shift From Protest To Projects and to Live SDGs in Edu-Action.

A high percentage of youth is aware of crisis, shocked by adult generations’ indifference, waiting for national government to pay someone to fix things, feel abandoned, empty-handed, desperate, burned out … ignorant of their powers to implement youth-led solutions with today’s Gandhis and Gryffindores.

The vast majority of youth are surprisingly tame and positive minded.

Youth ask for more appropriate practice- and skill-based learning for flexibility in professional futures and for competence in shaping peaceful, sustainable communities and societies.

However, sadly, in Britain, 50% of youth asked “what they wish to become in the future” respond “a celebrity”. In Germany, many top-selling albums promote a lifestyle of “threatening, hurting, torturing and murdering others as business model (gangster, mafia), many “artists” have criminal records for grave violence against youth (extreme bullies).

Youth feel left alone by adults about even the most basic human rights issues.

Temporarily, Spain’s youth unemployment rate was at 50%.

In Britain, an enormous number of girls report sexual harassment at school. Further, thousands of girls got serial raped by 80+% South Asian (Pakistani) organized crime rings in Rotherham, Bristol, Oxford, Newcastle, Telford, Banbury, Derby, Halifax, Peterborough – a phenomenon fiercely ignored and covered up for decades (!) by police and city administration “nervous about raising race issues”, blaming and criminalizing girl victims reporting forced prostitution, and opening the door to extreme predation on girls at masse scale.

During the pandemic, youth at school were subjected to extraordinary measures beyond those in adult settings. Teacher support and competence for even basic digital learning was  extremely poor and conined by negligence. Young people’s sound proposals for improved learning practices were entirely ignored by staff, school boards and ministries, strongly negatively impacting millions’ of youth’s mental health, academic performance, domestic abuse and professional futures with no one held responsible.

Meanwhile, adult created youth magazines inform on “how to wake up with perfect curls”, “how to tell if he’s cheating on you”, normalize porn and heterosexual anal sex, while The Guardian reports on rise of faecal incontinence among women due to anal sex (without anyone held responsible).

While there is much adult talkshow talk on “respect”, the vast majority of youth say that “we really have more important problems than gender pronouns” in their real lives in collapsing societies and planetary ecosystems – youth feel entirely ignored and left alone about it.

Youth are well aware of constant news reports on extreme crisis at World War III scale, that local and national adults take no relevant action – and have rightfully lost trust in adult generations’ care and competence.

Many Western European schools already have strong interest in global sustainability issues, dialog, partnerships, seek to repsond to multiple societal crisis, climate anxiety and eroding mental health, and need help to shift “From Protests To Projects“. Many Eastern European schools, youth and adult generations face additional challenges in overcoming societal lethargy and have enormous eco-cultural value to offer overdeveloped Western Europeans. To harness collective superpowers, we offer Pan-European school partnerships powered by student clubs and project-oriented for SDGs, social business, natural and cultural heritage, involving diverse win-win stakeholders like (twin) cities, regional businesses, foundations and EU Programs.

Contrary to general assumptions on Western European schools, there exist strong differences in mindset, learning culture, student club culture and different potentials and obstacles to youth leadership. How can France ever have youth leadership, if student clubs are banned? How inspire teachers, if they cannot choose project partners for their (students’) favorite causes, but partners are assigned by the mayor? How engage parents, if schools are not allowed to receive local funding or in-kind support, because this would be unfair to schools lacking a supportive human ecosystem? In greece and Bosnia-Herzegovina, how initiate partnerships, if headmasters have to call the minister of education for permission that we can give a presentation in class?

You see, Europe is over 50 years behind the US and Canada. Still, we have solutions for any European setting, and we can take rapid robusts steps together. 

Europe’s outstanding asset is shared humanist values that shed totalitarian religion, monarchy and fascist dictatorship, banned violence against children, students, women and prisoners, and leads to rule of law, citizen rights, participative learning culture, co-creative citizenship, clean industries, fair trade and nature rights.

Today’s Europeans are aware of suboptimal industrial society, global injustice and development needs and have respect for indigenous people. Like in North America, there is widespread will to support development projects in Africa, South America and Asia.

Europe is a robust cultural and administrative unit with very good infrastructure, largely okay security, strong vocational training, state institutions, public budget and (sufficient) responsible adults in positions of influence in regional government, media, education and public services that love the idea of youth doing awesome projects.

There is support for SDGs and Learning for Sustainability in education, media and local government that youth leaders can tap into.

