Freedom of expression is essentially connected with the human rights and the concept of democracy. Especially, it is important for young people because it is essential to help them to build their consciousness and knowledge of the world and of current events. Young people need to discover new and different ways to communicate in order to develop themselves personally and socially. On one side, more opportunities to tell about themselves, their opinions, their world mean improving self-knowledge and self-confidence; on the other side, the exchange of information fluxes support them in the process to become active citizens. Young people often have already familiarity with new media, but they don’t know their potentiality to develop freedom of expression and to build democracy. Discovering alternative ways to use new media will lead the young people to a deep awareness of the world problems, to connections with other people and to an active attitude in the society. In addition to this, a good knowledge of new technologies is nowadays part of the competences that are requested on the labour market, especially by young people. The Palestinian issue is a central topic of contemporary world, strictly connected with the themes of human rights and active citizenship. For young people from Europe, knowing directly this reality is important to become more sensitive to problems also outside European borders and, at the same time, more aware of general issues that involve all the human beings. For young people from Palestine, participants or target group, working in this direction is a way to empower and develop themselves learning to exploit the potentiality of new media in order to communicate and confronting themselves with youngsters from different backgrounds. So ARCS, in partnership with YDD, proposes the project Youth MEDIocracy Makers, whose objectives are: - increasing the awareness of human rights, especially of freedom of expression; - encouraging young people to participate and contribute to build a transnational society based on democratic, tolerance, justice and equality; - improving skills and competences in using new media to communicate; - spreading awareness of new media potentiality in the field of freedom of expression and active citizenship; - improving digital learning in coherence with the requests of current labour world; - involving participants with fewer opportunities and promoting a youth development based on the confront between different realities. Our project is composed by two kinds of activities: EUROPEAN VOLUNTARY SERVICE, that will involve the mobility of 4 volunteers from Italy to Palestine from the beginning of January 2015 to the end of March and other 4 from the beginning of April to the end of June, and YOUTH EXCHANGE that will be composed by two phases: one in Palestine in July and one in Italy in September with 15 participants from Palestine (+ 1 group leader) and 15 from Italy (+1). The participants will be between 18 and 30 years old and they will be balanced for number of boys and girls, young people in study or work paths and NEET youth. EUROPEAN VOLUNTARY SERVICE The EVS volunteers will compose the Media Unite of the receiving organisation (YDD). This Media Unite will have different objectives connected with the volunteers’ tasks: - Communicating YDD mission and activities; - Supporting the network between YDD and other youth organisations in Palestine; - Creating network with other youth organisations in the world; - Promoting advocacy campaigns; - Promoting Erasmus+ and supporting the YE preparation. YOUTH EXCHANGE After a long and participated series of preparation meetings, the YE participants will work on the topics of Human Rights, especially freedom of expression, Active Citizenship and Media. The program will include: - everyday team building activities, reflection groups and report of the day; - training about new media and editing videos; - workshops about Human Rights, Freedom of Expression, Journalism and Advocacy Campaign; - meetings with other organisations and experts; - fieldworks; - planning new initiatives; - intercultural open events. The Working methodology in both the activities will be based on several principle: match-making with the needs and the expectations of volunteers and participants; life learning based on autonomous and experiencing learning; intercultural learning; critical approach; team work; non-formal education methodology; systemic prospective. The results will be expected on different prospectives: on project participants, that will improve personal and professional skills; on target group of young people, that will become more aware of the project topics; on our organisations, that will enlarge their network and reinforce the partnership. But also we wish that the project impact will reach other organisations and stakeholders in order to spread awareness of the project topics and to influence local and transnational policies.