On 16th July 2015, groups of young people have arranged to meet in several Alpine protected Areas (APA) and natural sites throughout the Alps in order to share a physical, human, cultural and artistic collective experience in the mountains.
This is a collective project originating from the “Mountain Environment Education in the Alpine Protected Areas” working group, organised for the first time this year by ALPARC and Educ’Alpes, the network of French mountain education actors.
“Youth at theTop” is first and foremost an international project: a collective action will be organised simultaneously in six Alpine countries (France, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Germany and Slovenia), which will create links between the different countries and symbolically go beyond administrative and language barriers by considering the Alps as a sole region.
So this will be a day that will mobilise several Alpine actors around a unifying, original action. Above all it will be a friendly project to allow young people to “live an experience”, with the aim of making them aware of the value and importance of these mountain territories and developing (or giving back) a feeling of belonging there. The evening of 16th July will be a high point of the operation when the young people will come together around a collective artistic action on the theme of light. Their restitutions will then be shared and highlighted.
Despite the novelty of the event, the protected areas and other mountain education actors have lost no time in mobilising. Indeed, for this 1st test edition, 24 APA managers have chosen to take part. In addition to them, there will be 5 events run by an APA/ local operator partnership and one event organised by a refuge outside the protected areas which is an active member of Educ’Alpes, making a total of 31 events.
You can find all the 2015 “Youth at the Top” events attached here, as well as in our online calendar.
An Internet site, as well as a Facebook page, are being prepared for more effective communication of the information about the project and to facilitate exchanges between the various actors:
www.youth-at-the-top.org
https://www.facebook.com/YATevent
The “Youth at the Top” project has the financial support of our partner the German Ministry for the Environment
