There is a way out
“There is a way out” is a project resulting from Youth Council’s previous work with young female offenders in Correctional Home for Juveniles in Krusevac. The project got together young offenders and local young volunteers through organization of joint activities in the institution. Realization of the project has started in April and will last until October 2010, and the project is financially supported by Institute for Sustainable Communities (ISC, USAID).
The overall goal of the project is to contribute to efficient implementation of reforms in legislative system in Serbia in accordance with the National Program for EU Integrations and European Prison Rules, through process of re-socialization of young offenders.
Besides organizing educational workshops with 45 chosen young offenders, we are also preparing a joint theatre play as a final event, which will be performed in Correctional Home and Krusevac theatre, with both volunteers from the local community and young offenders as actors – members of the theatre studio “Bata Milosavljevic”, within Cultural Center Krusevac.
By promoting new way of youth participation and advocating about the process of EU integrations through promotion and support of reforms in penitentiary system, we are contributing to social inclusion of young offenders in the process or re-socialization and also promoting cooperation between civil and public sector and show that European values and standards can be applied on local level.
What gives a unique European dimension to our project is our cooperation with Youth Justice Board in UK, a non-departmental public body within UK Ministry of Justice. It works with young offenders, and to prevent offending and re-offending in UK. We have got the honor to be the first organization in the world to get the complimentary access to their training website, where all the information and material about their work with young offenders is kept. Until now, the access to this website was available only to employees in Ministry of Justice and Youth Justice Board in UK.
