(ANS – Munich) – Between 8 and 11 March the Salesianum in Munich was the host of DBYN’s youth conference ‘Generations of Participation’.  This conference within the framework of the European Year of intergenerational dialogue, was the second step in larger project.  It brought together 27 young people from 12 EU member states.

At the same time there was the annual meeting of the General Executive Body of the DBYN, which adopted a new master plan for the period 2012 – 2014

The idea for ‘Generations of Participation’ comes from the fact that over 170 years people of all ages have voluntarily participated in educating young people to become active citizens inside the worldwide Salesian Movement.  Young volunteers play a key role in this movement. “Generations of Participation” aims at setting-up an intergenerational dialogue between young volunteers, older volunteers and policy makers, in order to see how they can rejuvenate this tradition especially in this European year of intergenerational dialogue.

For this reason, prior to youth conference, the participants interviewed the older volunteers about their life-long engagement.  At the conference itself the interviews were used to identify good practices. Afterwards the participants met with a communication officer from the European Parliament, Mr. Paul-Joachim Kubosch.  The idea of this meeting was that the participants could get a better understanding of how the European Union thinks.  Mr. Kubosch explained the EU in all its complexity

The rest of the conference was aimed at creating tools how the participants could integrate intergenerational dialogue in their local organisations.  

The last step of the project will be a final publication which will try to bring together the work of the projects.  This means the interviews, the report of the conference, the outcomes on local level. 

During these days also at the Salesianum in Munich, the members of the General Executive Body of DBYN reflected on the crisis facing Europe – not only economic. Drawing inspiration from Don Bosco, they propose to use both ‘evangelisation’ and ‘education’ as tools for youth emancipation.  ‘Evangelisation’ focuses on the empowerment of young people through the development of ‘values’.  ‘Education’ focuses on capacity building of youth through the development of ‘competences’. 

The new master plan for the period 2012 – 2014 is accessible on the site of DBYN.

Published 23/03/2012