PEACE PROGRAMME FESTIVALS PROFESTS

An annual key activity within the Roots component will be the Local Capacities for Peace Programme Festivals (ProFests) aimed at opening up young people affected by conflicts to change of perceptions, attitude and behaviour. This component is also a best practice initiative piloted during the previous project phases.

The concept has been further elaborated making the ProFests forums where selected Roots Peace Work Institute alumni from all generation will act as key content developers and facilitators, with the project staff only assuming administrative responsibilities.

The ProFests are to be one-week-long residential pan-European activities enrolling minimum 40 participants.

These activities will be directly administered by YMCA Europe, yet in close cooperation with partner organisations at grassroots level. There are already preliminary agreements with number of YMCAs in Europe (Georgia, Greece, Spain, etc.), who are interested not only in hosting these key activities, but also in partial cost-covering.

We expects that this component of the Roots will set a tradition of regular YMCA youth events with clear focus on celebrating peace.