But this is under threat from inside and outside.

Escalating multiple crisis in Europe, such as eroding prosperity, peace, democracy, persistent child abuse and sexual violence, organized (youth) crime, clownish bad governance, toxic dopamine industry, sabotage of positive change by dishonorable interest groups inside and outside Europe, migration turbulences, rising violence against public servants, fires, loss of species, water, soils and ecosystems, future anxiety, mental health crisis among youth have awakend and forced local policy-makers to respond and set in motion multiple measures of innovation. IT IS URGENT.

The spaces, resources and support for youth-led projects at school, in town and beyond exist.

Adamant belief that state institutions alone are responsible to solve problems (by paying people), that only big organizations are entitled to act on eco-social matters, and trend to singly focus on the power of the collective (which can only be as genius as its individuals) …

… resulting in low sense of charity, fundraising, social enterprise, belief in the power of one, a culture of appreciation (in form of school programs, trainings, awards and news presence) … and years wasted waiting for government to act, and millions of youth in despair, while 7 million strikers each raising $100€ monthly would have generated $30 billion€ for ecosystem restoration by today, and feel confident about shaping their lives, land and future.

Further obstacles are

  • single focus on centralized national government, while real swift changes happen at communal level when youth inform caring councillors on their high impact projects
  • focus on big funding by big entities with lengthy applications and tight funding corsets, while small flexible funds sufficient for youth and edu-action projects are non-formally available from town and district councils, small regional foundations, entrepreneurs, wealthholders and citizens for enthusiastic youth and schools running high impact projects

Our global Project Partners provide opportunity for swiftly making the exhilarating experience of changing lives and land at grand scale, and shaping the future of entire regions.

Our YL Coaches and Magical Coaches educate youth and their adult allies on Youth Leadership Essentials, its rich benefits for life, professions and learning culture, and how to live ESD, LfS and SDGs in Edu-Action providing communities with positive vision, robust solutions and an active citizenry and global worknet to shape their good future.

SCANDINAVIA

STELLAR LEARNING CULTURE AND POTENTIALS FOR EPIC GOOD CITIZENSHIP

Intergenerational peace and collaboration, amazing project-oriented learning culture, sense of a good life, nature sports, regional stewardship, cultural identity, trust in self and neighbors, sense of responsibility of self, towards the collective and to faraway countries facing SDG challenges. Estimated potentials for youth leadership: HIGH, EN MASSE

A high number of youth are well educated, peaceful, with a good sense of self, home, culture, confidence (low climate anxiety), athletic and nature positive. 

The potential for high impact youth leadership is excellent.

While countries differ, we can say in general that the liberal 60s and 70s made  up to 30% of parents choose alternative schools, forcing the state school system to rethink and follow.

The healthy sense of community makes policy-makers and teachers want to create the best possible learning environment for youth to unfold their personality and skills to become able active caring citizens to create the next level good society, in trusted collective collaboration with parents and students.

Examples from Finland and Denmark:

  • Starting teacher training at university requires an entry test (hidden personality test, create the best lesson for any topic, subject, year you like; you have 5 hours and 1 sheet of paper; those who pass have a personal interview “are you willing to keep educating yourself in new learning methods for the next 50 years?”) that only 10% pass.
  • They study 80% pedagogy and 20% subject (only what’s treated at school).
  • Teachers work in teams, mix disciplines.
  • When a student performs badly, the principal asks the teacher “how come that s/he cannot learn well in your class? After all, it’s simple stuff.”
  • When students have an idea how to improve teaching and it convinces the curriculum developers at Helsinki University, students get support to practice their ideas for a generation of students.
  • The National Student Council has a veto right on new education laws, since ” only if it makes sense to students, it is a good law.”
  • Parents can enter classrooms at any time without notice.
  • Students spend 8 years together in primary school with the same main teacher.
  • In year 9, danish youth attend boarding schools, specialized for example on music (students create performances for host town’s citizenry and teach younger peers; in small towns they are the cultural hotspot) or on travel (organizing travel to Senegal, Nepal…)

which is simply the ultimate public school model.*

This makes us highly interested in exploring youth leadership in this societal ecosystem.

* In 200 other countries, it is yet unimaginable … not for lack of money or methods, but lack of Heart … french, german, american, russian, chinese, south african etc. teachers do not feel that students are their friends, are not willing to educate themselves throughout their career, do not want parents in the classroom. Likewise, the masse of students’ and parents’ psycho-emotional mindset does not qualify them for such good learning culture. They first have to heal individuals and society.

