HEY (Human Rights Education for Youth) is a new programme by the North-South Centre of the Council of Europe. Its goal is to strengthen young people’s capacities to act for human rights, by raising their knowledge and understanding of European standards and other international legal frameworks for human rights protection (such as specific United Nations, League of Arab States and African Union treaties, conventions, protocols and charters)

HEY is a series of online tutored courses, building on the HELP (Human Rights Education for Legal Professionals) programme, which has been successfully training legal professionals on topics related to human rights and Rule of Law for over 20 years in Europe and beyond. Selected HELP courses are adapted to a young audience, with new approaches and interactive pedagogy, based on the NSC expertise on global education and experience in youth cooperation. The programme includes a dedicated training process for tutors, ensuring a cascading of national courses, translated, and adapted to regional and national realities.

HEY is a unique offer that establishes the needed synergies between the expertise of the Council of Europe, based on its conventions and standards and:

• The NSC’s experience with young people and its unique position, within the Council of Europe, as North-South platform for dialogue and promotion of the universal values of human rights, the rule of law and democracy beyond the European continent. The NSC has developed expertise in Global Education based on non-formal education to build the capacities of young people in different parts of the world. Over the years, it has established a solid network of youth organisations active in Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. The non-formal education activities carried out by the NSC, through initiatives such as the Mediterranean and African Youth Universities, and more recently the Rule of Law Youth Network (RoLYN), support the promotion of the universal values and principles of human rights, the rule of law and democracy
• The proven and successful HELP methodology that for over 20 years has built the capacity of judges, lawyers, and prosecutors, in all 46 Council of Europe member States and beyond, to apply the European human rights standards in their daily work. This is done through the HELP online courses that cover a wide range of human rights topics. The HELP Programme has already produced meaningful results, notably in the Southern Mediterranean region, with more than 3700 users of the online platform, 18 courses available in Arabic and about 190 tutors. The HEY project will build on those accomplishments in the region.
• The long and successful history of Council of Europe of building capacity of young people and organised civil society on human rights in its member states, notably through the work of the Youth Sector, particularly through the Human Rights Education Youth Programme, with renowned tools such as Compass.

HEY aims to achieve the following objectives:

• To empower young people with knowledge and skills to promote human rights and rule of law: accessible, youth-oriented online courses, in line with European and other international legal standards and frameworks for human rights
• To strengthen youth civil society: to promote youth leadership and develop young people’s ability to actively contribute to their communities and support others
• To increase collaboration: between young people within and across regions, and between youth and legal practitioners, promoting exchanges in issues related to human rights and rule of law.