Cities 4 YOUth Event in Alzira, Spain (29 of September to 3 of October 2025)

From 29 of September to 3rd of October 2025, young participants from across Europe came to Alzira this time around, under the Cities 4 YOUth (C4Y) project, co-funded by the CERV Programme. As previous events, this one combined cultural discovery, civic education, and hands-on youth engagement activities.

Day 1 – September 30, 2025

Day 1 of the project, and a strong start at that. After being picked up from the hotel, participants visited IDEA in Alzira, which is the Local Development Agency of the City Council of Alzira. The partner for this project, Idea Europa specifically is the hosting organization for this work package, and Idea offers a variety of services aimed at economic, employment, entrepreneurial, and social development including participating in EU programs such as Erasmus+, ESC and in this case CERV.

After an introduction to the team at Alzira, each partner went ahead and presented their municipalities, with what they do, and what they offer to youngsters and beyond

Next, we dove in into what kind of programs and support Alzira, and Spain has a whole to youngsters, with a special focus on what they call the "Youth Guarantee System". This is a system that helps youngsters, after high school in finding interships, courses which leads to work. Since 2027, they have been collaborating with IVAj in the Young Opportunity Program (named Joop). This program bares a striking resemblance to Cyprus' ΑνΑΔ, which is a public authority, with uses a nigh identical system and is responsible for developing human resources, mainly through training, skills development, employment policy, and matching workforce needs. Both ΑνΑΔ and Spain's Youth Guarantee System have the same goals. And it–

• Helps make the workforce more competitive, productive.
• Helps unemployed people get skills and become employable.
• Helps companies adapt to technological, green, and digital transitions.

The Youth Guarantee System also has a cards and credential system which which offer the following

Youth hostel card: from 14 to 29 years old – cheaper hostels

Adult hostel card: from 30 years old – once again cheaper hostels in their system.

Group hostel card: A system NGOs can use, to offer cheaper pricing for groups, and is usually sued if 10 or more people are staying.

Serving as a showcase for what else IDEA has, we had lunch at IDEA Escola de Cuina, which is running a KA1 VET program based entirely on cooking. This program offers NEETs (not employed, in education and training) this one year program on cooking, and the projects' members are the ones who made food for participants.

Returning back to IDEA, we were visited by the NGO Interpreta Natura. Hosted by their members Miguelon and Timo, they hosted one activity on the interconnected of nature, where each participant received a word such as bee, coral or tree, and participants had to use yarn to connect them all. After this, participants used scissors to see how when different things affect the environment, other aspects that are interconnected are also affected.

The last activity of the day was a World Café. One team focused on climate change, another plastic use, and the last on biodiversity issues. Each participant shared their perspectives and issues each of their local areas have.

Day 2 – October 1, 2025

Day 2 began with a refresher of how the Oxford debate works. To start, participants voted on the two topics that they want to focus on, and with a democratic vote, the two winners were

• Topic 1 – Living in a 50k-inhabitant city has better mental-health prospects than living in a metropolis
• Topic 2 - Small cities are better positioned than big capitals to achieve climate neutrality by 2040." 

Each house, split into 4 speakers, the fascilitators explained how

• Speaker A: Introduces the position of the team
• Speaker B: brining in hard data and statistics
• Speaker C: Rebuttals
• Speaker D: Sums up the points previously made by the 3 speakers. No new information is added.

With ample time to spear, the participants worked in their teams to prepare for the debates that will take place the next day.

To learn more about youth opportunities in Alzira and its surrounding areas, more organizations visited Idea to present to the participants. These were-

• Backslash – An NGO based in Valencia, Spain, committed to empowering young people through education, human rights, and social inclusion since 2014. There presentation explained how they promote democratic values, sustainability, and international collaboration, providing youth opportunities to develop skills in areas like entrepreneurship, social rights, and environmental awareness.
• Valencian Youth Council (Consell de la Joventut de la Comunitat Valenciana)

A platform that represents and amplifies the voices of young people and youth organizations across the Valencian Community. Through advocacy, policy dialogue, and participatory initiatives, they work to strengthen youth participation in democratic life, promote equal opportunities, and influence decision-making at regional and national levels. Their presentation showed their role as a unifying structure for youth organizations, fostering collaboration, representation, and active citizenship.

• Scouts Valencians – A youth organization rooted in the values of scouting, dedicated to the personal development of young people through education in values, outdoor activities, and community service. With a strong focus on leadership, teamwork, and sustainability, they encourage young people to take an active role in shaping a better society. Their presentation showed their commitment to non-formal education, environmental stewardship, and the creation of inclusive spaces where young people can grow and contribute to their communities.

Next stop – Valencia!

This allowed us to visit Institut Valencià de la Joventut (IVAJ). This is the public youth institute of the Valencian Community. IVAJ creates and supports youth policies and programmes that give young people more opportunities to grow, learn, and participate in society. They promote equality, inclusion, mobility, and active citizenship, while also supporting youth organizations. In their presentation, they explained how they help shape youth policy and offer services that support young people at local, national, and European levels. While it may seem overcomplicated for people for some other countries, they explained that there are 17 such regional youth institutes, for the 17 autonomous communities in Spain. This is because of the sheer size of Spain as a country, and such institutions are necessary for all youngsters to receive the same care and opportunities across the country.

The last activity of the day was a very cultural one, a tour of Valencia. The participants took a guided tour through old parts of Valencia and saw real monuments built by Romans and Arabs. They visited the Centro Arqueológico de l'Almoina, where remains of Roman buildings like the forum and other Roman period ruins are preserved.

Day 3 – October 2, 2025

The final day of our Youth Event in Alzira, as well as what the previous 2 days were building up to, the C4Y Youth Festival in Alzira.

Taking place in the school COLEGIO LA PURÍSIMA ALZIRA and involving all the students of the school and over 100 attendees, the youth festival began with the audience guessing what the debate was going to be about. This was done using different types of icons and guesswork. Once again, the topics were –

Living in a 50k-inhabitant city has better mental-health prospects than living in a metropolis

and Small cities are better positioned than big capitals to achieve climate neutrality by 2040."

Going head-to-head, with 4 persons per team, the teams voted with green or red balloons.

The second and last activity at this school were 10 non-formal education-based activities based on learning about the European Union taking place at the same time, with participants switching between them. For this activity, the participants of Cities 4 Youth joined the students of the school. Some activities focused on building ideal towns (and what they should include), quizzes based on the EU. Another activity was based on presenting fake news, with one real news sprinkled in, and participants had to guess which is the real one.

To finish up the project, participants had lunch in a nearby town called Cullera, and also had time to explore it.