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#WeCoLead – Young Women’s Leadership for Collaborative Sustainable Communities

SwIdeas AB

#WeCoLead is a KA2 Cooperation Partnership co-funded by the Erasmus + of the European Union. Led by SwIdeas in Sweden, the project also gathers partnerships from Italy (CESIE), Greece (‘COMMON), Hungary (SVF – Subjective Values Foundation), and Luxembourg (FSL – Formation et Sensibilisation de Luxembourg).

#WeCoLead is an innovative project based on the idea that young women are especially positioned to creatively and innovatively initiating processes to develop a sustainable new normal that is coped with gender equality and empowerment.

Based on this, the project has two main goals:

  1. to empower young women to act as leaders in shaping the sustainable new normal and fighting against climate change, acting as change-makers, and exploring their active citizenship and socio-economic potential

  2. to promote sustainable internationalization by empowering the EU to act as leader in matters of biodiversity conservation, sustainable practices, and sustainable action.

This project brings together the power of young women to act as leaders in the promotion of green and sustainable practices, interactive and innovative methodologies, and collaborative methods to produce results that will be relevant, useful, and empowering for young women and for youth workers.

Meet the Results

Our Experience

RESULTS

1 - #WomenToWomen on Reels

At the start of the project, the partners conducted a social media content analysis, during which several posts that portray how young women used social media to voice their concerns and opinions were collected.

The results are summarized in an international report.

This was followed by the development of reels and one transnational roundtable with representatives of the target group.

The reels are available on the project’s social media accounts and on YouTube.

2 - #CoCreate the Toolkit

The #WeCoLead toolkit explores the role that informal and non-formal education can play to provide tools for young women to act as leaders and changing forces in their communities towards sustainability, equality, and inclusivity. It seeks to use education to promote female empowerment and encourage young women to collectively start the change in themselves and in their communities, challenging structural oppression and female roles, as well as challenging unsustainable actions.

The toolkit is the result of a co-creation process conducted with young women and youth workers. The result of this process is described on the harvest analysis from workshops and surveys implemented at the local level in each of the partner countries. The main inputs are summarized in the file to the right.

Inspired by the Civil Society Toolbox’s structure and methodology, the #WeCoLead Toolkit is divided in 3 different parts.

These steps aim to empower all young women, civil society representatives, stakeholders and youth workers on how to support female leadership in environmental sustainability matters.

The Toolkit is based on the core idea that, as result of our initial analysis, female leadership and empowerment are intertwined processes that take place gradually and can be supported on different levels:

  1. the individual level

  2. in small organizations or informal groups

  3. at the structural and organizational level in established organizations.

Accordingly, the toolkit is divided in 3 parts:

  1. REFLECTIVE METHODS FOR FEMALE LEADERSHIP IN ENVIRONMENTAL ACTION

  2. LAB ON WOMEN EMPOWERMENT FOR SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES

  3. PATH OF THE RAIN DANCE - WORKING ON JOINT PROJECTS FOR COLLECTIVE ADVOCACY

Check out the 3 parts of the toolkit below and feel free to use them and adapt them to your own needs and interests. WE CREATED IT FOR YOU!

Don’t forget to download the supporting documents!

3- #SoThatMoreCanCome

The purpose of the e-booklet is to provide to young women and youth workers useful tools and content that can support them to continue to transfer the knowledge and experience they have started within the project to other young people, especially women. The result is a 64-page long material that addresses young women leadership and collaborative sustainable communities in an interactive and practical manner.

  • For young women: It contains information about different issues regarding gender and sustainability. It also resorts to and introduces methods as well as skills that are considered relevant for young women to make the most of their potential to become future sustainability and community leaders. Finally, it includes information of relevant supporting organizations that can be reached in each partner country.

  • For youth workers: It seeks to support youth workers to boost the transfer of knowledge to young people regarding how to make their voices heard and how to engage in initiatives and participate in civic life, while encouraging critical thinking and storytelling. Therefore, the e-booklet includes information that can build the knowledge of youth workers and practical activities that can be directly used by them.

The e-booklet is divided into seven chapters:

  1. The first chapter introduces the topic of gender, delving into the dynamics between gender and economic and social sustainability.

  2. The second chapter inserts climate change and discusses its relationship with gender and sustainability.

  3. The third chapter focuses on labour market accessibility as a function of social and gender inequality, as well as education.

  4. The fourth addresses well-being and mental and physical health, with a focus on the consequences and impact of the COVID-19 pandemic recently experienced.

  5. The fifth chapter addresses the strengths and weaknesses of the use of social media, delving into the use of critical thinking and storytelling in spaces of digital interaction.

  6. The sixth chapter gives a practical response to the issues and matters previously discussed by introducing the tools developed within the framework of the project. It also delves into competencies and skills hereby considered resourceful for young women to guide and formulate proposals for political and social change.

  7. Ready-to-use and hands-on activities for youth workers to use with young women and youth.

Get to know more about the project’s topics!

#WeCoLead explored young women’s leadership within gender issues and sustainability, as well as the influence of social media in creating a platform for their voices to be heard and for active participation to occur. The partnership further looked into the potentials of storytelling and critical thinking to support young women’s leadership.

In the final stages of the project, our team put together two interesting articles that summarize the project’s experience.

Projec’ts news!

Newsletters

Press-Release

Contact the project coordinator

Lavinia Apicella - lavinia.apicella@swideas.se