European youth spend much of their time online

With the rise of digitalisation, youth spend much of their time online, mostly in communities on social media like Instagram, Snapchat and TikTok or gaming platforms such as PlayStation, Discord and Twitch. Therefore, young people spend less time outside and in physical places like youth centres. According to the Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Knowledge Gateway data (2021), the percentage of teenagers spending more than 2 hours on screens at the age of 11 is between 43-67% for males and 30-66% for females. At 15, these numbers are even higher: 53-71% for males and 50-75 for females. According to estimates, young adults spend, on average, 6-7 hours per day on screens. This phenomenon was amplified during the Covid-19 outbreak when researchers saw screen time almost double during lockdowns. They suggested that screen time may decline post-covid, but not to the level we saw before. In short, the trend of spending more time online is here to stay.
The fact that youth spend an increasing part of their time online and, therefore, less in physical public spaces also means that they need to be reached in the digital sphere and need digital counselling and information. The demand for digital youth work is exceptionally high among youth who experience social isolation, loneliness, anxiety, stress, depression, and digital or gaming addiction. Because of their social anxiety or less-developed social skills, they may experience many mental and physical obstacles when reaching out to youth workers or other professionals in the physical world, such as youth centres and schools.

Youth workers need to reach youth online and support to do so

Youth workers are aware of behavioural change among youth and look for ways to better adapt to this phenomenon, thus using digital youth work. They want to be able to reach their target groups online and offline. However, this is challenging as it requires changes to how they work. Youth workers can use the key social media and gaming platforms to be accessible to 'their' young people, interact with them online, or promote their offline activities. In reality, most youth workers are reactive on these platforms; only a minority offer online services and create content more effectively. 
Most youth workers need more insight into the online living environment of young people. They need to know the roles social media offers young people and what growing up in a digital environment requires regarding guidance. Nevertheless, there are many reasons for not tapping into the potential of digital youth work yet. These reasons range from a lack of funding from public authorities to a lack of education for youth workers. This leaves a gap between young people's needs and youth workers' professional development that requires to be bridged.
Plenty of tools in digital youth work need to be taken advantage of, such as providing platforms for peer-to-peer discussion on a diversity of themes, using gaming for training and learning, and reaching out to youth who are more challenging to reach offline. Moreover, digital youth work can address many areas relevant to youth, not only mental health issues. Digital tools provide an excellent opportunity for non-formal and informal learning about various specific skills and general topics, such as training, employment, mobility, gender equality and diversity, financial literacy and sexual education. Digital environments support community engagement and social and political participation. There are tools to improve low-threshold access to care or help and have an accessible way to contact professionals.

Youth and the digital transition are at the forefront of European policies

Youth work has developed differently across Europe for historical, social, cultural and economic reasons. These differences are further nuanced by digital divergences within the EU. However, both youth work and the digital transition are at the forefront of European policies and represent a vital backstop for the development of the field. The European Commission formulated the European Youth Strategy to engage, connect and empower young people in 2018. and published the agenda of Shaping Europe's digital future in 2020, focusing on digital transformation for the benefit of people and an open, democratic and sustainable society. And finally, 2022 was the European Year of Youth, putting youth at the forefront and shining a light on its importance in building a better – greener, more inclusive and digital – future.

NextGen YouthWork helps cities address digital youth work at a strategic policy level

These policy developments provide significant support to European cities to address digital youth work challenges. In addition, the URBACT programme, through the NextGen YouthWork network, will provide tangible, concrete support to 10 European cities to address this challenge and develop a hybrid and sustainable future for youth work at a strategic policy level. Eindhoven, Aarhus, Cartagena, Iași, Klaipėda, Oulu, Perugia, Tetovo, Veszprém and Viladecans will share their best practices and experiences and engage, connect and empower young people. And there are plenty of inspiring practices! Some cities succeeded by transitioning offline youth work tools to the online environment. Others excel at using gaming to engage with youth or even developing new tools for the digital environment. There are good examples of implementing digital shifts at the local level, as well as of pooling resources and knowledge at the regional or national level to ease the financial burden of going digital. Cities often initiate new tools, but grassroots initiatives by youth are also notable examples.

