The coordinating body is a group of individuals who are eager to directly collaborate with youth on daily issues, supporting their bottom-up/grassroots initiatives and establishing connections based on mutual empowerment, raising the qualitative bids of adult-youth partnerships:
Gil Pereira. Youth-work practitioner, environmental activist and educator, biologist.
“Since my 16 years of age that I’ve been actively volunteering in the NGO world, starting from my hometown Avintes, in Vila Nova de Gaia, and proceeding at a regional, national and international level, on a path that deeply shaped my interests in life and my beliefs about the importance of participative citizenship in society and education as the main drivers for social change.
Later on, I graduated in Applied Biology at the University of Minho, in Braga, followed by a specialization in Environmental Education at the Faculty of Biotechnology of the Portuguese Catholic University, in Porto. After that, since 2007, I’ve been working on several projects and institutions in the fields of education for sustainability and nature conservancy.
On the same last period of years, I’ve also been dedicating a big part of my time to youth work, with the main focus on non-formal education and its huge potential to complement the formal educational system.
I’m currently a youth worker at YUPI, an NGO located in Vila Nova de Famalicão (where I also live), managing and implementing projects of cooperation between schools and the local community, international youth mobility projects and capacitation actions to informal groups of young people.”
Isabel Pratinha. Psychologist.
“Since I concluded my master degree in Psychology – Specialisation in Psychological Intervention, Education, and Human Development at the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of the University of Porto, I have been working in different school contexts, that include formal and non-formal education.
I started my professional path collaborating in research projects in the Development Psychology field. Later I got a job as a psychologist in a high school in Maia. More recently I have worked as a teacher in Nepal and afterward, in a Waldorf school in Latvia.
In 2016, I attended the Long Term Training Course inFormal – on the integration of non-formal education approaches to the formal education system for youth empowerment at a local level.”
Olga Glumac. Youth work practitioner, codesigner, researcher.
“I have obtained a Masters degree in Graphic Engineering and Design at the Faculty of Technical Sciences, University of Novi Sad, Serbia.
For the past ten years, I have been working with youth NGOs and collaborating directly with different community stakeholders on various fronts (project management and administration on the executive level; coordination of local programs; education). I try to practice reflection in regards of education subjects, enriched by actively concluding three training courses for youth work practitioners that follow non-formal education methodologies, under the Erasmus+ program.
I have been living in Portugal since 2012 and currently, I am pursuing a Ph.D. in Design on the subject of Citizenship, Inclusion, and Participation within the Ph.D. Design International Program at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto. My passion is coaching youngsters as partners in codesigning learning processes for their self-empowerment, inside the school context.”
Raquel Morais. Teacher of graphic design, researcher.
“I was born in Lisbon, in 1970, but I live and work in Porto. I currently teach in a vocational school called Árvore and I conduct research in I2ADS in the Fine Arts Faculty of Porto University. My experience is shared between illustration, design and digital arts. As a researcher and teacher, the fields I focus on are social design, education for sustainable development and artistic education.
I finished a Masters degree in Digital Arts – Multimedia (Escola das Artes – UCP) in 2001, and concluded my Ph.D. degree in April 2015 with the thesis Risco & Stroke – the experience of teaching graphic design for the construction of the individual.
My professional route bounces between animation (Filmógrafo studio, Porto, 1992-93), children’s illustration (Porto Editora, 1994-97; magazine “Pais e Filhos”, 1997-99; Editora Nova Gaia e Editora Educação Nacional, 2005-12), silk-screen, web design and interactive aplications for education.”
Tamara Todorović. Language teacher, youth work practitioner.
“I obtained my Bachelor’s degree in Spanish Language and Hispanic kinds of literature at the Faculty of Philology, at the University of Belgrade, Serbia. Soon I developed a love for working in education with young people, which led to choosing to teach foreign languages as my vocation.
I live in Porto, Portugal, since 2011, where I obtained a Master’s degree in Teaching Portuguese as a Foreign Language at the Faculty of Arts of the University of Porto. I currently work as a freelance teacher of Portuguese as a Foreign Language, and I perceive myself also as a youth work practitioner, particularly interested in inclusive learning environments, youth empowerment and intercultural learning.”
In case you want to contact us, please do so via: locyplatform@gmail.com
Lab of Collaborative Youth 