Summary

Context

The European Union as we know today is the result of seventy years of development and treaties. Although the treaties are translated into all the languages of the 27 members states of the EU, that does not ensure everyone understands the text. They are all written in “legalese”. So how do we ensure that the importance of the European Union is recognized by young people if its texts are far from their reality?

With READY we want to raise EU awareness in young people by making relevant provisions from EU treaties understandable to them. We want to raise literacy competencies in young people, so they can better understand the meaning of these treaties and the importance that they have over their lives.

Objectives

READY aims at raising literacy competencies in young people, who are furthest away from political awareness. This will be achieved by combining a personal approach to the EU through an exploration of the EU in the young person’s everyday lives and through research conducted by the young people themselves on EU treaties. Through this guided and support process of discovering the EU through EU treaties, young people will develop their autonomy to further understand the EU.

The mains and objectives are:

• To ensure that the language of the relevant provisions to young people present on European Union treaties and policies are accessible to them.
• To bring young people closer to understand what the European Union is.
• To trigger the interest of young people so they appropriate the text of EU treaties.
• To promote knowledge of the real impact of the European Union in the daily life of EU citizens.
• To foster a better quality youth work using innovative and creative approaches
• To improve the skills and competencies of youth workers and future youth workers

Impact

We aim at bringing back the connection between youth work and EU treaties, by making their relevant provisions accessible to all. We will also support the further development of the quality of youth work: by making the reach and limits of EU policies to youth in a language that is accessible to them, young people will have an increased sense of citizenship, which allows them to claim the rights that are ensured to them in the paper.

By organizing multiplier events and final conferences in Brussels, which will include young people, we will enhance the promotion and recognition of youth work by policymakers. READY can be seen as a direct contribution to the Bonn process. As the Bonn Process represents the common effort to put the European Youth Work Agenda into action and make it become real, we aim at making it accessible and visible to young people. In READY we will work with both target groups – young people and youth workers – to boost youth work.

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