Balkan Culturtal Institute received a support from "Youth in Action Program" for its project named “Balkan Youth – Open Stages”. It is a multilateral youth exchange, which provides an opportunity for a meeting of 37 young people and leaders from five Balkan states: Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey, Greece and Cyprus. It is planned to be realized in Bulgaria at the end of June, 2013. The project aims within 8 days to give youths an opportunity to debate on issues such as how cultural diversity and belonging to a specific cultural and ethnic community reflects on social, respectively on the career development of young people; how young people develop their career and professional perspectives in the field of culture. It is planned best practices on promoting role of communities and institutions in building effective youth development strategies and policies for social inclusion and career development of young people in times of crisis to be exchanged and discussed. The program will offer a variety of methods in the sphere of non-formal education – the method of cooperative learning, interactive role games and workshops, presentations, artistic outdoor activities – open stages, visiting of cultural sights, cultural evenings. The project idea is to stimulate the cooperation between young people young people from arts communities in the Balkans, to contribute to the unity, tolerance and mutual understanding between them in the context of intercultural understanding.
