September 2014 ISSUE 44 www.agenzijazghazagh.gov.mt

For more information on these and other projects by Aġenzija Żgħażagħ log on to www.agenzijazghazagh.gov.mt

National Youth Policy Consultation

As part of the draft Youth Policy consultation process, the Parliamentary Secretariat for Research, Innovation, Youth and Sport together with Aġenzija Żgħażagħ and with the support of Eurodesk, within EUPA, held a consultation seminar with youth organisations. The seminar kicked off with a presentation explaining what’s in the policy document. Later on, the young people together with other stakeholders present during the consultation seminar, had the opportunity to give their feedback on the document during a series of workshops targeting all of the 11 action plans proposed in the draft document.

The first certificate presentation ceremony at Youth.inc

The first certificate presentation ceremony for young people who successfully completed the Youth.inc training programme within Aġenzija Żgħażagħ was held on Monday 22nd September 2014 at the Mediterranean Conference Centre. The occasion saw 260 young people who completed the course during the past 3 years gather together with their families and friends to celebrate the success of their achievements. Certificates were awarded by the Minister of Education Evarist Bartolo, who praised the young people for their commitment to the programme and thanked everyone who was and still is involved in this programme.

Divergent Thinkers: And the winner is…

This year’s winner of Divergent Thinkers 03 is Kristina Borg. Using the pseudonym laKri, Kristina’s work entitled “Fuori dalla Finestra” reconstructed the experience of a group of residents who live in the Casa Verde in Milan, whose lives were drastically changed by urban planning. Adrian Abela placed second with his social media projection “Adornment”, which merged the radical ideas of Viennese architect Adolf Loos about ornament with the art of tattooing messages.

Bloggers Training

SOS Malta, in collaboration with Aġenzija Żgħażagħ, in September offered a training course which focused on developing knowledge skills and attitudes in human rights and supporting participants to recognise and act against racism and discrimination in their online form of expression. A total of eleven applicants participated in the course, all under the age of 30, some active bloggers, and others who plan on starting a blog. The training session was a success and the participants are planning a way forward to put the tools into practice.

Bridging youths to business

Aġenzija Żgħażagħ joined forces with the European Union Programmes Agency (EUPA) and the Malta Business Bureau in organising a round-table event with the aim of bridging young people to the busi-ness/private sector. This event forms part of an Eras-mus+ project entitled ‘Cross Over’, which is a Key Ac-tion 2 project aiming to foster cooperation between organisations from different countries in the fields of youth work and non-formal learning for young people.

The consultation process is still open and the public can send feedback till the 31st October 2014 on nationalyouthpolicy.mede@gov.mt. The draft national youth policy can be downloaded from www.agenzijazghazagh.gov.mt. The National Youth policy, which will cover the period 2015-2020, is expected to be launched in January 2015. Hon. Chris Agius Parliamentary Secretary for Research, Innovation, Youth and Sport was present during the consultation seminar.

Divergent Thinkers’ exhibition was organised by Aġenzija Żgħażagħ with the support of St James Cavalier Centre for Creativity. This year’s exhibition, which was set up at BLITZ - St. Lucy Street Valletta, presented contemporary artistic practices by young Maltese artist that explored divergent thinking, offering proposals based on a single word: RADICAL.