The Breathing Art Company is proud to share that we recently joined the “Break theCycle” Erasmus+ Project, which took place from 19th to 27th March in Samobor, Croatia. The Project was part of Erasmus+ KA1: Learning mobility of individuals, addressed to youth workers, funded by the Croatian National Agency and coordinated by Althea Association. Erasmus+ is the EU’s programme to support education, training, youth and sport in Europe through non-formal education, fostering transnational cooperation and mobility. It is managed by the European Commission, supported by National Agencies, and the general objective of the Programme is the sustainable development of Partner Countries in the field of Higher Education, developing the European dimension and promoting European values. As an Erasmus+ for youth workers, the “Break the Cycle” provided a non-formal education to young people through a whole week of workshops and activities focused on gender equality and sexism. Its main objective was the raising of awareness among youngsters, making them more conscious about the topic and empowering them as vehicles of positive dissemination for an improvement of the society and the workfield. “Break the Cycle” was joined by youngsters selected by international partners associations from Croatia, Ireland, Spain, Poland, Greece, Romania, Turkey and Italy. During the implementation of the project, the selected youngsters could learn and deepen their knowledge about gender balance, making new international friends and living an amazing experience abroad. The activities included different workshops aimed at understanding what sexism is and its different types, how to recognize it and how to define it. Moreover, the topic was also presented from a technical communicative point of view introduced by the “Hate Speech” concept and the consequent converting method “Counter Alternative Narrative Speech”, which can defuse the negative power of words and transform them into positive dissemination. Every work day was structured into four workshops, two in the morning and two in the afternoon, in which firstly trainers provided the explanation of a specific topic and secondly participants divided into groups unfolded exercises and activities linked to that topic. At the end of the day each group presented their outcomes and shared them to others. Not only were the treated topics really interesting and well explained, but also the following teamworks let youngsters get closer to the subjects, developing critical thinking, sensitivity to the matter and active consciousness about sexism. The trainers, Andreja, Umut and Leon, were well prepared and let people always feel heard, creating a perfect ground for healthy and constructive debates among participants. It was really amazing the positive and motivational energy that flowed among the activity room’s walls.
The program included also two inspirational wonderful guests: Sanja Siročić and Ljerka Oppenheim from the Sofijia Association in Zagreb. Their contribution was essential because they represent a beautiful reality dedicated to promoting gender equality and empowering women, being actively involved in raising awareness about the importance of gender equality through education, campaigns and public events. Thanks to their intervention, the young participants could truly understand how hidden and roots sinked is sexism and most of all how it can be easily detected in daily actions, speeches and images, such as in the advertisement we constantly have under our eyes. The enlightening week concluded with an overall research by each national group on the situation of their own Country about gender equality, presenting the outcomes to everyone and letting tables of discussion be open. At the end of this experience, we can affirm to be really satisfied by what we learnt. Thanks to that, we are more conscious about gender equality in all its shapes, being well trained to detect it and to fight it day by day. We will try to disseminate as best as we can, making efforts to improve our society and being active, careful citizens. For this reason, we will host a workshop of the “Break the Cycle”’s outcomes on 9th April at 18:00 in our dance center TheStudio, in II Strada Privata Borrelli 18. A massive thank you to the European Commission, the Croatian National Agency, Althea Association, the trainers, all people who made this project possible and who joined.

We can definitely make our world better!