Welcome to the International Youth Work Trainers blog and thanks for taking the time to have a read of the first post. Over the coming week youth work trainers from 20 countries will be coming together at the East Clare Golf Village in Ireland to begin working towards improving cooperation between youth work trainers in the international youth field and prepare for the Erasmus+ programme.

The group is arriving in Ireland today and will be spending this evening getting to know one another in a social setting before beginning the programme in ernest on Tuesday. During the first day the group will be looking at developing a shared understanding, mapping the international youth work training landscape and the European context – wrapped up with an open team meeting of all the participants to decide on actions and next steps.

Wednesday will give the group a chance to dream of international collaboration between youth work trainers and creating a vision for how collaboration will work in the future – with no holds barred on the possibilities and potential. During the afternoon the group will be spending time looking at how their ideas link into existing support structures, what new structures might need to be created and developing the action plan to move forward.

Thursday will be the final day and will be focused on clarifying the aims and objectives of the group, further developing the action plan and dividing out the tasks and actions to the participants. The group will also be drawing up a contract of cooperation which all the participants can subscribe to, giving a common reference point for them and allowing them to build ownership both within the group and in the wider international youth work trainers community.

Finally let me introduce myself, I’m Duncan Hodgson and I’ll be attending the full week and capturing the discussions, learning and actions through this blog and other social media channels. In the future the group will take ownership of the blog and further develop it themselves.

The group is also keen to engage the wider trainers community and would encourage contributions from others from the international youth work field who can’t be in Ireland with us – so do share with us your thoughts in the comments on the blog or by tweeting #iywt14. If you want to know more about how you can get involved in the conversation click here.