Augustine John -Global Developments Strategy

The Exchange programme enabled me to identify and explore the commonalities and challenges involved in working with young people in different country settings. The Host accommodation was conducive to self-analysis and the interactive exploration of various training approaches to facilitate young people’s personal development and experiential learning. The interactive learning with staff and volunteers of Kids & Co was very productive and instructive to experience how Kids & Co work with young people in helping them develop their leadership skills. Some of the most important experiences and knowledge gained were the comparative approaches (theoretical and practice based) to intervention in respect to common challenges facing young people and, how difficult it is to motivate young people who are ‘defeated’ by unemployment, low aspirations and lack of opportunities. If there was any further suggestions to complement what Embrace and its partner organisation do, could be an establishment of clear outlines of what the running order and intended learning outcomes would be for each programme. As well as a virtual network where people could share thinking, raise issues, and work together on building new paradigms and new approaches of intervention with young people.