YOUTHPASS WHAT IS IT AND HOW CAN I USE IT
Youthpass is the writing outcome of a non-formal education/experience. It has been created by the European commission as recognition tool for the certification of all the opportunity provided by the program Erasmus+.
Firstly, obviously a non-formal education will not replace the formal one, but, the first can become a great support of an official bachelor’s degree, a CV and other diplomas, just see it as a complementary of school studies. The Youthpass can actually be seen as a non-formal CV, not based on skills or knowledge, but mainly on competences acquired through learning-by-doing and non-formal education processes. Indeed, the most consequent effect of having our own YP, Is the capacity of self-reflective, auto-evaluation and self-assessment which directly leads to an enhancement of communication skills. Nowadays, this last is peculiarly valuable for the employers
In order to summarize the YP truly helps to structure thinking, regarding the learning process. Well, I think the genuine main aim of the YP is to improve the acknowledgement of the self-directed learning of the volunteer. The point is, when 83% of the volunteer in Youth Exchange think the YP helps to communicate skill when applying for a traineeship and 72% of the EVS volunteers think the same for a traineeship opportunities those numbers, even if they only represent statistics, show a real, long-term, serious trend toward the increasing influence and confidence on the non-formal education. By the volunteers, by the European institution and then, by the employers.
Testimonies:
Santa,Latvia, EVS
“For me, Youthpass has served as a great tool to transmit the experience and competencies that I have acquired during my EVS. In 2009, I did my long ter preoject of 12 months in an immigrants’ centre of “Fundacion Ataretaco” in Tenerife, the Canary Islands. Although I had no previous teaching experience, all my EVS activities were about giving lessons of Basic English and Spanish and informatics as well as alphabetisation.
After finishing my service, I decides ti stay for some time on the islands, because I wanted to learn more about immigration. That is a very important topic in the present of the Canary Islands and will be the future of Latvia.
The Evaluation Commission of the Master on Social Inclusion was giving extra point for those who already had any previous experience in the area. The competition to enter was quite difficult. So, I decided to attach to the application my Youthpass, the only experience I had working on social inclusion. I entered in the Master programme and it could that it was also thanks to those points that my Youthpass had contributed.
Then, after finishing the master and joining my PhD, I started looking for a job in Tenerife. There was a nice offer for a part-time English teacher in a very good school. The only problem was that they asked for previous experience in teaching. The only relevant one I had was from EVS, therefore I attached my Youthpass to the CV. And I got that job!
I couldn’t have imagined that my EVS as well as Youthpass impacted me so much, but in fact they have a lot !”
