The Listening Caravan contributes to the well-being of young people

In the fall of 2019, the “Warm City” campaign was launched with Deinze’s mascot Warm William. Through this campaign, the city is focusing on the mental health of children and youth. In this context, the JOW caravan was created this summer, in the Warme William listening room. This fall, the JOW Caravan took a school tour to a number of high schools in Deinze to introduce its youth work to many students.

“Warmy William is part of the Warm Cities and Municipalities campaign,” says Connie de Spiegeler, a local councilor responsible for healthcare. “De Warme William is used to discuss mental health and resilience among children and young people. Cities and municipalities are motivated to undertake campaigns and projects to spread Warme William and its message locally. The campaign itself also provides beautiful examples of inspiration, including the design of the listening room. This is a safe space that you design and lead yourself , so that anyone who is upset about something has a familiar place they can go.Urban Youth Development Works has begun working with a number of young people to create a mobile listening room.

Go mobile

“A mobile space for young people has many advantages. It provides young people with a familiar, accessible environment in which they can express themselves and be heard. This helps build confidence and reduces barriers to talking about Personal matters.

“At the same time, a range of activities is provided. Because everyone has the right to free time, this is an excellent opportunity to introduce the diverse offer to the young people themselves. Participating in leisure activities is not only a right, it stimulates creativity, self-confidence and social interaction, which is essential.” For young people’s well-being and emotional development.

The JOW mobile will always be operated by youth development workers from Deinze City. They provide a listening ear, provide recreational activities and can guide young people in their search for help.

In short, the mobile listening room is an extension of Danish youth work and thus contributes to the well-being of young people.

School tour

“To make the Prieljant Youth Center better known among young people, we will conduct a school tour. Concretely, at the beginning of the school year we visited different schools with the JOW convoy and offered different activities to the students during the lunch break,” says Rutger de Reo. “We organized sports and games, installed a photo booth and a building field which we left in the school grounds for a week. In this way, the students were able to learn about various urban youth initiatives, including the youth center and youth development work.

Brillgant Youth Center is an open house for young people and their organizations. They can go there for confidential chat, a variety of activities and extensive support from their Youth Association. By focusing on accessibility and a warm, family atmosphere, we want to offer young people a safe experimental space. We give them space and support them. The space they need to be young and the support they need to find their way as growing teens. We not only focus on accessible entertainment offerings, but we also provide additional guidance to young people in other areas of life through our youth development work.