The young leaders who attended work with the charity’s local groups in Birkenhead, London, Manchester, Derbyshire and Leicester. 

Over the weekend participants took part in certified first aid training and sessions around supporting young people’s mental health. These helped the group to learn new skills to take back to their own groups so that they are in a good position to support the young people they are working with.

Carmen, young leader says:

“The most important learning moment for me was during the mental health workshop focussing on supporting young people”

The later half of the weekend focused on those attending taking part in some basic leader training such as sharing activity ideas, looking at why young people, parents and volunteers choose Woodcraft Folk. As the E-mpACT project is looking at the affects covid and lockdowns have had on youth work, part of the weekend was spent looking at social media and digital youth work and how this has been used in different situations and what the young leaders experience of this was. 

On the Sunday, the group took part in a session to share their ideas around what should be priorities for governments, schools, universities and organisations like Woodcraft Folk to fight the ongoing climate and nature crisis. The outcomes of this session will be shared with think tank Think NPC who will use their ideas, along with others from across the organisation, to write a report to the government about young people’s views on tackling the climate crisis

As well as taking part in training sessions, the group had time to get to know each other and cook some delicious food to enjoy such as home made pizza and fajitas. Everyone had time to enjoy the early April sunshine and explore the beautiful surroundings of the centre.

The group will continue to stay in touch as the project progresses and will use online platforms to share skills, activity ideas and experiences to support each other whilst working with different groups.

Young leader Isaac says:

“I am looking forward to meeting the group again and working together to produce some social media content that would engage the younger generation”

If you would like to find out more about the E-mpACT project get in touch with lauren@woodcraft.org.uk

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Empact is a IFM-SEI project focusing on addressing the youth needs during and post covid-19 pandemic, addressing digitalization, non-formal education and international solidarity. E-mpACT aims to raise awareness in youth work by examining the pandemic’s impact on non-formal education. 13 participants from five different countries (The UK, Zimbabwe, Slovenia, Peru and Norway) gathered together and shared their experiences of the pandemic’s impacts on young people. Then, during the workshop they worked in small groups to reflect on research, especially youth-led findings. Collating all the resources and the research toolbox they had, at the end of the workshop, they were able to co-design a research project.

Woodcraft Folk participant Lilith says at the end of the day “I didn’t know anything about research, now I have a pretty good understanding”.

After a long day full of information, the host organisation planned a feminist tour walk of Berlin, the group discovered the city and learnt some interesting facts about Berlin with a feminist point of view. 

Eva, ESC volunteer who went to support the two DFs says:

“We had a great time during the feminist tour, the stories were diverse and interesting to listen to.”

During the last day, the group planned the next steps; to deliver a workshop in their home countries – with all the tools they sourced during the weekend. In March 2023, they will all come together during an online meeting and share the result of their data and the material they collected.

The E-mpACT Team from Woodcraft Folk will now come together and work on developing national training for young leaders as well as finding a place for online youth work as a valuable tool of engaging with young people and bringing them brilliant experiences.  

Particpant Lilith says:

“I enjoyed meeting new people and talking about the differences around the world was really interesting. This weekend was an incredible opportunity, thanks to Woodcraft Folk.”

Participant Izzie went on to say – “I went out of my comfort zone, I talked to people and learnt new things. The workshop was really well structured and interactive.”

Find more about the E-mpACT project here

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The E-mpACT project is led by IFM-SEI and is a three-year project focusing on addressing the youth needs during and post covid-19 pandemic, addressing digitalization, non-formal education and international solidarity. E-mpACT aims to raise awareness in youth work by examining the pandemic’s impact on non-formal education and international solidarity. The project involves young people/youth partners from 8 countries and 4 continents.

During the trip the participants took part in workshops about ‘what makes the perfect trainer?’ looking at online and offline qualities of different methods of facilitation and what resources trainers need to be the best trainers. The group also discussed digital activism and promoting causes through certain platforms such as Tik Tok, Instagram, Twitter etc. Woodcraft Folk participants were especially interested in hearing about promoting calls for environmental change through different online mediums. The participants had a chance to share their own experiences of online youth work, this differs across the world and the participants were engaged in hearing about other people’s stories and experiences. 

As well as exploring online youth work the participants took part in an intercultural evening where every organisation brought something to share from their culture. Woodcraft Folk participants created an activity where everyone was able to make their own victoria sponge cupcakes as a classic take on the UK snack.

“ we got to try lots of different foods such as Slovenian apple slices and Norwegian chocolate” – Mickey Lowe, Woodcraft Folk participant.

The group were also able to explore Slovenia’s capital city Ljubljana.

“I enjoyed learning the differences and similarities between the IFM-SEI groups – different aims and principles and histories and how IFM is growing” – Mickey Lowe, Woodcraft Folk participant

“My highlight was being surrounded by so many empowered and motivating people with such valid opinions about the cause. It made me feel how powerful WCF can be in the future” – Eliza, Woodcraft Folk participant

Next steps of the project include two more participants from Woodcraft Folk attending a methodology research weekend in Berlin in November. Once this has happened, the E-mpACT Team from Woodcraft Folk will come together and work on developing national training for young leaders as well as finding a place for online youth work as a valuable tool of engaging with young people and bringing them brilliant experiences.  

Check out the E-mpACT webpage to find out more about the project

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