Workshops with young people in France
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Gender equality in the labor market
Climate change
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European citizenship
Gathered for an afternoon, the young people were first able to familiarize themselves with the storytelling and graphic facilitation method. To help them understand the power of both narrative and image, the facilitator first showed them examples of posters and videos of communication/awareness-raising campaigns produced by others. The young people then discussed which ones they thought were the most powerful and impactful; the debriefing was completed by the facilitator presenting the key elements of an awareness-raising campaign. The young people were then able to act!
The first objective we wanted to achieve was to make young people understand that, as European citizens, we can become aware of the challenges of our European societies, for today and for tomorrow. To help them to identify specific issues, the facilitator gave them photos and discussion sheets. In sub-groups, the young people observed and interpreted the photos; each group chose the issue that was most important to them. What came out of this was:
Especially in terms of the catastrophic effects on biodiversity and the need to change our capitalist/consumerist system.
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Particularly in terms of wage differences (women generally receive 15,5% less than men).
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Which prevents citizens from participating in the European democratic process.
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To think about solutions or changes to be suggested both for citizens' lifestyles and for policies, the young people wanted to document each of the problems identified. Each sub-group was able to do this with the help of information sheets that had been prepared in advance by the facilitator – these documents allowed them to discover the European policies (and therefore some of the solutions) that were already in place to combat the challenges.
The young people also carried out online research and, using a question cloud, they discussed and debated possible new solutions at different scales and involving different types of actors. In this way, each group focused on one message, one idea on which they wanted to build their awareness campaign.