The year 2023 marks the end of the European Year of Youth and the beginning of the European Year of Skills and Competences but: how does it affect a project that its main target is not only young people but young people in the need of training and engaging in the creation process of business activity such as the RAISE Youth project? From FUNDECYT-PCTEX we can only talk about our own perspective and the relationship we have with the young community in rural areas of our region, but the answer is… not much.
When we stop to analyze the profile of the NEETs FUNDECYT-PCTEX has been working with while under the RAISE Youth project we discover that even though we can find that an ample majority of young people are well trained, academically speaking, or are even enrolled in formal education on and high or university level, but they still lack some basic skills needed when entering the job market or when trying to start their own business initiatives. This new European Year of Skills and Competences marks a new opportunity for all the projects and organizations participating to put the focus of their activities in the capacity building and training of young people all across the European territories, an opportunity we are willing to take.
During this year 2023 the team of FUNDECYT-PCTEX will continue on giving technical support to the R&D centers, private companies, universities and public institutions of Extremadura, organizing activities for transferring knowledge to relevant actors in the regions and will keep on working towards the goal of the RAISE Youth project, specially towards the strengthening of the trainings and capacity building networks in the region. From FUNDECYT we believe that young people need to be reinvigorated and make them part of the decision-making processes of those policies that directly affect them while also making them engaged in their communities and territories. To do this and also achieve the goal set for the RAISE Youth project we will keep on working with young people in rural areas of Extremadura to offer them the training they need to develop the skills and capacities needed to start their business activities while also making them more participative and engaged in the different volunteer work and activities done in their vicinities to put a solution to the problem they deem more important.
