European Youth Week in Novi Sad - eYouWiNS 2008

"People, Let's Talk!"

The main goals of eYouWiNS are very similar to the other youth festivals in Europe, and that means giving opportunity to young people to connect, to meet each other and to discuss about the actual phenomenon, the stimulus to learn about the world around them through new knowledge, and to change that world with their creativity and new ideas. The festival should motivate and encourage young people from Serbia and Europe to take part in all aspects of social life, to promote communication through different forms of informal education, to promote accepting differences, tolerance and dialogue, mutual respect and understanding


By MARKO ANDREJIĆ
from Belgrade, SERBIA


The third European Youth Week in Novi Sad - eYouWiNS, organized by Faculty of Technical Sciences and Creative educational Center, will take place this summer from August 20 to 27th. With strong aspiration to have an active part and to promote interculturalism, the organizers of this thematic youth festival, whose mission is to elevate the cooperation spirit and to connect cultures, ideas and on the first place people, are inviting, in the year of European interculturism, 150 participants from Serbia and Europe to come to Novi Sad.

Motto of the third eYouWiNS is "People, lets talk" (Dialogue, not monologue) and the participants will discuss in four workshops about importance of communication, accepting differences, tolerance and dialogue. The topics for 2008 are: cultural heritage and artistic innovation, "Face your history - Turn to the future!", identity in crisis: global vs. local and Inter-religious dialogue among young people. The official language is English, and the deadline for application is July 15 (only through the official site www.eyouwins.com). Participation fee is 40 euros, including accommodation, food and complete program.

Imported idea

European Youth Week in Novi Sad was first launched in 2006 and it was like one of the youth festivals in Europe, which have been dealing, in latest 15 years, with young people and their position, their active participation in the society but also have discussed about European integration and the role of young people. During two years of presence, in different festival's activities participated more then two thousands of young people and the capital city of Vojvodina was host for more than two hundred people from 25 different countries. Among the lecturers were Hans Ola Urstad, the chief of OSCE Mission, Bojan Pajtic (the Prime Minister of province Vojvodina), Radmila Marinkovic Neduchin (rector of University of Novi Sad), and also the chief of office for democratization of OSCE mission in Serbia, representatives of foreign embassies and EU delegation in Serbia, as well as European Movement in Serbia. This year the concept is a little bit changed because many news are prepared for the guests. The leading lecturer will be Robin Wilson, expert in the field of intercultural dialogue and the cooperator of European Commission on numerous projects in this area in the last years. It is planned to make more fun and to create carnival atmosphere in Novi Sad's streets during eYouWins 2008.

- An idea about starting eYouWins was launched in the spring of 2006, when our colleague and one of the creators of the festival Zeljko Tekic, returned from Slovenia where he spend a month through students exchange programme. During that time he had interesting and important meetings with the students who organize very similar festival in Maribor, but what had the most influence was his participation in the meeting of SORCE Network. There were the majority of the leading people for the European youth festivals like this. The impressions from that meeting were so strong that we got an idea "Let's make something like this in our place!"- explained for WAVE magazine about the roots of festival in Novi Sad Vladimir Todorovic, project manager. - The team who organized and started the first festival was consisted of about twenty of us. Working together in different student's or non-governmental organizations or some kind of friendships in the past made connections among us. I think that those elements were decisive for the festival and its success. Past experience when we were working on similar events and mutual trust between organizers were the base to get the whole thing to the end successfully and just in four months we had, we succeeded to realize the festival, that in the beginning was just an idea, with 78 participators from 20 countries.

The organizer of European Youth Week is non-governmental organization KEC- Creative-Educational Center from Novi Sad, and co-organizer and the strategic partner is Faculty of Technical Sciences of University in Novi Sad. KEC was founded in 2004 and it has been always orientated to cooperation with youth organizations from countries in the neighbourhood, first of all Hungary. Support from the Faculty and cooperation with this institution are from great significance because it has given the base to organizers and represents their second home. It's not necessary to say that most of the organizing team are people from Faculty of Technical Sciences.

- The main goals of eYouWiNS are very similar to the goals of the other European festivals that are very alike, and that means giving opportunity to bring together the young people of Serbia and Europe, to connect and discuss about the actual phenomenon, the stimulus to learn about the world around them through new knowledge, and to change that world with their creativity and new ideas. The Festival should promote and encourage activity of young people in Serbia and Europe in all aspects of social life and through different forms of informal education, to promote the communication, accept differences, tolerance and dialogue, mutual respect and understanding - says Todorovic. He emphasizes that the fact that Festival takes place in Serbia gives one specific dimension to eYouWins and also gives one goal more that arises out of the situation that in Serbia still exists one big dilemma if Europe has an alternative, and that is to spread a word about Vojvodina and Serbia as a part of Europe, promoting European values among the young people in Serbia and the region and positive attitude about European Union. - Every year there is one specific goal. Therefore, we started in 2006 with the question: "Is Your Europe, My Europe?", and focused on question of possibility of integration of new countries in European Union. Last year we put focus on question of borders and visas for Serbian citizens, and also for whole region, and motto of the Festival was "People vs. Borders". This year Festival with topic "People, let's talk" is dedicated to European year of intercultural dialogue, so all the lectures and workshops will be oriented to that topic.

Promoting communication

In the first year of the festival, there were five workshops. Last year 2007, there were more than 100 participants, and the concept was similar, with lecturers and workshops dealing with three topics in three groups. The organizers claim that about 20 people, mostly students, carry out the biggest part about organizing eYouWins festival, and the organizing team is divided into a few smaller teams with specific tasks like providing quality lecturers and workshops' moderators, fundraising, promoting festival, registration and reception of participants, organization the amusement part of the program. Vladimir Todorovic considers that domestic and foreign students are very interested to take part in.

- When we are talking about cooperation with other festivals, it was a little bit neglected in last two years, because we wanted to base our festival very firmly in the organizational area, and also we wanted to provide good lecturers and quality program. After we reached that, one of the ways for further development is connecting with some other festivals and youth organizations what will be in the matter of fact, our main idea for the next year. We want to be a member of SORCE Network, but more than that we want collaboration with the similar festivals in order to get more quality and reach higher level. Through that networking we want to articulate all our needs and reach all our targets. We have plan for this year to cooperate closer with the organizing team of "International Student Week in Belgrade". The cooperation and partnership of eYouWins and ISWiB should be a good step forward, towards improving the quality.

Organizers expect eYouWins 2008 to be better and with more contains than the first two festivals, to attract more attention and to make stronger position of the festival, to be well-known among the young people in Europe and Serbia. They also expect, throughout this year's topic, the participants to learn more about their personal and cultural barriers in communication and how to leave it behind, what is the purpose of intercultural dialogue and how to expand it, about meaning of cultural heritage and identity in Europe, and in that way they want to contribute to education. They are sure that eYouWins will have a big influence in mobility and networking of young people, as well as in their bigger participation in the society. Finally, they want to have a share in spreading the idea of Vojvodina and Serbia as parts of Europe, and to promote European values among the young people in Serbia and region. In that way, to generate the positive attitude about European Union. The strategy and plans for the future are very ambitious, but they would like to talk about that after successfully eYouWins 2008.


(Published: 10.07.2008.)