Finding a Common Denominator with Young Europeans

Nowadays the gap between the language use of the young and older people is perhaps wider than ever. The appearance of Twitter and Facebook has fundamentally changed the spoken language of an entire generation, which is sometimes difficult to comprehend for the society of adults. For Veszprém’s Design Driven City concept and, accordingly, our ECOC bid, a key issue is how we may bridge this ever-widening gap. We are working on creative and innovative solutions to successfully involve these young people in urban communities and the work of the ECOC team.

In our Generation V project, for example, we are inviting secondary school and university students to work with us in redesigning the city between 2019 and 2023. The young people will work together for one year in small groups, each on a concrete urban planning question or problem. After the research period of the first few months they will have the opportunity to collect experiences abroad on a European study round-trip. Their work will be aided by well-known architects, artists and artisans.

The Camp Balaton project is aimed at rethinking camping by Lake Balaton – a tradition of cult status by now. Thousands of children spend their summer holidays every year in children’s camps around the Lake – to them, we would like to show something new and organise exciting programmes: fill the camps with culture and creativity. We are going to organise talent discovery camps for talented young people in a range of arts, where they may exercise their skill and deepen their knowledge under the mentoring of professionals and renowned artists. At the end of the project, children will have the opportunity to present what they can do in a mini-festival. Although students go back to their classrooms at the end of the summer, we do not intend to stop there: creativity development methods and programmes will be created in cooperation with youth-oriented cultural institutions and civil organisations.