Are you passionate about empowering the next generation and creating a better future? Stay up to date with NextGen YouthWork cities to learn about truly inspiring practices in youth work!

 Integration is a weasel word. Hard to pin down, it means different things to different people. The 3rd URBACT City Lab brought city practitioners and policy makers together in Warsaw to explore this tricky principle. What does it mean for cities and what do we mean by an integrated approach to sustainable urban development?

The Lab findings will feed into the German EU presidency’s refresh of the Leipzig Charter in 2020. So, what did we learn? Here are five headlines.

1. Re-state our values and find new ways to measure success

The world now looks very different to 2007, when the Leipzig Charter appeared. Since then we’ve witnessed a global financial crisis, the digital revolution and increasing globalisation. We’ve also seen the rise of populism and the fragmentation of trust between the public and politicians. Many European cities struggle with widening inequalities.

Going forward into the 2020s, do we expect our cities to adopt a ‘business as usual’ approach or, instead, are we at a fork in the road? New economic thinkers like Kate Raworth are creating an alternative economic framework that challenges the old assumptions. Her "Doughnut Economics" approach bounds our economic activity within the scope of the environment, raising questions that every city should consider.

Kate sets out seven ways to think like a 21st century economist. The first is to change the goal. Across Europe cities including Stockholm (SE), Amsterdam (NL) and Berlin (DE) are exploring these new ideas, looking to reshape our idea of successful integrated cities.

2. Become bilingual and free range

Lab participants spoke about the factors driving mistrust between citizens and government. They include the use of official language which alienates people as well as the impersonalisation of services through the use of technology. The net effect is a barrier between the people and the services which their taxes fund.

Cities are exploring ways to address these challenges. In a previous URBACT network, the Mayor of Amersfoort (NL) encouraged City Hall staff to get out from behind their desks in order to engage directly with citizens. He spoke about free range civil servants, who are comfortable out in the community. In fact they are part of the community; parents, neighbours and citizens like everyone else. But this requires a shift in mindset for some municipal officials, which requires support and encouragement.

The city of Łodz (PL) has embraced this concept in its regeneration approach to a 6.5 hectare site characterised by residential buildings constructed in the late 19th century. As part of this sensitive work, the city recruited and trained a large team of local mediators, literally go-betweens linking the neighbourhood with the municipality. This element of their good practice is one of the components being transferred to cities in the Urban Regeneration Mix network, includes Zagreb (HR), Braga (PT) and Toulouse (FR). Too often, city authorities outsource this engagement activity to third parties, and in doing so, miss the opportunity to build capacity and experience in house.

3. Harness the power of public spending

Making Spend Matter is an URBACT Transfer network focused on mobilising the significant power of public spending to achieve local impact. The starting point is recognising the significant scale of public budgets, and their importance to local economies. The approach, which started in Preston (UK) has involved getting a better snapshot of what is spent, where and with whom.

During this initial phase, the city saw the proportion of its public spend with Preston based suppliers increase from 5% to 18%, and the proportion spent with regional based suppliers increase from 39% to 79%. The model starts with a local spend analysis, and seven other cities are currently transferring the approach through this network. By definition, the approach requires public partners to collaborate, through the mobilisation of anchor institutions across all sectors. This is integration in action!

4. Revisit approaches to tackling poverty

Although welfare models are complex and varied across Europe, there’s a general consensus that they are failing. At the same time, we see that investment in physical revitalisation can often lead to gentrification and the displacement of the most vulnerable.

Many city authorities are looking at new and innovative ways to address this. One example is Aarhus (DK) which is successfully personalising budgets designed to support people back to work. Another is Barcelona (ES), which has an Urban Innovative Actions project, B-MINCOM aimed at breaking cycles of deprivation in Besos, one of the city’s poorest neighbourhoods. There, average household income is around 50% of the city rate.

The approach provides a guaranteed minimum income level to 1,000 households on a trial basis. It combines the income guarantee with an active programme of employment support and enterprise development. As the pilot concludes in autumn 2019, it will have important lessons to share across Europe.

