On August 25-26, in the capital of Lithuania, Vilnius, the kick off  meeting of the Youth Integrity Ambassador Program (YIAP) took place, being the first TPM meeting of this project, supported by Erasmus+ programme in the field of youth, focusing on volunteering and good governance. 

Representatives from ENGSO (SWE), ENGSO Youth (SWE), EUSA (SLO), Special Olympics Europe-Eurasia Foundation - SOEE (IRE), Portuguese Sport Confederation (POR), Lithuanian Sport Federation Union (LTU), Organisation for Sports Education - OPES (ITA) and RF- SISU Småland (SWE) were attending the meeting that was held in the premises of the National Olympic Committee building in Vilnius.

The meeting was opened by an introductory session, where each partner had the chance to introduce the representing organization, their self and the position they will be taking in the project, as well as other members of the team that is going to be involved. The formal part of the introduction was followed with a teambuilding activity for the attendees to get to know each other a bit more, since they will be collaborating on this project in the next 2 years. 

The starting introductory session of the meeting was followed by a presentation of the objectives and phases of the project and detailing the number of participants in each meeting and foreseen phase of the project. It was presented that through this project the partners will be working on two big fields, EU Youth Strategy and EU Work Plan for Sport and that the goals are to make youth representatives the main characters, to give them the tools to reach the goals, to involve them in making decisions and creating a toolkit as well as to give them the space to share their ideas and to grow. After implementing these goals, the next goal will be to send them back to their local communities and to be the ambassadors that will try to engage other young people in future and implement the results of the project through inclusivity and teamwork.
Besides the main objectives the representatives of the partner organizations present were able to also hear and understand more about their roles and engagement in specific phases and activities of the project and about the multiplier events that they will be organizing together with selected youth participants.

The second part of the first day of  this meeting was dedicated to gathering more information about the project results and responsibilities of each partner organization and sharing ideas of best practices and ways of monitoring the evaluation and the learning framework of the project. The representatives talked about the foreseen activities and tools that are going to be created and organized by the partner organizations, such as the creation of the Youth Integrity Ambassador toolkit, the Youth Integrity Ambassadors Campaign and the project impact video, as well as getting a broader explanation about the dissemination events planned to be organized after the  training course which will be the second planned activity, after this TPM. The discussion part among the attendees, in which they shared their opinions and ideas on three main questions: how we want to monitor our results, how we evaluate it and how to keep the sustainability  of the results after the project is done, was the activity that wrapped up the first day of this kick off meeting in Vilnius. 

The second day of the kick off meeting, was held on the 26th of August and it was dedicated to informing and discussing about the next steps and other important details about the project such as the next meeting scheduled for Brussels happening at the end of September, the training course foreseen to happen in Portugal, the selection, criteria and profile of the youth representatives that are going to be participating in the project as well as visibility, communication and dissemination of the steps, activities and results of the project.

YIAP is a cooperative partnership with the aim to trigger a positive change within the sport sector and create a culture of integrity across Europe and to educate and empower young people with and without intellectual disability to become sport integrity ambassadors.
Funded by the Erasmus+ Youth Programme of the European Union, the project will run for a period of 24 months from May 2022 to April 2024. The YIAP project is led by the European Non-Governmental Sports Organisation (ENGSO) with ENGSO Youth (SWE) and Swedish Sports Confederation (SWE), partnering with EUSA Institute (SLO), Special Olympics Europe-Eurasia Foundation - SOEE (IRL), RF-SISU Smäland (SWE), Portuguese Sport Confederation (POR), Lithuanian Union Of Sport Federation - LSFS (LTU), Organisation for Sports Education - OPES (ITA) and associating partners The European Lotteries.

For more information, please see www.eusa.eu