YOUZ Ideas Generation

Context
Our friends from UnAltroStudio asked us to join them on a rich and complex journey to give voice to the young people in the Emilia-Romagna region (Italy), collecting ideas and proposals for the shared definition of future regional policies. Four macro areas of interest have been identified: greener, fairer, closer and smarter – for a greener, fairer, more inclusive and smarter future. In relation to them, we asked young people to express their needs, highlight existing gaps, and suggest ideas, solutions and projects: from how to improve school and teaching, to how to manage the territory and guarantee diversity.

Process
We designed and led all the meetings, both online and in person, facilitating the work groups and giving them the tools to get to know each other, activate networks and connections, express themselves and collect tangible proposals to bring to the attention of regional representatives. Over the course of five months we have worked with hundreds of people on a variety of environments: on a lawn, in a museum, at a music festival and in ancient cloisters. Our approach, though, has always been consistent: listening, sharing and building a facilitation kit, together with our partners, to make our participants independent when they met in spontaneous, smaller groups.

Solution
A shared path, a collection of grassroots voices culminating in the final event during which all the proposals have been presented, engaging both subject matter experts and people who live experience the policies every day at school, in the gym or associations. We coordinated the experts and the various working groups so that everyone could make a contribution to the finalization of the proposals themselves, which the students handed over to the representatives of the Emilia-Romagna region, with the aim of being integrated and implemented in the next regional youth policies.