If you experience any kind of issue by watching the video, please click the following link: http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=LMYRqNYBztg


drew our attention to examples of social media and movements that enable youth to become agents of change. Rita stressed the world’s ‘youth bulge’


that is increasingly marginalized by


multinationals that place economic and political motivations above anything else. The shared imperative by both of these outstanding leaders, however, was a pressing message for us all - particularly as we began a conference on youth. They urged us to always be deeply informed of the world around us, to be even more engaged through informed action and to remain unwaveringly motivated through it all. I was certainly encouraged, and I returned to their thoughts with others as we met one another during meal breaks and across tables in workshops.


And it was through those workshops that the multiple angles, perspectives and strategies around youth development would be unpacked,


explored and contextualized. [click here for


full program]. One of the most well received workshops at the Forum was from Simon Malbogat of Mixed Company Theatre in his session entitled Acting Out Social Conscience.


Inspired by


Brazilian theatre practitioner Augusto Boal, himself a student of the critical pedagogue Paulo Freire, Simon used principles and methods of Forum Theatre to engage participants to imagine different responses and outcomes to common problems. The result is a tool that can stimulate thought, dialogue and action around for all ranges of issues related to youth and social change. More specifically for the international development practitioner were workshops like the one by Nadine Grant and Riaz Nathu of Plan Canada and the Aga Khan Foundation Canada, respectively. Participants were taken to Indonesia and Northern Pakistan, where


the speakers shared their respective youth-centric


models for sustainable economic empowerment programming. Workshop participants were tasked to engage directly with these


models, and undertaking, for example, a robust assessment


imaging themselves as practitioners in those settings to reveal


employment needs, opportunities and readiness. This workshop underscored the importance of adopting context-specific economic development models for youth if


improvements to overall quality of life for an entire generation are to be achieved.


With 3 workshops to choose from at each of the six modules over the course of


two days, the overall experience to be had


by each participant was bound to be varied. To visually capture these diverse learnings, each workshop concluded by asking participants to summarize on flipchart the top three big ideas they would walk away with. Near the end of the Forum, a wall nearly covered from top to bottom with these learnings allowed everyone to gaze over the collective response and this served as a poignant reminder of the power of a collective capacity on any given subject, not least youth development.


Closing comments from Newmarket-Aurora MP Lois Brown engaged the audience on a number of issues and settings where the Canadian government is active. Following her remarks, OCIC hosted a reception, with dance and spoken word performances, to allow participants to continue conversations and networking with new and familiar friends. I spoke to many that evening who commended the comfortable and safe space that was created during the Forum. In such a setting, voices from youth and those concerned and working with and for youth alike were heard all the more clearer. That OCIC enabled such a space on a subject so important to our collective and shared futures meant a great deal to me as a part of the organizing team and even more so as an individual committed to bettering a world with youth at its centre.


iAM March 2014


17


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