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European Friends for Green Trends
European Friends for Green Trends
Start date: Jan 1, 2015,
End date: Apr 30, 2016
PROJECT
FINISHED
European Friends for Green Trends was a long-term EVS project centered on the theme of environment protection and sustainable development. The project was held in Opatija and included two volunteers coming from two different European countries (Poland and Spain), who were together doing their 12-month voluntary service.
The objective of the project was changing people’s way of thinking and acting in more green way by young people’s active participation and their involvement in community by volunteering and by doing so improving their quality of life. Impacting society but also adopting practical skills and competences especially in the area of promotion, PR, event and NGO management, graphic design and IT through non-formal learning process that consists of individual and group work, learning by practice, practical workshops, discussions and exchange of experience. Taking part in the national green campaigns – Zelena and Plava čistka as a part of the global Let’s do it! campaign, contributing to Ecological centre Opatija (organising eco fairs, celebrating relevant ecological dates, holding workshops with children), giving presentations in schools about ecology and EVS programme, talking to stakeholders or empowering children, creating promotional materials, making videos and taking photos, creating and implementing new projects or improve the on going, the volunteers participated, moulded, contributed and lead society to adopt greener and more sustainable lifestyle. The knowledge gained and skills adopted the volunteers used in the realisation of their personal projects: Spanish lessons for the children during the summer activities in the Children Association Opatija with the emphasis on environmental protection as well as the audio-visual exhibition "Croatia in the eyes of EVS volunteers" in the gallery in Rijeka showing the volunteering activities, natural beauties of Croatia discovered during the volunteers' travels as well as the local food.
All target groups (pupils in schools, youth in local community and other citizens) had the opportunity to meet, socialise and learn from young volunteers coming from different backgrounds (education, nationality, culture), exchange experiences and gain new knowledge and skills through interaction within various workshops, events and other activities implemented during the voluntary project.
The participants of the project lived and worked together. They had an opportunity to learn about the each other's culture and exchange attitudes and experiences. They have also discovered the Croatian culture through participating in the various events and joining local folklore group. This directly led to a more acute awareness of other cultures, tolerance and better understanding of diversity and indirectly help to prevent prejudice, racism and exclusion.
The project results were also visible in the promotional materials (leaflets, logos, videos, photos, banners) designed and created by the volunteers which will be used in the future activities of Zmergo and that contributed to the projects where Zmergo is a partner.
The project impact was also felt among youngsters in Croatia through intensive promotion of European Voluntary Service and Erasmus+ Programme in the form of presentations, promotional photos, writing articles about EVS experiences for media and Zmergo's website as well as participating in the events organised by other NGO's. Finally the project results were shared with people from Poland and Spain through personal blog posts of volunteers in the own languages as well as writing articles in English for the created by the volunteers eZine Fermaj, which is still managed by them and so that contributing to long-term benefits of the project.