Eurodesk Iceland organized a visit to Grundarfjörður earlier this week and presented opportunities abroad for local young people. The presentations were made in collaboration with Alicja Chajewska who lives in Grundarfjörður and were therefore available in three languages, Icelandic, English and Polish.
On December 6, Eurodesk visited Grundarfjörður and held presentations in the town. The small town is located on the Snæfellsnes peninsula, overlooking Breiðafjörður bay. The visit was part of reaching out to the countryside in a more active way and offering a personal chat with the staff of Eurodesk and the National Agency for Erasmus+. During this visit, a special emphasis was also placed on reaching immigrants, so the visit was organized in collaboration with a Polish European Solidarity Corps (ESC) trainer named Alicja Chajewska, who now lives in Grundarfjörður. Alicja has a great interest and knowledge of Erasmus+ and ESC and helped to promote the event through her network.
Two types of presentations took place at the local upper secondary school, one in Icelandic and one in Polish, and a trilingual Erasmus+ coffee in a café in town in the afternoon. Instead of the traditional presentation for the students in the school hall, a comfortable presentation area was set up next to the lounge area in the central space of the school, and in this way the students could be invited to talk about the parts of the programs that they were interested in. The students were really happy to have an informal discussion rather than a slide presentation. A group of Icelandic-speaking and Polish-speaking students took part in the conversation.
The team then visited the primary school and the library before the Erasmus+ open house started at Valería kaffi. 12 people with diverse backgrounds came there - such as refugees from Ukraine, a Polish-speaking parent interested in opportunities for their children, and representatives from the Grundarfjörður Community Center and the Snæfellsbær Youth Council. They welcomed the opportunity to hear about the possibilities of European cooperation, to participate in a brainstorming session with the Eurodesk and National Agency staff and to get a personal visit to their local area.
We would like to thank Grundfjörður and other guests of the events for the interesting discussions and great reception. A special thanks goes to Alicja for a successful collaboration.
