What is the Federation of Children’s and Youth Municipal Councils? Figure it out now!
GYIÖT (Official name in English: Federation of Children’s and Youth Municipal Councils) has been established in 1996 with the aim of organizing and supporting the local initiatives of children’s and youth councils across Hungary. This means in practice that we promote the concept of youth work mainly at the local level. We are working with an 8-membered operative group. Some of our colleagues are full-time employees, some work on contract basis and also rely on volunteer work of some colleagues. The decision-making body is the general assembly of representatives which meets at least two times a year. The GYIÖT is one of the oldest organizations in Hungary that contributes to the development of local youth work through promoting youth participation. GYIÖT is a national organization that has a wide network of partners across Hungary.
Our main activity is concentrated around developing and promoting local youth work. We are cooperating with different stakeholders in this field in order to enhance the recognition of youth work in Hungary. We partially focus on projects where youth participation as a value/tool/principle is taken into consideration. We believe that participation is a tool but a value as well. We provide consultancy to local governments on developing their own youth work activities. We offer training and support to different organizations (youth clubs, youth councils, schools, associations etc.) about principles of youth participation, non-formal education etc. We also develop our own projects related with youth work, where we focus on the preconditions of youth work: therefore different projects are focusing on research to have evidence based local youth policies; or the newest project we are working on is basically mapping the competences of practitioners in the field to better understand who are the “youth workers” in Hungary.
We contribute to increasing the level of youth participation at any level, promoting democratic attitudes and supporting one activity that aims to involve young people in decision making processes. Active in promoting EU citizenship and critical thinking, as well as believe in fundamental human rights, rule of law. We are proud of the fact that during the last 10 years, we have managed to reach more than a thousand youngsters and decision-makers.
We work with local municipalities and authorities, youth workers, local youth organizations, children’s and youth municipal councils, education providers. We are an official internship placement organization of ELTE Faculty of Education and Psychology. Students from adult learning MA, community coordination BA program are supported and supervised during their university placements by our staff.
We are currently working with a team of 6 people whose primary task is to manage and execute ongoing projects. Some of them have more than 10 years of experience in youth work and some have been involved as volunteers and interns in the last year.