First seminar of Team Up Youth started!

5 people from Germany, 2 from Denmark, 2 from UK and 9 from Macedonia came on the 10th of September 2015 to Sruga (Macedonia) to talk about media and education. During the 8 days they will share their knowledge and experiences to develop ideas for teaching through media. The seminar will finish with the conference on the 17th of September in Skopje.

First day of the training was really exciting. Participants got to know each other and the leaders explained what will happen over the course of the week. Everyone took part in icebreakers and all the participants were looking forward what the next week will bring.

Presentations and discussions were the main point of the second day of the seminar. Participants shared knowledge about their national school systems with the other groups. It was extremely interesting to compare the German and English education systems. Additionally, many examples were given of transitions from school to work from the Macedonian system, which is still struggling with some issues. One of the Macedonian speakers Sanja Stojceva admitted: “If I would make this presentation 5 years ago, I would just say that there is no transition between the school and working market. Now, I can say more, but still not enough”.

Something unique was to listen about the UCAS system from UK. It appears that to get a place at the University not only depends on your final school exams but also if you can accrue enough UCAS points from post-compulsory education providers. One of those providers is SHIFT – the partner of Team Up Youth project.

Participants of the seminar could also get to know the practical examples of the other organizations. Workers of Burgerhaus Bennohaus from Germany explained some of their projects – for example “Medienpass”. “One of the examples of the different types of media we showed to the pupils from the partner schools was ‘How advertisement works’.  It is very important was to teach them the critical way of thinking. In the end they needed to create their own product. The project was a realized in the frame of economy classes”.

There are many examples of the ways to practice your future job in Germany but what about Macedonia? Participants of the Team Up Youth heard today that internship possibilities in this country are not sufficient. The way to the success for most of the young Macedonians is volunteering.

Many stories, many countries and sharing good examples are the key words for summing up the first few days of the workshops.  As one of the Danish specialists said: “It is all about rethinking”.

Project is organised by AKO Burgerhaus Bennohaus with the partners from Macedonia - Volunteers Center Skopje, Denmark - Burt and UK - SHIFT

The project is sponsored by Erasmus +

Daria Jaranowska

Photos taken by Jacopo Landi