5. Embrace the integrated approach!

The Leipzig Charter was one of the earliest documents to promote an integrated approach to urban development. Almost 13 years later, many still struggle to understand what this means in practice. Many barriers stand in the way - including the departmental silos we find in City Hall.

In response to this, URBACT has recently conducted detailed research exploring integrated working in practice. This identifies examples from cities working this way across Europe, and sets out practical tips to follow. Stories from Strasbourg (FR), Cluj-Napoca (RO) and Antwerp (BE) provide guidance and inspiration.

A key message is that this isn’t as hard as it sounds, and city practitioners can break things into manageable chunks to help take them forward. The watchword is letting go of perfection. Perhaps that’s the first stage to adopting a more integrated approach.

 

 

The key principles of the original Leipzig Charter provided the focus for each URBACT City Lab.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Sandra Rainero, network Expert for URBACT ONSTAGE Transfer Network, shares the experiences of l’Hospitalet de Llobregat (ES), Grigny (FR), Adelfia (IT) and Aarhus (DK).

Nothing touched the heart of the people of l’Hospitalet de Llobregat (ES) more than the Opening Ceremony (the Toc d’Inici) of the Spring Festival and the music of the Banda Provençana. During the festival, the band showcased the traditions and popular Catalan culture of the city. Today, its French horn player is 18-year old Wang Wei,* a Chinese national who arrived in L’Hospitalet at the age of 9, enrolled in the neighbourhood school and joined the Tandem programs of the Municipal Music School and Arts Centre (EMMCA).

Surely music schools are the most exclusive education system there is?

Conservatories and schools are attended mainly by those who have either a good enough social and cultural background to afford it, or budding talents that get to the spotlight thanks to heavy discipline, solfege, vocalising and exhausting practice. However, one performing arts schools has gone a long way to undermine such stereotypes opening its doors to today’s diverse and complex society: the EMMCA in L’Hospitalet (ES), now sharing its Good Practice within the URBACT ONSTAGE Transfer Network.

Urbanity and education: a multifaceted and complex relationship

Typically, cities have a subsidiary role in a formal education system, so when they govern education programmes – regardless of their level, groups or topic – they make a strong political statement. It's even more so when we add in cultural education. As American sociologist Christian Smith would argue, cultural systems are the result of human capacities to shape the meanings and structures of social existence together.

This is why the cities of the URBACT ONSTAGE Transfer Network use music and performing arts education to equip citizens with the so-called “cultural and artistic capability”. They view access to culture as a fundamental right for citizens.

Living on the margins but playing for its heart

People of L’Hospitalet (pop. 250,000 c.) and Grigny (pop. 28,500 c.) are those living at the margins, on the fringes of the largest metropolitan areas in Spain and France, namely Barcelona and Paris. Until not so long ago they were both little suburban towns. Life in Gellerup (pop. 340,000 c) seems a world apart from the thriving city of Aarhus, yet it was named the European Capital of Culture in 2017.

As migrants make up for about one-third of the residents (90% in Gellerup), over time these three municipalities have structured public music schools where the egalitarian approach has replaced the elitist one. While teaching music, these schools offer opportunities and different ways to empower those who often fall between the cracks of our society, because of their cultural, ethnic, national background or other forms of diversities and vulnerabilities.

Conservatory Director Edgar Solmi recalls that it was the Department of Grand Paris South that came to the Grigny conservatoire a few years back, right after the violence in the social housing district of La Grande Borne (Big Border) and asked for musical help to appease the inflammatory social unrest. The Conservatory therefore plays an important part in the municipality’s strategy with Grigny being named City of Peace to change its story, and to offer its citizens better opportunities.

The city of Aarhus has been investing an important amount of financial resources for the regeneration of Gellerup, building public spaces and moving a large Department of the City Administration to this part of the city. The focus of the activities of the Musikskole in this district are part of a wider policy and city strategy.