Changemaker Student Clubs are a great start to nurture it. They improve image of youth, teachers, schools, nurture a sense of positive news, active citizenry, collaborative learning culture at school, and involvement of parents and partners.

The societal climate and learning culture are a perfect foundation for creating an Enabling Environment for youth-led High Impact Projects with caring stakeholders in schools, the municipality, parents, news media and supporters.

Finland, Norway, Sweden and Denmark have achieved the most peaceful, egalitarian modern societies on the planet, with strong love for nature sports and a healthy sense of sensuality and sexuality, a stunning level of intergenerational peace, love and collaboration showing in teachers seeing students as friends, amazing learning culture and education policy (view schools tab) while stating “we are still beginning to understand how good learning works.”

Social and entrepreneurial thinking are strong among youth and young adults, cities support sustainability innovation, companies and embassies support sound development projects abroad. In Norwegian, “business / economy” means household, which leads to a common sense of responsible business and good governance. There is strong investment in sustainable development at city and national level.

Entrepreneur clubs are common. We encourage to add Social Entrepreneur clubs, since it grows the number of interested youth (ecology, social, development…), a fascinating story (making citizens contribute), with far more activities (communications, project partners, public speaking, alliances with diverse stakeholders, activate peers and citizens, vividly dosument on social and news media…), makes real impact on lives and land, and provides many opportunities for citizens to team up and contribute (not just buy the product or service).

Scandinavians have a good, realistic relationship to their history and cultural identiy, a good sense of self and trust, which enables them to trust others, e.g. in terms of permission to camp on public lands. It is extremely rare that police use a gun. They have a strong sense of what makes a good life, a balance of individual self-responsible sovereignity and responsibility to the collective, resulting in a solid, confident YES to liberties and a solid, confident NO to behavior incongruent with universal ethical values destroying the achieved social harmony of inner and outer peace, inner and outer joy and inner and outer abundance.

While not everything and everybody is perfect, we highlight these aspects, because they are a million times better than elsewhere – view the SCHOOL tab as proof.

 

We are not yet aware of obstacles.

While successful teen hero*ines in North America build on passion (which is highly useful to inspire people), and Scandinavians are more reserved, their general good collective spirit (watch Danish handball national team home matches) may be supportive of Philanthro-Party culture and movement building.

While Scandinavians have strong trust in the collective’s institutions (and it works for good governance), they also have strong sense of regional stewardship, and in involving citizens in shaping good life in town.

GERMANY

ERODING ENORMOUS POTENTIALS – URGENT DESIRE FOR NEW GOOD WAYS

One hundred years after saying no to monarchy, strong sense of federal democracy and social justice, investigative journalism on strong state tv, and fifty years of green movement, libertarian party culture, eco-cultural travel and push for non-authoritarian student-oriented learning culture have created high awareness for eco-social issues in education and mainstream culture. However, due to lack of personal passion in meaningful action with relevant results for society, there is very low sense for dreaming big and project-oriented student clubs.

Thirty years of inundation with shitty tv shows, music, fashion model imagery, bullies and sexist criminals honored as cultural icons and high tolerance for youth violence and crime have popularized anti-social behavior and created high insecurity of self among girls and boys. The “non-gangster” youth segment is highly aware of our time’s priorities, yet not served with proper role models to help them shift From Protest To Projects.

Multiple crisis has closed schools, ears and purses to positive action and FUNdraising, but there is still enough, since multiple crisis has led to sound german progressive decision-makers to start looking for and investing in fresh programs of virtuous spirit, tangible change, meaning and empowerment for self-organization. Estimated potentials for youth leadership: MEDIUM

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FRANCE

A SERIOUS MESS WITH DYNAMIC POTENTIALS

“The country of love? No way,” say french youth stuck in a frustrated population with extremely high social tensions, eroding economy, persistent sexist violence, multi-sided colonial hatred, negative media image, hyper aggressive anti-social youth gangs, epidemic of police suicides, polarized political swings, limiting monarchist elitists structures of authority and rules rules rules in homes, schools and streets created from a feeling of “you cannot trust teenagers”. Even among European gamers it’s said the ones least social and collaborative, totally losing it, insulting people are the french. If youth behave this way in their favorite hobby, it’s become really bad. Extreme need for non-formal youth-led projects with pure focus on the good of lives and land that everybody agrees on. Estimated potentials for youth leadership: MODERATE, SELECTIVELY

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Civic education curriculum. Elementary schools obliged to do projects

Epic sense of arts, creativity, beauty, passion, individual self-determination

Spaces of wild land

Architectural beauty

 

Extreme leftist ideology among activists, now supercharged with gender and post-colonial racism memes that cloud people’s view for being humans loving peace, plants, animals and merry neighborhoods working together on creating a good world free from dysfunctional 1920 wordshells, trenchees and dislikes. 

