Dates: 21st November – 1 st December 2017

Venue: Taevaskoja, Estonia

Organizer NGO: Noorte Ettevõtlikkuse Arendamise Ühing

Project information

What is the reason that so many people suffer from depression? One of the reasons may be that people are not satisfied with what they are doing on a daily basis and are stressed because they have to take daily decisions that affect their lives.

The idea of “if you yourself do not believe in yourself, you will not believe in someone” gave us the motivation to write this youth exchange project. After secondary school leavers to feel a great pressure of society – in the coming months to make the decision as to who we become and what we will do in the future. This is very scary, because in reality we do not know if we make the right decision. We suffer from little bit lack of self-confidence because of our decision may not seem right for our parents or friends. Ultimately, however, we are just on our own, those who have to make that choice and responsibility. We want to find the courage and confidence to take responsibility for our own decisions and behavior in the future. Society expects us to do something, but we can not rely on the public, we want to act in accordance with our own interests and wishes, because if we don’t do that, then we too will fall into depression circle. Because it is a serious disease and affects many people in our society, then we want to make the effort that our generation would be healthier.

Aims

Youth exchange project’s objectives:

1) To increase young people skills to deal with daily life challenges;

2) Develop youngsters’ capacity to express their real ideas in an honest way;

3) Support youngsters’ ability to work in an international group (the development of tolerance);

4) develop youngsters’ skills in order to analyze their actions and their behavior in various situations (gives us the opportunity for self-improvement);

5) to support young people on their way to discovering their strengths and weaknesses (to help us understand what options we have in life);

6) Develop international cooperation.

This exchange of experience helped us to understand how people feel and how we can grow together, European citizens can be healthier.

In this youth exchange project, there were 27 participants from five countries (Estonia, Turkey, Italy, Romania and Poland). Main target group were youngsters who have recently graduated from high school, university, long-term international experience, long-term job experience etc. and who want to discover how to maintain self-motivation.

Project “Step Up – Believe in Yourself” is funded from Erasmus+ Estonian National Agency. Project is organized by Noorte Ettevõtlikkuse Arendamise Ühing (Youth Entrepreneurship Development Association) which is a non-profit organization established in early 2014, aimed at the youth entrepreneurship development and support of the after school and work activities (including international youth projects).