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SpunOut.ie Blog
Youth Day 2008
Blog: Ireland's flagship event in the run up to European Youth Week, Youth Day, was an unqualified success.
SpunOut.ie Youth Boarder, Paddy Duffy, reports on the hoopla of Youth Day 2008:
Imagining the future: mad capoeira skills, workshops on everything from volunteering abroad to composing songs and making comics, and about 300 young people from all over the country: Ireland's flagship event in the run up to European Youth Week (EYW), Youth Day, was an unqualified success.
The central theme of the day, organised by Ireland's national agency Leargas, focused around the global village and specifically the town square where most of the action happened.
Over the course of the day the town square consistently regenerated, from ye olde medieval times through to the present day and way on into the future. But besides, there was the graffiti city, where young people got to get their message across through the medium of spray paint; the photo booth, where groups were pictured with posters they made on things that would make their future better; an online Eurodesk consultation where young people could have their say on the way Europe involves them in decision making processes, and a host of youth groups presenting their respective projects at stalls. And that's not even including the workshops!
Everybody on the day had the choice to do two workshops, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, and the choice ranged from drumming and drama to volunteering and wall climbing. One group put together a time capsule of all the things they considered important to say about the present, and what we want to tell future generations about ourselves, while another were given the task of composing a song that represents their experiences as young people, including musical accompaniment and lyrics derived from both classic pop songs and their own heads, within about half an hour. Though seemingly impossible, the groups handled their task with aplomb. They were in tune and all.
A special word has to go to the capoeira workshop too. For the uninitiated, capoeira is a Brazilian martial art and it is awesome. Unsurprising then, that their workshop was plenty popular amongst the participants and their demonstrations of back flips, high kicks and general agility were awe inspiring. The professional instructors weren't bad either.
There was also the now fabled Criss Cross Group (you have to do a Zorro type motion with your hands when you say that, by the way) who did roving consultations based on three issues: youth participation, image and suicide. The Criss Cross Group is, as you might suspect, an amalgam of different youth groups across the country who came together to do team building residentials and the group from which Ireland's delegates to Brussels in November have been chosen, and they'd a unique way of carrying out their consultation. They split into groups with different coloured hats: for example, black hats asked questions about the negative elements of the issues raised, yellow was positive, blue co-ordinated the answers and so-forth. As a result, their findings were as comprehensive as they were interesting and insightful.
After everybody showed off what they learned in their workshops there came the final proclamations. “The Proclaimers” was a workshop where the young people involved set out their visions of Europe and presented them as punchy one-liners, bellowed out in the style of a ye olde town cryer.
To wrap up the day, yours truly read out the final proclamation after which I presented it to one of my fellow future delegates in Brussels, Adam from Bray Youth Service, whilst being carried out in a King Chair wearing a robe. This actually happened.
By: Paddy Duffy
Learn more about European Youth Week.
