DiscoverTalent

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Volontariato Torino (Vol.To ETS)

Organisation:

Volontariato Torino (Vol.To ETS)

Country:

Italy

About organisation:

Volontariato Torino (Vol.To ETS) is the Volunteer Support Centre of Turin, a non-profit organisation with 144 member organisations and a network of more than 1,300 associations, to which it provides services according to the Italian Third Sector Law. Vol.To is one of the five biggest Volunteer Support Centres in Italy. The organisation's mission is to qualify and support volunteers in order to enable them to seize opportunities and take individual paths of development. For this purpose, it develops projects to build tailor-made learning paths on the needs of volunteers. Since 2016, Vol.To is also the official Eurodesk Local Point or Multiplier of Turin. Vol.To works to provide free services (such as training, consultancy, planning, communication etc.) to assist associations. Vol.To’s vision is a future in which the distinctive features of volunteering will be a guide for individual and collective challenges.

Title of the project

DiscoverTalent

Start date:

5/11/2021

End date:

22/3/2022

Objectives:

This project was promoted by the students of the SAA-School of Management of Turin for the development of youth transversal skills that aimed to reduce the gap between the school and the world of work. Vol.To collaborated with 15 students of the Curie Vittorini High School, who were involved in the activities of the Eurodesk Local Point so that they could actively experiment themselves in professional contexts and increase their knowledge about European issues and opportunities for young people. Students were invited to create an awareness campaign to be used on the social media channels of the Eurodesk Multiplier of Turin. Participants created their project, structuring an awareness-raising campaign on "Violence in Europe" divided into three categories: gender violence, violence about one’s sexuality and racial violence. For each category, students created videos and posts in Italian which were translated in English and French too and which were also able to reflect the identity brand of the Instagram page of the Eurodesk Local Point. This was realised starting from the EU priorities related to inclusion and the fight against discrimination (also related to the sustainable development goals of the 2030 Agenda). The campaign attracted the attention of users, as demonstrated by an increase in the number of followers on Facebook and Instagram pages of the Eurodesk Local Point in Turin.

Why the project was: empowering young people, adapting to changing realities, or thinking out of the box:

The project was entirely realised by young people (young workers and university students) for young people (high school students), therefore a true youth-led project. Participants structured the whole program from the beginning, without the intermediation of adults. This opportunity led students to experience a work environment and, on the basis of the feedback received during the meetings, improve their information-seeking skills, communication with the work team and respect for deadlines, in order to gradually gain greater levels of confidence. The creation of the campaign allowed students to analyse social issues with the aim of increasing their sensitivity to these topics and using a peer-to-peer approach. Moreover, thanks to the local Eurodesk social media channels, the campaign has managed to connect and engage more people by expanding students’ messages and their insights. As information providers, these students took care of the pan-European and international dimension, thanks to the translation of posts in several languages and to the choice of key objectives related to the SDGs of the UN 2030 agenda (in particular no. 5 “Gender Equality” and no. 10 “Reduced inequalities”). Students had the opportunity to collaborate in a different reality from school (so more similar with a working team), in the perspective of becoming active citizens. For these reasons, it can be affirmed that the project has empowered all young people who have been involved in it.

How the project was inclusive:

This project allowed sharing of multimedia content and posts on the Instagram and Facebook channels of Eurodesk Local Point in Turin (respectively “https://www.facebook.com/EurodeskTorinoVolTo” and “https://www.instagram.com/eurodesk_torino_vol.to/”). The style of the posts has been able to reflect the identity brand of Eurodesk’s social media profiles and, thanks to the multilingualism, the published posts reached more people and more nationalities.The subject of the project “DiscoverTalent" is one of the EU key themes for the septennate 2021-2027. The students have analysed which European measures have been adopted to fight gender inequality, with the promotion of the female role in decision-making. For this reason, the young participants structured the awareness campaign also addressing the topic of violence in Europe. In particular, they analysed the phenomena of gender-based violence (starting with the rights acquired by women over the centuries), violence regarding own sexuality (sexuality and rights in Europe, the theme of “coming out”, the Italian “DDL Zan Law”, about the measures to prevent and combat discrimination) and violence connected to ethnicity (racism and xenophobia). These topics attracted a lot of attention and ensured visibility not only to the social media channels of the Eurodesk Local Point in Turin, but of the whole Eurodesk network, especially among young people who were attracted by the catchy mode in which the messages were posted.

