LYRA Project Final Meeting

Dolna Banya, June 3-5, 2024
The seminar ‘Advocacy for SRH and Youth Campaigns – Sharing Experience and Plan For Future Activities’ on one of our projects – identifying and building young leaders, was held between June 3 and 5, 2024 in Dolna Banya.
We discussed the youth study visits to several institutions that took place in April this year. Then the boys and girls from Dupnitsa, Byala Slatina and Simitli visited, met people working there and found out how the SACP, NCPHA, UNICEF, the British Council and IoM work. They were tasked with learning details about the day-to-day and core activities of the organizations, as well as understanding how they work for and with vulnerable groups. They shared what they had learned as presentations at the event, where some of their mentors from the institutions were also presented. Within the framework of the meeting, colleagues from NGOs also presented, they shared good practices and upcoming initiatives of their organizations. Earlier, in the framework of this project, young people implemented campaigns to prevent certain diseases and also to recognize fake news in their communities. Future leaders have expressed a desire to be involved in some of the upcoming initiatives related to safety Internet surfing for children and adolescents.

The LYRA project (Launching Young Roma Advocates, 2021 – 2024) aims to identify and contribute to overcoming inequalities in marginalized Roma communities, by empowering young Roma leaders and ‘exporting’ knowledge about Roma to society. The initiative had a focus on the often underestimated and unstimulated, but actually serious potential of young Roma and the insufficient coverage of health services for Roma children, adults and youth in the national maternal and child health programmes.