Natasha’s story from the Training Course “Youth work in Green entrepreneurs”
By Natasha Darkov In the period May 1-7 in Struga, Macedonia, the SEGA Coalition of Youth Organizations within the Erasmus + program conducted the international training course “Youth work in Green entrepreneurs” which included youth workers from Macedonia, Slovakia and Turkey. I am happy that I participated as a representative of the YMCA and gained new knowledge and competencies in the field of green entrepreneurship. Considering the small number of participants, we had a chance for a larger discussion and the opportunity to receive better mentoring support from the organizers. The topic was elaborated in detail with basic information about entrepreneurship and of course green business ideas and their development. Each participant had to develop a detailed business plan for their idea with a special emphasis on green entrepreneurship. The training course was based on an innovative approach to green entrepreneurship as a sustainable business model by preserving the environment and raising youth employability. Starting from the basics of entrepreneurship (definitions, skills and competencies) through the basic factors for a successful business (clear goals, business idea, organization, marketing, SWOT analysis) we quickly reached the stage of planning our green business while taking into account our environment (family, friends, acquaintances, institutions, banks) who and how could help us. Green business ideas were analyzed and evaluated if they are profitable, innovative, realistic, etc. Next came the stage of developing a marketing plan for our ideas after which we finalized them by creating a financial plan for the business ideas. On the last day with concepts developed in this way, we presented green ideas and solutions in an interesting and interactive way which was followed by the selection of the best business idea.
Capacity Building Project with “Signs of Hope”
During our YMCA existence we have faced and overcome many challenges, but nothing close to the last three years which caused serious damage to our work in general, management of the organization and the program model. But here we are, back on our feet and ready to invest on improvement of our structure and method of work. We are happy to announce of our newly established partnership with Signs of Hope of CVJM committing to work on improvement in two areas of our work during 2023: governance and methodology of youth work. Governance improving within non-profit organizations is of paramount importance. Robust governance practices provide the foundation upon which the entire organization stands. It ensures transparency, accountability, and ethical conduct, which are essential in garnering trust among stakeholders, including donors, volunteers, and the communities we serve. It’s not a dry, monotone concept but an energizing force that propels your mission forward, making it resonate with your passionate community and potential partners who believe in social responsibility and philanthropy. We aim to improve our governance structure, our constitution, our policies and set a baseline to get ready for new partnerships development in the coming period. Peer-to-peer education plays a pivotal role in empowering youth and fostering community development, a mission that aligns seamlessly with our dedication at the YMCA and youth work. The dynamic exchange of ideas among youth not only cultivates a sense of ownership and responsibility among the young people but also encourages them actively to engage with their peers. In a formal context, this method of education can be a powerful tool for building leadership skills and instilling a sense of civic duty. When youth learn from their peers, they can connect on a deeper level, as they often share similar life experiences, challenges, and aspirations. That is why we will deep dive and explore this model in the coming period in order to find the best positive practices we can use. Stay with us via our communication channels and expect some exciting news by the end of this year.
Digital education with HP LIFE courses in Bitola!
Opportunities for digital education in Bitola As part of a long-term collaboration between YMCA and HP, this April we started holding digital literacy courses for the youth of our city. The courses are made by experts in their fields from the HP company and conducted by YMCA youth workers. We find these courses useful for adding value to the informatics curriculum in schools as well as for practical use in our everyday lives. The courses are short in duration from 20 to 50 minutes, in five topics with several courses in each of them. The courses offered are in the following topics: communications, finance, logistics, marketing and startups/innovations. The courses have open appointments for which ANYONE CAN APPLY, as well as reserved appointments offered for groups/institutions that work with young people. The groups are limited to 10 participants each. The courses are: completely free for anyone with a functional email, intermediate knowledge of the English language and a desire to learn and upgrade their knowledge. The courses are held in the premises of the Youth Center – Bitola. Digital Hubs in the Western Balkans Building on that success from 2022, this year YMCA World and HP are expanding the initiative to reach as many people as possible and further close the digital divide. In that direction, in 2023 the program expanded with the digital hubs of the Western Balkans at the initiative of the YMCA and enabled by HP helping the YMCAs in Kosovo, Albania, Serbia and Macedonia to expand existing or create new hubs for digital education in order to enable young people, including those from marginalized communities, teachers and youth workers to gain greater educational and employment opportunities. The initiative in the Western Balkans aims to reach 25,000 people per year by bridging the digital divide and providing equal access to digital tools and resources. For this purpose, YMCA will work and collaborate with young people, schools, employment centres, businesses, youth workers and teachers to create digital equality in the Western Balkans region. YMCA in Kosovo aims to improve its reputation as a digital provider and engage young people in recognized courses that enhance their CVs. In Serbia, the focus is to make a digital hub available every day and to achieve digital equality. In Macedonia, the goal is to initiate a long-term program for digital education. In Albania, the plan is to provide easy access to the digital hub for primary and secondary schools and other categories of people. Beginning of the successful collaboration of the World YMCA with HP In 2022 the World YMCA and the HP Foundation launched a partnership to accelerate the digital equality of young people and marginalized communities around the world. Seven YMCA associations have integrated HP LIFE courses into their programs to improve digital literacy and encourage young people in their communities to actively participate in an increasingly digitized world. HP LIFE is a program of the HP company that works to achieve the goals of reaching 150 million people by 2030 and expanding the program to 50 countries (the YMCA has a presence in 120 countries). HP LIFE digital skills training courses in 2022 involved more than 1,300 students mainly aged 15 to 26. YMCA World’s Vision 2030 strategy also includes digital equality as it fosters education, employment and entrepreneurship in communities around the world. HP’s continued global collaboration with the YMCA can reach young people in the communities where they live today by giving them access to practical business and IT skills that can help them thrive.
