Non-governmental organization Youth Power was part of the study visit held in Mostar under the project “Men and Boys as partners in promoting gender equality and prevention of extremism and violence among youth on Balkan” from 15.4 to 17.4. 2019. The study visit was related to the Y Program, which is being implemented in secondary schools in the region where participants had the opportunity to get acquainted with the history of the Y Program, the accreditation process of Program Y in the Herzegovina – Neretva Canton, standards for implementing this program in schools and to discuss the following steps. Participants of the study visit were representatives of relevant ministries, institutions, schools and partner organizations from the region.
The guests had the opportunity to get to know more about the cooperation of the Youth Power organization and the ministry of education, science, culture and sports of Croatian National Theatre, where minister Hadžović welcomed them.
Hadžović said that Youth Power has been cooperating with the ministry for the last few years and have so far realized 800 different workshops in 12 different schools and included the complementary structure of school management and the students who became peer educators.
“Today we have a meeting of the governmental and non-governmental sector. Our goal is to regularly prevent any bad things happening in a society like alcohol, drugs, gambling, etc. “, Hadžović emphasized.
Sumka Bučan, director of CARE International, said she is currently working on creating a methodology that could be introduced into school systems.
“The importanceof this work is the Y Program, the youth program, which is accredited in several parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In Serbia, the program is of special importance, while it is accredited in Kosovo and we are working on accreditation in Albania. Our goal is to introduce the youth program into the system. This program supports healthy lifestyles, works on the prevention of peer and gender-based violence and promotes gender equality” – said Bučan.
The last day of the study visit was reserved for visits to high schools where activities were conducted and participants had the opportunity to speak with directors, pedagogues and peer educators and therefore find out their standpoint and view of the program itself.