The training aimed to develop participant’s competences to train and support participation of young people in decision making process on different levels concerning life of young people and to establish cooperation between young people and public authorities working in the field of youth. The course was based on the principles of Human Rights education and education for democratic citizenship with the main focus on promotion of the idea of youth participation and democratic citizenship in youth policy and youth work.

28 representatives of local and regional authorities working in the youth field and youth organisations took part in the training course. The participants had a chance to discuss the activities of the Council of Europe in Ukraine with Ms. Lytvynenko, Deputy Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine, and recent developments in youth policy and a new Law “On Youth” with Mr. Yuzych, expert of the Reanimation Reforms Package, coordinator of the working group for the Law “On Youth”.

Mr Yarema, Deputy Minister of Youth and Sport of Ukraine also joined the training to present the “Roadmap for youth policy reforms” and to discuss initiatives of the Ukrainian government in reforming youth policy in Ukraine.

As the result of the five days training course, the participants developed their understanding of the key issues as human rights and democratic citizenship, social inclusion and non-discrimination, youth participation and cross sectoral youth policy. They have learned about recommendations for reforming youth policy in Ukraine, expressed by the international team of experts in the Youth policy review, opportunities to join and take actions within No Hate Speech Movement campaign, ways to improve their competences as youth workers and youth leaders descrined in the Council of Europe Youth Work Portfolio and principles of development of evidence based youth work and youth policy.

Participants have developed several follow-up initiatives and projects aimed at empowering young people for participation in their communities:

• Setting up and/or improving the functioning of youth consultative bodies at district and regional state administrations in Vinnytsa, Lviv, Luhansk, Kherson and Ternopil regions. These bodies should be grounded on the principles of democracy and respect for Human Rights and shift the state youth policy to be based on needs and interests of young people and agreed with young people.
• Establishing and further development of the work of youth clubs/youth centres in Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkiv, Kirovihrad, Odesa and Ivano-Frankivsk regions aimed to support youth initiatives and develop competences of young people to be active citizens of their communities.
• Initiating of youth exchanges between different regions of Ukraine with the purpose of developing dialogue and rising awareness about existing stereotypes between representatives of different cultures. The pilot project is planned for implementation between Sumy, Volyn and Chernihiv region with the potential involvement of Dnipropetrovsk, Vinnytsa, Kharkiv, Vinnytsa and Zaporizhe regions.
• Initiating youth campaign in Vinnytsa and Rivne regions within No Hate Speech Movement Campaign including educational activities involving secondary school students and students of higher educational establishments.
• Organising educational and analytical activities with the purpose to involve young people into local youth policy development and implementation in cities Dnipro, Kryvyi Rih, Melitopol, Zaporizzha, Kharkiv and Chernihiv.