Borders in motion

Borders in motion | Photo: Christian Lue

After more than a year of preparation, the eight project days passed remarkably quickly. This project, implemented by our partner Strait Up in Tarifa, Spain exceeded our expectations. As our first youth exchange composed entirely of participants under the age of 18, the project demonstrated convincingly that this generation possesses both the capability and the motivation to take on meaningful responsibilities.

Our group consisted of ten adolescents aged 15–17, each entrusted with the autonomy to design, implement, and evaluate their own workshops. Supported by mentors, including GSI Youth Advisory Board Coordinator Mohamed Ben Mussa Hamed,  and our colleagues from the Bremen Germany chapter of Nature Friends, the participants engaged in an impressive range of activities, including hiking, martial arts, comic creation, reflective journaling, standard dance, constructed language development, and even strategic card games.The diversity of these workshops highlighted the creativity and initiative of the group.

The central theme of the project concerned navigating “borders”, both physical and social.  Starting with the logistical border of sustainable transportation options, through linguistic borders with the German colleagues, participants explored the personal borders that cultures erect, and the borders between formal education and the freedom and responsibility demanded by  non-formal education.

The participants’ experiences ranged from waiting in the VIP lounge of Madrid’s Atocha Station, to unexpectedly traveling in a business-class car of a discontinued train, to sharing urban spaces with Málaga’s unhoused population. Each encounter contributed to a broader understanding of mobility, accessibility, and social coexistence in contemporary European cities.

We are deeply grateful to our partners at Nature Friends Bremen, whose expertise in professional youth work greatly enriched the programme. Their support was instrumental in enabling our participation and ensuring the project’s overall success. Participants from this event have joined the GSI Youth Advisory Board and, inspired by this collaboration, the team has already begun planning the next youth exchange.

This project was made possible through the support of the European Commission’s Erasmus+ programme.