Building connections for future cooperation: our PBA in Liège
From 11 to 16 September, VIEWS International welcomed organisations from across Europe to Liège for Inclusive, Accessible and Sustainable Youth Work, a Partnership Building Activity focused on creating connections and exploring opportunities for future cooperation.
Some of the organisations already knew each other and had cooperated before; others were meeting for the first time. Having five days together gave us the time to get past the introductions and better understand what each organisation does, what it can bring to a partnership and what it would like to develop next.
Accessibility and inclusion were among the main focal points throughout the week. We exchanged experiences around making international youth activities accessible to everyone, while also looking more broadly at inclusion and meaningful participation in youth projects. For some participants, the week was also an opportunity to become more familiar with visual impairment and with different ways of communicating and cooperating with people with disabilities.
Environmental sustainability was another important part of the programme, looking at the choices involved in planning international youth activities and how environmental considerations can be integrated in practice.
Alongside these discussions, a large part of the PBA was dedicated to finding common interests and looking at where future cooperation could take shape. As the week progressed, we moved from exchanging experiences and getting to know each other’s activities to working on concrete project concepts.
In small groups, participants took initial ideas and developed them into possible future projects, defining their focus, objectives and activities and considering how they could be taken forward after the PBA. This also gave us the chance to move beyond talking about potential cooperation and actually start building something together.
By the end of the week, participants left Liège with new connections, a better understanding of the organisations they had met, and several project ideas that they can choose to develop further together. The PBA ended there, but hopefully some of the connections and ideas that started in Liège will continue beyond it.
