The best contribution to the improvement of tomorrow’s day of community and for the country is to ensure the development of youth and to give them opportunities to generate their own ideas and to implement them. For this purpose, between August 5 to 8, FYN organized its first summer camp entitled “Seed the change”.
18 young people from different communities and different regions of Armenia gathered on the shore of Sevan to acquire knowledge and tools on human rights, peacebuilding and environmentalism at the Armenian Camp. Being one of those 18 young people, I would like to introduce you an “insider look” to the four-day camp life about the seminars led by the FYN team, and share my impressions and opinion.
First of all, It’s worth mentioning that the recruitment of participants was carried out by application, which guaranteed the success of the following days as much as possible. The selected participants were motivated and inspired to make changes in their own communities, to be a part of community activism, which had a great impact on the process of the camp. The age difference between the prep-team members and participants was not much, this is why the relationship between the two parties was equal and horizontal. In these respects, the organizing process was at a high level.
In order to be effective in the course to avoid information overload, the agenda was defined by the principles of non-formal education combining the study with entertainment. The seminars were accompanied by discussions, games, the audience became a direct participant in discovering the topic due to which all the information was understandable and memorable. All the learnings included a practical part, during which the knowledge was reinforced by the implementation of practical tasks. In addition, the participants were always energetic due to the energizers (activation game), the latters significantly encouraged them to stay alert and active during the seminars. And the absence of meaningless restrictions, the flexibility of the schedule and methods, as well as inclusive and welcoming environment made the seminars more interesting and engaging. It is noteworthy that in addition to the main classes, yoga group meetings were organized in the morning, during which we got acquainted with a number of meditation methods and yoga exercises.
Topics related to community life and local development were selected for the seminars. During the first three days, participants were provided with valuable knowledge and skills on human rights, environment, non-violent civic activism, advocacy, leadership, cooperation, conflict resolution and other topics. On the fourth day, a deep reference was made to the generation of ideas and programs as well as their development and implementation, which prepared the young people to apply for the sub-grant programs. After, participants of the camp have had the opportunity to receive funding and mentoring for the implementation of their own programs by the NGO, which is an excellent opportunity to make a difference in community life.
Based on the above, the camp was able to achieve its initial goals. All of us returned home inspired by FYN teamwork, new acquaintances, sufficient resources for enthusiastic community activities
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Written by Arshak Melkumyan
Translated by Liana Habeshyan
Edited by Mariam Avetisyan
