Abused no More
Safeguarding Youth & Empowering Professionals
Background information about the project
The Abused no More (AnM) project is an EU funded 3 year programme that aims to create, support, develop and serve strategic partnerships in the area of youth-led training, educational and awareness raising activities that will allow better integration of marginalised youth particularly those from migrant groups putting an emphasis on gender based abuse and persecution.AnM also aims to improve services that are being provided to young people making them legally literate in order to resolve daily issues.
At present, school education in the law and basic rights that would allow young people to lead their lives equally in modern European societies is almost non-existent. However, research supports that when people are given the basic legal knowledge to deal with everyday situations not only they stand a better chance in society, but also avoid consuming public services unnecessarily (IARS, 2010). The question of what make us legally capable becomes particularly timely in the current financial climate where more and more young people are struggling to cope, and the demand for legal advice is ever increasing. For young people, a legal problem – let that be crime or debt related, domestic violence or employment – will have a bigger impact. Starting out in life presents young people with enormous new challenges. Marginalised youth are even less likely to receive help or want to engage with the system and what is available to the mainstream population.
However, communicating law related information through formal education or training to marginalised youth and those servicing them is not an easy task. International projects (e.g. Street Law, PLENET, Youth Empowerment Project) have shown that to achieve basic legal literacy among the public, including young people, it must be carried out organically and in a user-led fashion. Therefore, in Europe, a gap is identified in the field of training, education and youth that could be filled through the free dissemination of a youth-led programme for service providers and young people with the aim of increasing their legal capability.
Project Partners
The project is supported by Erasmus+ (Key Action 2), and is delivered in partnership with 4 European Partners namely:
IARS International Institute (UK) – Lead partner: is user-led and user-focused charity with a mission to give everyone a chance to forge a safer, fairer and more inclusive society. Over the last 10 years, the Institute has been providing world-class and cutting-edge educational, research, policy and networking services of local, national and international significance. We are focused on empowering the most marginalised communities through direct service delivery, while enabling organisations to achieve, measure and improve their social impact.
Stowarzyszenie Interwencji Prawnej (Poland): SIP was established in 2005 by a group of young activists and lawyers. Since then SIP evolved into a professional non-profit organization with the aim of combating social exclusion through provision of free legal advice to people whose rights and freedoms are threatened or violated and raising legal and civil awareness in the society.
Anziani e Non Solo (Italy): is a NGO working since 2004 in the field of social innovation, with a specific focus on management of project and realization of services and products in the field of welfare and social inclusion. The activities carried out by Anziani e Non Solo concerns: Active ageing, intergenerational activities and support to frail and dependent elderly, training and support to family carers, informal and formal carers, prevention of gender based violence, elder abuse and discrimination, fight against poverty, support to employability and to social inclusion of disadvantaged groups
Romanian U.S. Alumni Association (Romania): The Romanian – U.S Alumni Association is a non-governmental organization founded in 2013 by former grantees of U.S. funded programmes, including the Fulbright Programme, Hubert H. Humphrey and Marshall Memorial Fellowships, International Visitor Leadership Programme etc. The association aims to support young people, young researchers and those at the early stages of their career while it also brings together over 50 international scholars and practitioners from a wide range of academic fields and areas of professional expertise, including social sciences, law, international relations, economics, culture, medicine, journalism etc.
The Project
The Abused no More (AnM) project will help to bridge this gap by focusing on increasing legal capacity in the areas of gender-based discrimination, exclusion and abuse against some of the most marginalised youth groups and in particular those who tend to be disadvantaged due to their gender and cultural differences (e.g. immigrants, refugees, descendants from immigrant families) and other social obstacles e.g. sexual orientation and ethnicity.
Inspired and motivated by the priorities of the EU Youth Strategy, the AnM project will bring together young people and professionals to establish a cross-sector, transnational Strategic Partnership in order to design and implement innovative practices and come up with a set of reference documents (online & in print) that will: (a) empower marginalised youth (b) increase the capacity of service providers, notably in the areas of integration, equity and inclusion, gender-based abuse and discrimination.
Focusing on the Europe 2020 Strategy, AnM aims to foster, migrant integration, social equity and inclusion through a two-tier approach i.e. by empowering and involving directly marginalised youth in its delivery, while at the same time increasing the capacity of organisations servicing them. In line with the provisions of the Lisbon Treaty to “encourage the participation of young people in democratic life in Europe”, through non-formal learning activities and the development of an evidence-based training programme, AnM will promote innovation, exchange of experience and know-how between different types of organisations providing services to youth with fewer opportunities.
AnM will be carried out in key EU locations (UK, Poland, Italy, Romania and Cyprus), building on the learning of partners’ projects. It will:
1. Map and analyse key concepts in the areas of marginalised young people’ legal literacy, focusing on gender-based discrimination and exclusion
2. Identify relevant innovative educational and training practices in the participating countries and produce a free report
3. Organise seminars with partners to exchange learning and to perform cross-training activities
4. Design a free, user-led, face-to-face training package and pilot them in the participating countries
5. Involve young people directly in the design and piloting of the programme engaging at least 20 young volunteers in each country
6. Design and deliver an elearning course reaching at least 1000 organisations and individuals across Europe
7. Set up and facilitate a wider network (database) in order to disseminate its practical results, exchange further best practices and ideas and ensure multiple effect and sustainability.
8. Publish a book (online and in print) bringing together its 3 year learning and practical results, launch it at an international conference and disseminate internationally.
The project will not only help the employability and social inclusion of the young people directly involved, but also bring positive and long-lasting effects on the participating organisations. Moreover, through the transfer and implementation at national and European levels of its innovative practices and training programme we expect to help bring about EU-wide institutional and cultural change, improve services provided to marginalised youth experiencing exclusion and discrimination, while fostering social equity and inclusion.
