One of the activities in our “Are You A Couch Potato” project is holding a meeting in each country that is involved in it. We already had a chance to meet in Poland, Slovakia, Romania, France and last time also in Brno. It was very unusual due to the Coronavirus that was already coming to Europe. 

In spite of this, having the safety rules in our heads, and following recommendations from WHO, we met in Brno but not with partners from affected countries.

 

Why do we meet?

Every time you work with someone, it’s very important to get to know each other. We are from different countries, having different cultures of work and what’s most important different needs of the NEETs. They are the most important part of the project. 

Without the knowledge regarding those differences, it would be difficult to work on the valuable outcomes of our project, that in many cases have to be quite universal. 

 

How do our meetings look like?

All the meetings have a regular schedule, which is however adapted to the current stage of the project. On the first day, we summarize the work that has been done since the previous meeting – it allows us to understand the results and see the real progress. Thanks to this, we are able to immediately dispel our doubts and share our thoughts with the rest of the team. Usually, the first day of the meeting ends up with a planning session. As we all know “A good plan is a half work done” so we follow this rule, knowing that thanks to this we can deliver the results in a given time and in a given form. 

On the second day, we visit NGOs from a city that we visit. Some may ask – but what’s the purpose of it? The purpose is to listen and to learn from those, who have already done some good job related to working with people disadvantaged in the labor market. To improve the results of our work, we have to learn on real examples and talk to people that are able to bring some indirect value to the project. These meetings are extremely inspiring and bring new energy to our project team.

 

What has already been done?

In Brno, we had a chance to summarize the work so far. As you may know, from our previous blog posts. We already held workshops for NEETs and for trainers. And the next step is to bring all our learning and scenarios into one, great Toolkit for Trainers. The framework of the toolkit has already been created and discussed during the meeting. Now we’re waiting for the final result. 

The next outcome, that we can’t wait to share, is another approach in case of CV, which are troublesome really often for those who haven’t been working yet. Not every person willing to find a good job is able to share the experience in one, formal document. Sometimes soft skills and motivation play a much bigger role. We believe in it and created the first CV video that a potential employee could see instead of reading a boring CV. Based on the example prepared by WUP in Katowice and Leżę i Pracuję Foundation (partners from Poland), all other partners will prepare their own CV video.

As a next step, we will also prepare webinars that will discuss the areas of knowledge used in the workshop scenarios. Follow us to see the results!

 

Visit at Symbiosis 

In Brno, we could visit only one, but very exceptional organization – Symbios. 

They present shared housing for young adults leaving the orphanage and university students in Brno. The project is in the initial phase, as they want to verify whether it is a functional tool in the Czech Republic for solving the situation of young adults leav

ing the orphanage without any preparation for real life. We could talk to the coordinators, participants and were amazed by their engagement and commitment. 

I totally recommend learning more about their project: https://www.symbiosbrno.cz/

 

What other participants say about the meeting

Despite difficult and rather unpredictable circumstances, I was glad that the meeting in Brno took place as planned. I enjoyed the social parts of the meeting and also our visit to Symbios Brno. I am already looking forward to our next meeting in Spain as I think that we have become a very good team.

Kateřina Hodická, Czech Republic

 

„I was thinking that creating a CV video might be more complicated than I originally thought. I have to borrow a microphone, but I don’t know who and at the moment I can’t even search for a person for a video.”

Eva Lukešová, Czech Republic

 

Thanks to the visit to Brno we could know the project SYMBIOS – very good practice on how to deal with the problem of transition of young adults from institutional care to independent life. Shared living with university students is a very good idea. It gives the possibility of building relationships and integrate into the labor market. Young adults learn how to take responsibility for their own lives.

Agnieszka Rozmus, Poland