South East European Youth Network (SEEYN)

The South Eastern European Youth Network (SEEYN) is a network organisation involving 16 member NGOs from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Kosova, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Slovenia. It is an attempt of overcoming differences among societies that have recent tradition of conflicts through bringing young people from the entire South Eastern Europe region to work together. ‘The vision of SEEYN is to achieve a stable region with developed mutual understanding without prejudices among young people through their mobility, co-operation, and active role in society’. SEEYN aims to promote pro-social values, peace and understanding through grassroots volunteer exchanges, advocacy actions and capacity building in organisations. Year of the foundation: 2000 Structure of organization: General Assembly, Steering Board, Executive Director SEEYN is starting implementation of an IPA project in Albania “Volunteering values and practice in service of people with disabilities in Albania” in partnership with its members from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and an Italian partner in 2011. SEEYN and its trainers provide training and consultancy to organisations and institutions that want to develop different forms of voluntary service. In 2010 we organised 7 international training courses. We also started an SEE networking project for European Year of Volunteering 2011. In 2009 we have organised training for youth exchange leaders and 2 trainings for young trainers with support of Youth in Action. In the first half of 2008 we delivered 40 in-house trainings with aim to support capacity of volunteering organisation in SEE countries. In 2007 we have delivered 40 trainings as well as one seminar and one TC supported by Youth in Action. SEEYN delivered 40 trainings during 2006 in topics such as volunteer management, project cycle management, fundraising, PR, EC YOUTH Programme as well as 2 trainings for trainers SEEYN is organizing and supporting short and long term exchanges of volunteers in the region since 2000. We have exchanged more than 100 long term volunteers within the region. Each year our members organize more than 50 international voluntary work camps across the SEE region. SEEYN is also active in the field of advocacy and lobbying, especially for volunteering. We are a member of European Volunteer Centre (CEV). In period 1999 – 2008 we have been funded by Danish Ministry of International Programme FRESTA/The Neighbouring Programme. In that period SEEYN provided organizational and financial capacity to its members and other NGOs in the field of volunteering, youth mobility, cross-border cooperation and non formal education. Over the years we have strengthened our member organizations to become leading volunteer centres and services in their countries and improve recognition and legislation of volunteering in SEE countries. We gained lot of experience and know how in building network structures, programmes, strategies and identity. We have capacities to share this competences with other networks and similar organizations.