Not so long ago the Elections Observation Project (EOP) of AEGEE, which aims at training potential election observers and creating a sufficient capacity within AEGEE for international election observation missions, brought forward the initiative to be more involved in the recent European Parliament elections besides voting. This involvement in the elections got translated in becoming a volunteer, member of the pooling station commission, or in any other way being a part of the organisational process of the European elections. Hence, several AEGEE members were taken by this idea and now would like to reflect on their experience and share it with the whole network.

Gratitude from the Central Election Commission of Latvia for volunteering at the EP2014

I was a volunteer at the election station in Riga on the 24^thof May. Despite the wonderful weather which made that Saturday very tempting for paying a visit to the beach, I spent the entire day in the polling station meeting Latvians who decided to do their civic duty and vote on Latvia’s representation in the EU for the upcoming five years. Checking voters’ passports and IDs, making necessary notes in the voters’ list, welcoming the media and observers of the overall election process were among my responsibilities. The highlight of her day probably was meeting one of the most prominent voters – the former president of Latvia – Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga. According to my observations she spent quite a long time in the voting booth carefully scrutinising candidate lists. Mrs Freiberga had a substantial input in the country’s accession to the EU, therefore the former president must have been very cautious choosing eight Latvian faces that will soon be seen in the next European Parliament. Another positive observation suggests that youth, middle-age and elderly people’s participation in the elections was more or less equal in that particular polling station. I also met several confused and puzzled first-time voters, as well as few non-Latvian EU voters who confidently came to do what they are entitled to. Overall, the turnout in the polling station I was volunteering in was one of the highest in Riga (and actually slightly beat the EU average).

Tomasz Kowalski voting

By the end of the election-day, I also counted ballot papers and followed the electronic vote counting procedure, which allowed me and my colleagues from the election commission to finish the day earlier than it would have been in the case of manual vote counting. After the elections I must admits that working 7 am-11 pm was exhausting, but the experience was certainly worth it. Next time, for the Parliamentary elections taking place in October I will try to become a member of the polling station commission.

Tomasz Kowalski (AEGEE-Gdańsk) was the chairman of the election commission in a tiny Polish district. Being in such a responsible position he was in charge of various tasks: managing a team of six people, handling bureaucratic issues and filling in the papers, taking care of the overall voting process, as well as managing the vote counting procedure and reporting election results to the City Council. It was 2am when Tomasz took a sigh of relief, when his working day was finally over. According to Tomasz’ observations, youth participation in the elections was terribly low in his district.  “Sometimes I feel that only older people feel the need to vote, younger people don’t care about such things at all. It is really sad. Personally I’m in favour of a compulsory voting system, but Poles are not prepared for this”, he said.  Therefore, he thinks that Poles still need to learn the rights and responsibilities democracy brings.

Youth after casting vote for EP2014 in Riga, Latvia

Sadly, Tomasz had to admit that it looked like his co-citizens do not appreciate the fact that Poland has been independent and free for nearly 25 years and it has made an enormous step forward since then. “I hope that one day we will reach the normal voting attendance.”

In Germany, seven AEGEEans, as well as non-AEGEEans, were involved in the election process in Koln. For instance, Sophie Schwab (not a member of AEGEE) was quite disappointed by her experience, since she only counted envelopes and ballot papers, therefore she did not feel the real civic spirit of democratic participation. For others it must have been a different experience – various lessons learnt and conclusions made.

The EOP is proud of our members’ commitment for the European elections 2014 regardless of the level and outcomes of their involvement. The project will continue strengthening its efforts in engaging AEGEE members in election processes since we already saw the success of our endeavors.

Written by Diana Ondža, AEGEE-Riga

Who observes if democracy works? How does election observation work in international organisations? And should there be an election observation procedure within AEGEE? To answer these questions, AEGEE members Alin-Florin Calin (AEGEE-Wien) and Thomas Leszke (AEGEE-Köln) decided to launch the Election Observation Project during Agora Zaragoza. Almost five months later, the first project meeting took place in Köln from the 7th to 9th March. Ten motivated members of the project met to define the different goals of the projects and to discuss further steps.

The team elaborated four different aims of the project. Each of the aims presents a different level of election observation, and are: to have a pool of AEGEE observers that are capable of observing international elections, to create an observations trainings procedure during Agorae, to get AEGEEans involved in domestic elections and to establish an election observation procedure within AEGEE during elections at Agorae and local Agorae.

After a day full of hard work, the project team members joined AEGEE-Aachen and AEGEE-Lviv, who were visiting Aachen, for an European night. This European night took place in a small and cozy bar in the city and was a great way to end the demanding day. The whole team enjoyed the time spent with them and are grateful to the locals. As usual, it was really fun to meet old friends and to make new ones. The first project meeting was a great success and all members left Köln motivated and dedicated to work more for this interesting and demanding project.

Of course the project didn’t stop after the meeting, but will continue to give members of the Network a lot of new opportunities. In weekly Skype meetings, the election observation project is taking the next steps to achieve its aims. Right now, the project is researching how to participate in the European Parliamentary elections in different countries and also the possible involvement of AEGEEans in international observation.

For the Ukrainian presidential elections in May 2014 the team is working in cooperation with the Eastern Partnership Project in order to accreditate our organisation to be able to send observers. At Agora Patra, team members will be conducting election observation during the Agora elections and show the results to the Network.

If you want to be part of the Election Observation Project, do not hesitate to join the EOP mailing list or check the Facebook page.

Written by Julia Krebs from AEGEE-Osnabrück and Nikolay Kazantsev from AEGEE-Sankt-Peterburg.