The EMMCA’s activities started in 2005, but the school moved to its own headquarters about ten years later as part of the urban regeneration project for the Gornal district, known as a difficult neighbourhood home to a large Roma community, initially shunned by L’Hospitalet residents. The educational objective of this urban policy came before the actual school building and it took time and incessant networking with the social fabric of the city to get its value recognised.

Musical atonement for the school’s ‘original sin’

The Greek etymon of school, skholḗ means “place of rest”, a respite from the body’s toils and a place to exercise the mind. Over the last millennium, this artificial separation between the body and the mind has persisted, making it hard for students who do not comply (because of their diversity, background, learning or behavioural issues) to succeed and meet educational standards. So, human expressions and arts that entail the simultaneous use of body and mind, such as music or performing arts, remain the Cinderella subjects of “regular” schools - or exclusive to specialised (and often even more exclusive) education.

The wager that the EMMCA took up when it started its Tandem programme in public primary schools meant including music, dance or theatre into the curriculum, but also to teaching them at the same level and valuing them as much as other subjects.

“If math and English can be taught in a group-class, why not music?” The educational objective does not refer to achieving a standard artistic performance level (although this happens quite often anyway) but rather the well-being and the feeling of safety in the group that fosters the ability to learn.

In Aarhus, the experience of the Musikskole has also revealed its limitations. After years of “incursions” in regular classes by music teachers, musical education remained a world apart from ‘real life’ for its students because regular teachers were unable to give continuity to music classes.

As financial resources dwindle, the focus has recently shifted to providing other teachers with skills to continue the musical activities. The new approach is to combine music-teaching with social skill building, to embed the aesthetic didactics (songs, activities and methods) into the school’s daily routines. The project of online animations with traditional Danish songs also goes in this direction.

For many years now, musician Andrea Gargiulo of MusicaInGioco has been working with children with disabilities and behavioural issues in Adelfia and other municipalities in the Puglia Region. He has codified practice and multidisciplinary techniques into a methodological approach called "reticular didactics" that the Italian Ministry of Education has recognised.

“I worked with Suleyman,* a deaf boy who was also unable to speak because in his country, Albania, he had spent a lot of time in the orphanage without receiving adequate care” Gargiulo recalls, “but though he could not speak, he could sing! He managed to develop his own self-regulation and managed to be even in tune, and to improvise jazz on the piano, resting his hand on the sound box.”

Another strength of the inclusive approach to music education is that they draw and adapt from non-formal, experiential and inductive education approaches. As the experience of EMMCA and the Adelfia tell us, these methods are more flexible and inclusive because they drift away from the mistake-and-performance-evaluation paradigm. They aim at personal and social empowerment, rather than achievement, therefore they have a profound social and therapeutic value.

A slow but inevitable recognition

EMMCA’s music lessons have made of Wang Wei an important element of the city’s musical life, and all along they have helped him go through education, learn the local language and become an active citizen, applauded by the local community in the parades.

When Suleyman’s adoptive mother saw him singing and playing for the first time, she broke into tears of joy. She was convinced that her son could never be a musician, and instead she saw him doing it with incredible simplicity and talent.

Neuroscience and evidence-based research carried out on L’Hospitalet and Adelfia’s cases indicate that music and dance have positive effects on the brain, activate neural connections and logical abilities, improving social, behavioural and mathematical skills. However, the introduction of music and performing arts in the general education system by local actors (like the Tandem programs of the EMMCA and Music’n’play) have not happened overnight and are not always welcome by the system. Their actual implementation has shown how difficult it remains to change the formal education system.

One of the enduring issues related to performing arts education relates to its costs for the local administration, especially when a rights-based, democratic approach to culture is promoted.

The Catalan Government, in the case of EMMCA, the Department of Grand Paris South for Grigny and the Puglia Region for Music’n’Play all support these initiatives, with the help of private donors. Territorial and vertical alignment of integrated policy and good practice remain therefore paramount for their sustainability. The dialogue we see happening during the ONSTAGE Transfer Network about cultural, education and social policy is encouraging for these schools to set their plans for social change in motion.

*fictional name of a real person