“Administration will never allow it.”

No student clubs

Mayor assigns school project partners. Only major NGOs and networks eligible.

Crippling administration prohibiting a feeling of sovereignity (only the king is sovereign) sabotaging self-made entrepreneurship, and thereby positive social and economical change. Grossly dysfunctional.

Administration blinded opaque not accessible, you are just a number

polite facede, courteosie, from the royal court where no one loves or trusts anyone and people hide behind masks to avoid hatred to escalate in violent bloodshed. 

 

BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA

THE FASCINATING BALKANS – MISUNDERSTOOD AND SUPER PRECIOUS

“It’s complicated.” Different from negative media portrayal as criminal, chaotic and corrupt, teen and twen fe/male travellers and hitch-hikers feel much safer in Balkan countries than in Berlin, Paris, Marseille or Birmingham. Fabulous sense of #1 priority is being human, no servility, no cultural and religious overidentification and division, feelgood culture – there’s always time for a coffee outside, and you can stay for two hours by law, but no one bothers you if you stay for ten. Great wild nature, rivers and wolves, mind blowing Tito era stories, crazy war stories, amazing humor and sense of celebration. “So many nice people, so how come you say schools and administration are so awful?” – “Because all the bad people go work there.” Twens express frustration over that “no one appreciates when you try to do something special”, corrupt groups in politics (“I wish any group of Western Europeans would run ur government, everything would be better”). Grandiose experience of adventurous Eastern Europe, rich in Rocky Mountains, adventure, stunning yet sharing same values etc. Perfect for summer camps and school collaboration.  Estimated potentials for youth leadership: LOW, SELECTIVELY

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Incredible human warmth, buying a 75 cent coffee grants seating for 2 hours by law, and if you stay for 9 no waiter complains. Teens are welcome to hang out in cafes and restaurants, celebrate their b’day, meet to work on projects for hours, can bring own cookies… no one complains, no one feels disturbed by their presence. 

Protect against micro hydro dams, kicked out Shell. We are already poor, the only thing we have is our water and nature.We won’t let anyone kill that, especially since we’ll never see a dime for it. (train rails inspection 10 million. they found 1 million)

The derby, enemies, but only for a day. In Europe toxic, because it makes their pseudo identity and self value illusion. Not in Sarajevo – no need for illusion, truth is we are good people, self-value.

Positive sentiments towards Austria and Germany, each family has one or more fmembers in Europe, the US, …

Bosnians are well appreciated for their global education and human decency, making them pleasant co-workers and employees.

 

The flipside of content

“no one appreciates when you try to do something special.”

“No one is willing to make an effort. when you do it german way, you can make a business here, no problem.”

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OUR PRIORITY PROGRAMS FOR EUROPE

FROM QUICK CLASSROOM ACTION TO LONG-TERM CAMPAIGNS

MINI-COURSE

FROM PROTEST TO PROJECTS

SDGs IN ACTION

PROJECT PARTNERSHIPS

ISSUE #1

YL MAGAZINE EUROPE

ACTIVATE SCHOOL + CITY

YL COACH IN RESIDENCE

LOCAL CHAPTER

TRAIN AS YL COACH

EXHIBIT + ROADSHOW

PAN-EUROPEAN SCHOOL COOP.

CLIMATE CRISIS RESILIENT REGION

MEET OUR TRAVELLING COACHES

INVITE US INTO TOWN!

SIARAH

travels Germany with horse and goat. She has much to share on exploring inner and outer nature as initiation journey into adulthood, barefoot life, the sacred feminine and life cycles.

ERIC

travels Europe with a rich program to activate regions for Youth Leadership, add them to the YL Map, report solution stories, grow our crew initiate projects with youth, citizens, teachers, cities…

CARINA

hitch-hikes the Balkans and South America, scouts regions and reports on solutions. She embodies trust in people being GOOD, with fun anecdotes, practical knowhow and wisdom to share.

ABBIE

turns her love for nature and eco journalism into hiking Britain’s trails and telling of her adventures, cultural heritage, fears, joys and tricks to Spend More Time In The Wild on her youtube channel.

PHOTO: SIARAH PRÜSS