Youth Forum launches toolkit for standards for youth policy

At the Youth Forum’s Academy meeting, taking place in Paris this week, the European Youth Forum launched its new toolkit: 8 Standards for a Quality Youth Policy.

The toolkit was developed by the Youth Forum’s Expert Group on Youth Policy, made up of representatives from the Youth Forum’s member organisations, with the aim of developing a practical tool for youth organisations to assess the quality of youth policy in their own context (whether national, local, regional or European) and to support advocacy work calling for policies that fullfil young people’s rights.

The Expert Group has identified 8 quality standards that represent good quality youth policy. For each standard there is a set of indicators that help members to comprehensively analyse the situation in their context.

The toolkit is designed for members of the Youth Forum and youth organisations to use themselves and to examine and reflect on youth policies. Based on their assessment, organisations are encouraged to develop their advocacy plans in the light of what they found, in order to promote the rights of young people and, ultimately, make young people’s lives better.

The European Youth Forum encourages youth organisations to continue to call for better youth policies, which support young people in the areas that affect them most. It calls for youth policies which are mainstreamed across the various sectors, such as employment, education and healthcare. The Youth Forum would also like to see policies which see young people as a solution and not a problem, and calls for young people to be involved in the policy making process, so that they are integrally involved in formulating solutions to the problems which affect them.