Monitoring: Bitola – Cycling City
Within the framework of the community mobilizers program, YMCA with the project “Bitola – Cycling City” is monitoring the fulfilment of the given pre-election promise for the realization of bicycle infrastructure in Bitola. The monitoring of the election promises of the political parties and the mobilization of the community to demand accountability and fulfil the promises is part of the project to support electoral reforms. The YMCA is involved in this project with activities that include observing the election promise for the construction of bicycle paths and infrastructure in Bitola. Within the framework of the activities, research of official announcements and documents, meetings with several stakeholders, survey research and an info session is foreseen. This initiative will monitor the election promise for the reconstruction and construction of new pedestrian and bicycle paths. Pedestrian and bicycle paths are extremely important for a municipality such as Bitola. There are a large number of people who want to recreate or walk around the city every day, but a large number of them also use bicycles or walk to reach a certain destination (work, school, etc.). By enabling special pedestrian and bicycle zones throughout the city, Bitola residents will gain many health and environmental benefits. The obtained results of the monitoring will be shared with the public through: posts on social networks, press releases and info sessions. These activities are carried out in collaboration with Strategic Management Systems (SMS) and aim to increase community engagement on issues relevant to them. “Supporting Electoral Reforms” is a project of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), implemented by the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES). The list of all innovative initiatives within this project for 2022 and 2023 can be found here.
Stop the Discrimination of People with Disabilities
In partnership with Poraka Nova we have started a 7 months long campaign (from February until August 2023) against discrimination of people with disabilities. This project is focused on raising awareness about this discrimination (the existence, recognition and prevention of discrimination) in schools among pupils and the school’s professional services, as well as promoting the legal procedures in case of reporting discrimination to authorities. The legal procedures are made available and promoted through The Commission on Prevention and Protection against Discrimination (CPPD). The goal of the project “Stop discrimination against persons with disabilities” is to raise awareness of the existence of discrimination against persons with disabilities in all spheres of life in our society, as well as to point out to specific groups of people in Bitola the existence of legal regulations that help to sanction, prevent and reduce it in the future. Those groups of people are students in secondary and primary education, educational assistants and professional services in schools. This program will bring much-needed awareness against discrimination to school pupils through peer-to-peer education as a methodology. This project fits into our strategic priorities to work with youth on non-formal educational programs and focus on peer-to-peer methods. The topic fully aligns with our mission and the values we promote. In this project, we will work with youth and with school professionals working with these vulnerable categories of young people. Raising awareness of non-discrimination towards persons with disabilities includes: This is a project supported through small grants from the anti-discrimination program of the Macedonian Center for International Cooperation – MCMS, financed by the European Union, and implemented by Poraka Nova and YMCA as partners. Follow our Facebook page for updates on the project activities!
Participation in the Community Service Fair
On December 7th, from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., this year’s Fair for Volunteerism was held in the Foyer of the Culture Center – Bitola. It featured 11 non-governmental organizations from Bitola and the region, as well as the work of local volunteer clubs, which presented their volunteer opportunities and shared their success stories and projects. Among the 11 organizations that took part in the Fair was YMCA Bitola. This was a great opportunity to connect volunteering opportunity providers and high school students in the city. The fair is the sixth such fair in a row, which is organized by the American Corner in Bitola and is primarily intended for high school students, students, and young professionals. The other organizations that took part were Sefra International, MKC Bitola, Together Macedonia, Interact, Lions International, Sumnal Bitola, CEDI, Zlatno Pero, and the Center for Culture from Bitola.
