A delegation of the International Movement ATD Fourth World, Among Which Young European People, Met by Commissioner for Education, Culture and Youth, Androulla Vassiliou
Press Release Bruxelles, Brussels, Monday 30th May 2011:
With European institutions
- Youth Appeal to Europe : “We have trouble understanding this world but we want to find our place in it”
- “Appeal to each person and to European officials”, at the Commemorative Stone in Honour of the Victims of Extreme Poverty on the Esplanade of the European Parliament: photos
- "Joining with young people to rid Europe of poverty and exclusion"
- The Fourth World European Committee
- The European Fourth World People’s Universities
- Cercle de pensée Joseph Wresinski
- European Fourth World Solidarity
"The young people ", said ATD Fourth World Director for Europe Véronique Reboul-Salze, “called the European Union to really invest in young people and not leave the weakest aside”.
A school system where everyone succeeds
Nowadays within European Union, the ratio for early school-leaving among young people is that of one for seven, notwithstanding the low level of literacy which reaches one in five for teenagers aged 15. Young people report that school fails its aim as far as young people and children living in extreme poverty are concerned. They feel unconsidered and even rejected by the school system, which takes into consideration neither their life experience nor that of their parents. Too often, plans of actions and networks set up to help young people in failure are "dead ends" offering no future. These devices stigmatize them even more, break their motivations, and result in neither recognized diplomas, nor work.
International Movement ATD Fourth World requested that the experience and the thought of the poorest people be taken into account in order to fight against early school-leaving, and that teachers be trained to become partners of the pupils’ parents, especially those who are the most impoverished.
Access to training and employment for all young people
It is indeed through employment that one gets trained to work. The young people asserted their aspiration to finding a job in which they could get accompanied and trained as well as financial security. They called the European Union to encourage Member States and institutions to do their utmost so that young people - and in particular those who are the least trained - may not be left to themselves in their first job-seeking.
Helping young people from all backgrounds and EU countries to meet
Young people want to contribute to a society where everyone could live in dignity and they demonstrate it through numerous acts of resistance and solidarity against situations of injustice. They called for means to be implemented in order to reach out to the young people experiencing the most difficult situations and to support them with getting trained in any European country, with travelling within EU, and thus be offered opportunities to open up, to meet others, and to contribute to a fairer society.
Commissioner Vassiliou welcomed the meeting with ATD Fourth World and emphasised how important such meetings are, as they provide an opportunity to speak to young people about their life experiences in person and not simply from a theoretical point of view. She also underlined her own commitment to combating poverty through education: "This year, the European Commission has already published new initiatives on Early Childhood Education and Care and Early School Leavers, which will help the EU to reach two of the headline targets of the Commission’s ’Europe 2020’ strategy – to reduce the share of early school leavers and combat poverty and social exclusion."
For further information, please contact :
Marie-Cécile Renoux: 00-33-6-80-07-80-84 mail :
