Youth for Europe, Action 1 of the Youth in Action programme, encourages young people’s active participation, mobility and the development of their sense of citizenship.

It has three main strands:

• Youth Exchanges with European partner organisations (Action 1.1)
• Youth Initiatives at local, regional or transnational levels (Action 1.2)
• Youth Democracy Projects focusing on the participation of young citizens in democratic structures at local, national and European level (Action 1.3).

What is a Youth Exchange?
Youth Exchanges bring together groups of young people (supported by youth workers/leaders) from two or more countries. This provides them with an opportunity to meet, discuss and confront various themes/issues such as racism, the environment or gender equality, whilst learning about each other’s countries and cultures. This Action is open to young people resident in the UK between the ages of 13 and 25. Under exceptional circumstances you can include a small number of participants aged 26–30.

What is a Youth Initiative?
Youth Initiatives are projects devised, managed and delivered by young people. Projects are communitybased and help young people develop their initiative, enterprise and creativity. Youth Initiatives are also integral to young people gaining basic project management skills which are easily transferable to the job market:

• setting budgets
• project planning
• reporting–skills

This sub-action supports projects designed at local, regional and national level (National Youth Initiatives) as well as on a European level (Transnational Youth Initiatives) and is open to young people between the ages of 15–30 (15–17 permitted with a coach).

What is a Youth Democracy Pro ject?
Youth Democracy Projects aim to increase the active participation of young people within their local, regional or national communities or at international level, by supporting their participation in representative democracy.

The core concept is ‘active citizenship’ and a project should therefore:

• recognise and support the various forms in which young people can play a more active part in society
• improve young people’s understanding of and relationship to representative democracy
• assist them to take advantage of available participation opportunities.

Applicants must have a national and transnational networking dimension. This means that each project must be based on partnerships from at least two different countries and in each country there must be at least two different partners. A partner can be a non-profit organisation, a local/regional or national authority, or an informal group of young people (aged between 13–30).

Youth in Action application deadlines