Local Volunteer Awards
The Council for Volunteering of the Municipality of Bitola awarded the local awards for volunteer/volunteer action for 2022. This award is given on the occasion of December 5 – the International Day of Volunteers and the purpose of its award is to encourage and promote volunteering in Bitola, to increase the visibility of volunteers and positive volunteering practices, and to inspire further promotion and development of volunteering at a local level. YMCA Bitola is part of the Local Council for Volunteering (LCV) of the Municipality of Bitola, which has its representative in this Council. The winners of the award this year were Ferzije Asanovska, Valentina Sokolovska, and Marija Boškovska, awarded as volunteers for 2022, then the “Association for protection from multiple aspects – VIKTORI” from Bitola, awarded as an organizer for volunteer work for 2022 and Natasha Darkov – volunteer coordinator for 2022. The prizes were awarded by the mayor of the municipality of Bitola, Toni Konjanovski, who thanked the awardees for their actions so far, wishing for many more successful volunteer activities in the next period, for which the municipality is always ready to provide the necessary support. The event took place on the premises of Mladi Hub in Bitola.
Local Volunteering Strategy for 2023-2026
The activities of the Local Volunteer Council of the Municipality of Bitola (LVC), which were aimed at the participatory creation of a new strategy for volunteering for the Municipality of Bitola for the period 2023-2026, have recently ended. Since YMCA has its representative in LVC for the period 2021-2022, he participated in the working group which, together with representatives from other active youth or youth organizations from Bitola and advisors from the Municipality itself, prepared this strategic document. 3 working meetings were held with a previously determined agenda and under the guidance of an external expert who had the task of taking into account all remarks, proposals, and suggestions by the members of this working group and preparing the strategy together with the action plan for the period 2023 – 2026 year. This strategic document will further be submitted to the Bitola Municipality Council, which is expected to adopt it by March 2023. These activities were organized and carried out by MCC -Bitola under the name “It’s time for volunteering”, a project financed by the grant program of the project “Youth Participation for Strong and Sustainable Development of the Community” financed by the European Union. At the same time, through this project, the capacity of all members of LVC Bitola was strengthened through the realization of training for the creation of volunteer policies and the implementation of plans that the members received. Through this activity, the project strengthened LVC with skills for creating volunteer policies, so that it can successfully create a new strategy for the development of volunteering in the municipality of Bitola and implement the activities following the new document without hindrance and in the future.
Green Agenda through Green Bair and 1000 woods for 1 acorn
For several years in a row, the YMCA supports the “Green Bair” initiative, which is trying to realize the idea of reforesting parts of the area called Bair in Bitola. It is an area consisting of bare hills that suffered from the fire a few years ago in this part of the city. This is the fourth such action in a row and this time 200 evergreen seedlings of black pine were planted. In the past three years, more than 400 evergreen seedlings were planted in this area, some of which have been successfully adapted and are already greening the area. Several associations of citizens and some companies support this initiative, which we hope will continue to happen in the future. More information on the activities and photo galleries is available here и here. In addition to this, in the second half of October 2022, the team of the ZEMI ZDIV platform, where the YMCA is a part, started the preparation for the implementation of the environmental action “1000 forests from 1 acorn” which aims to raise environmental awareness among children and adults about the importance of trees in the process of environmental protection. The action consisted of collecting healthy oak acorns that were distributed to children from primary education with the aim of planting them at home, growing the trees and transplanting them to a permanent location. With this action, we want to interest them in their active involvement in the process of planting new trees, and to motivate them to continue with such healthy habits in the future. The goal is for each child to have their own oak tree that they will grow and later plant in a specific location. This year, this action as a pilot project was organized in three elementary schools in Bitola (OU St. Kliment Ohridski, in OU Dame Gruev and OU Goce Delchev) within the framework of complementing the teaching of natural sciences.
Youth Exchange “Bike-up”: Bitola vs. Denmark
By Anna-Katharina Lüers My name is Anna-Katharina Lüers and I am coming from the Danish Youth Team, from Denmark. This event called “Bike up” was held in Bitola, North Macedonia and was about urban transport in Europe, or at least it is what was I interested about. During the activities in this youth exchange I have become aware that in Denmark we have a lot more bikes and therefore also, a lot of parking spots for them. This is in regard the parking spaces not available here in Bitola. Here, there is a few spots, but not enough, and therefore you need to park the bike on the side of the street. Another thing is that there is also only one “real” bike line in the town of Bitola and if you are not using that, you need to share the area with the pedestrians or cars on the road, which makes it more difficult and slower to get to your goal. There is very high curbstones in Bitola, which makes it hard to switch roads, because you need to get off your bike a lot. With the infrastructure in Denmark, you can easily attend where you need to go and bike rides are more prioritized than people with cars. I had great time during this exchange, I learned a lot new things for other countries as well making new friends. From the difficulties other countries had, I learned a lot of things related with bikes. My general impression is that we need to appreciate the infrastructure that helps to bike more easily and to always help and support initiatives that are raising awareness about this things in the communities were biking is not well developed. By Petar Kazakov The project was interesting and helpful. I am already in contact with many people who wants to ride bikes, but in the urban infrastructure they can’t, since the infrastructure of the city itself doesn’t allow it. This was the biggest awareness for me, and the other thing is that I became more aware is the fact that we need to know how to repair bikes at elementary level. This is lacking, but is vey helpful. Overall, the project was good and I am satisfied how all turned up.
