From November 29 to December 6 UNOY Peacebuilders together with PATRIR from Romania and Peace Dialogue from Armenia organised a study session on Gender Equality in Youth Peacebuilding Projects. The session was supported by the Council of Europe’s Directorate of Youth and Sports and held at their European Youth Centre in Budapest. In addition to the five-person implementation team, 29 participants from 22 countries came together to share their experiences and learn from each other and the trainers. The purpose of the study session was to explore how youth peace NGOs can address and challenge gender inequality when implementing projects and activities. It was a busy week with an ambitious program that ran all day, and often with gender themed movies or discussions after dinner at night. Many new contacts were formed and follow up projects created. The session was a great success, and certainly reminded us of the importance to continue to work on including gender in youth peacebuilding projects.

The study session made it obvious for me how far my organization is from being truly gender mainstreamed. I came out with practical tools to initiate changes and go much further than merely monitoring the standard indicators of gender breakdown. Thanks UNOY! – Volha (Belarus)

Rarely in one week am I as challenged, inspired, encouraged and mentally stretched as I was last week during UNOY's Gender Equality study session. The participants all had something to share meaning we've all gone home not only understanding the topic better but also with new ideas for projects, with new concepts. It reinvigorated my belief that we can create a world that is equitable to all genders peacefully. – Lydia (UK)

Thank you for an excellent week that you organized for us. It was an intensive, challenging and fruitful week. We learned, found, and shared many things from you and all other participants. I am happy that I experienced such a beautiful week in my life. I will do my best to use these experiences in my future practices. Hope in future you will hear good news from me and from all of us. – Famil (Azerbaijan)