Green aspect:

The project was made up of four meetings, half of which were organised online: this has allowed not to organise too many journeys and has facilitated the participation of all those involved, even remotely. This type of project management was inspired by the remote cooperation methods that Eurodesk also uses extensively for its transnational networking work. The idea of creating an awareness campaign on discrimination in Europe by analysing three distinct categories, i.e. gender, ethnicity and sexuality, made it possible to establish a certain type of mental openness among students. These topics and the modalities of their discussion made it possible to broaden the students' vision also on the environmental theme and on the importance of the challenge against climate change. Thus, although this project does not link directly to European green policies, it develops thoughts of inclusiveness and equal opportunities that cannot be separated from the health of places and the need to preserve the natural environment. Raising awareness against violence also means raising awareness against human violence to the environment. Violence often turns out to be an expression of social hardship that often comes from poverty, which has increased in recent decades in Europe and around the world, partly as a consequence of the ever-raising socio-economic as well as climate emergencies caused by global warming.

How the project has given a European dimension to your event and ensured the visibility and promotion of Eurodesk?

This project allowed sharing of multimedia content and posts on the Instagram and Facebook channels of Eurodesk Local Point in Turin (respectively “https://www.facebook.com/EurodeskTorinoVolTo” and “https://www.instagram.com/eurodesk_torino_vol.to/”). The style of the posts has been able to reflect the identity brand of Eurodesk’s social media profiles and, thanks to the multilingualism, the published posts reached more people and more nationalities.The subject of the project “DiscoverTalent" is one of the EU key themes for the septennate 2021-2027. The students have analysed which European measures have been adopted to fight gender inequality, with the promotion of the female role in decision-making. For this reason, the young participants structured the awareness campaign also addressing the topic of violence in Europe. In particular, they analysed the phenomena of gender-based violence (starting with the rights acquired by women over the centuries), violence regarding own sexuality (sexuality and rights in Europe, the theme of “coming out”, the Italian “DDL Zan Law”, about the measures to prevent and combat discrimination) and violence connected to ethnicity (racism and xenophobia). These topics attracted a lot of attention and ensured visibility not only to the social media channels of the Eurodesk Local Point in Turin, but of the whole Eurodesk network, especially among young people who were attracted by the catchy mode in which the messages were posted.

Impact:

The project achieved an increase of about 60% in views on the Facebook page and on Instagram profile (counting together 1,500 followers) of the Eurodesk Local Point in Turin: overall 19 posts were published in March 2022, each of them accompanied by impactful images and videos and then re-posted on the SAA-School of Management Facebook and Instagram profiles (counting together more than 9,000 followers): all the pictures and videos can be found at https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/18htsrjdF3qtufwfJghWnRL2Nq5KoMpGk?usp=sharing. 3 young Eurodesk operators from Vol.To, 1 young tutor from SAA and 15 students from Curie Vittorini High School (aged 17-18 y.o.) took part in the initiative. The attractive communication strategies of these posts allowed Vol.To and SAA to gain even more visibility about their social campaigns and about the opportunities offered by both organisations. Moreover, sharing these social issues has increased the degree of sensitivity on such topics, which can be considered one of the most important impact factors of “DiscoverTalent”. Expanding the target audience of the Eurodesk Local Point in Turin, also in terms of more requests for consultations, has had another tangible impact: more young people, attracted by the campaign, later chose to find out more about Eurodesk and about mobility opportunities abroad. Finally, all the involved students had the opportunity to develop their soft skills and to make an important experience of teamwork.