These are days of uncertainty. The crisis threatens to make Europe a smaller and darker place. What is the future of education in Europe? What can we do to improve it? In the Y- Vote Convention on Education, Research and Mobility organized by AEGEE-Kraków (from the 4th to the 9th of march0) some responses were given.

Erasmus +
The convention began with the new Erasmus+ program for 2014-2020, which became effective on January 1, 2014 and has caused great confusion. The main novelties are the unification of the old programs of formal and informal education Youth in Action, Erasmus, Comenius, etc. and its extension to sports education and vocational training, as well as greater opportunities for agreements with partners outside the EU. It is expected that the new Erasmus will simplify the paperwork for new agreements, to ensure a more equitable system of scholarships and to reach the entire European population (students, teachers, workers, etc.).
Following this, the importance of mobility programs and the need of institutional support was discussed. The wide range of social and personal skills they provide are useful when entering the labor market. In addition, cultural exchange and knowledge of reality they provide are vital for a united, educated and democratic Europe.

Quality of Education
Then, the discussion focused on “quality of education ” and the need for an education that meets the needs of the individual and society despite cutbacks situations under the excuse of the crisis. Education is not a cost: it is an investment.
Regarding the normal, non-formal and informal learning, it is also necessary to improve the poor recognition caused by public authorities and companies and the lack of tools to measure it.

“Visit” of MEPs
A visit of two Polish MEPs was scheduled for a colloquium. To everyone’s disappointment, they did not come, alleging scheduling problems. So we had to throw our questions about the European policies to their assistants. We got the feeling that there are going to be only a few solutions from the highest levels and that the Erasmus generation will have to make a change, so that working on platforms like AEGEE in the near future will become more important than ever.

Students Agenda for Europe
During the last few days of the event, we wrote the final document which will be presented to the next European Parliament: the recommendations for Students Agenda for Europe.
The process started with identification problems within the competence of the EU and then the proposition of feasible, concrete and clear solutions.

Y Vote?

Lately, disappointed by the political situation that led to disaffection of young people regarding the system, rather than in rebellion, had resulted in disinterest in politics. Why vote? Because in the Parliament the future is decided. Your future. Our future. You can decide with your vote. If you do not vote, no one else will decide for you. Vote. And even if you disagree with all political options and even with the same system, do not make abstention: vote spoiled ballot-paper. Abstention is just to renounce to a right. Voting is to decide. Decide.

More European
It was not just a meeting on education but also on Europe and its people. Every day and night, the great organisers of AEGEE-Krakow showed us the charm of their city, the university capital of Poland. It took us a week to learn about the customs, the past and the dreams of the others. And about ours.

And the last night came. Find the missing sock across the room. Zips. “I have to spend the last zloty: let’s go for beer!” Then a shower and the European Night.
And back to your city. But only to your city. Because all the time you were at home.

On May 25, do not forget to vote in the European Elections.

Written by Javier González Moreno (AEGEE-León).
Pictures courtesy of Karina Kubis (AEGEE-Kraków) and Karolina Kubala (AEGEE-Kraków).

Within 18 months the European Union citizens will be called to participate in the elections for the European Parliament. The paper ballots and the voting ceremony is perceived as the biggest expression of democracy. And yes, it does have a symbolic power and it is a very necessary part of the system of representative democracy towards which many countries have turned in the past. But democracy goes much beyond. In a true democratic culture, the citizens have the opportunity to participate in the process on a regular basis, establishing a dialogue with their representatives in parliament, in order to really have their opinion voiced there. And with elections coming closer, this dialogue really intensifies, and the citizens receive clear information about their options, so they can ask questions (and get answers) in order to have all the necessary data that will allow them to make an informed decision at the moment of voting.

We all know our current system is far from perfect. Citizens lose confidence in democratic institutions because they feel an immense gap between them and their representatives. Clear symptoms are the low participation rates in the elections, the perception of politicians as a cause of problems when they should be there to solve those problems, and the apparition of movements which question the current political system (like the Indignados in Spain, Occupy Wall Street in the USA).

Youth nowadays disregard politics, they do not consider it their business. Why should we care, when they do not care about us? This is the beginning of many problems. In AEGEE we have to think differently. If politicians do not want to listen to us, we are going to shout louder, we are going to learn how the politicians’ world works, so we can chase them and make them hear our ideas. Because if we do not, they will only listen to the vision of young people from their own political parties, who will to a large part tell them what they want to hear.

Y vote results booklet

As mentioned before, in 18 months we will celebrate elections to the European Parliament. It is the period when politicians are more approachable, as they need to convince the citizens to cast their votes. We will once again take this opportunity and shape it into a project which aims to encourage young people to vote in the EP elections. Yes, our project will do that, but why not have youth participation in a broader sense included? Why restrict ourselves to the framework of the elections? Why not take EU politicians beyond their comfort zone? The results of European Parliament elections will affect every citizen of every country in Europe for at least 5 years, therefore we should have a broad project present in all our network. The Y Vote project 2009 was a great success and we will take it as an inspiration, but we can aspire to have a more inclusive project. We have the expertise and we have the ideas, and soon we will have the right people to shape an impactful project. There is no time to lose.

The Comité Directeur has launched an open call for members interested in creating this project. You can still join this initiative by sending an email to miguel.gallardo@aegee.org with the subject “team elections” and including your name, antenna and a short description of how you see yourself participate in the project. Deadline November 4th.

If you are at the Agora, approach us any time, maybe during the AEGEE Fair. We are happy to receive feedback or ideas on this topic.

There will be a meeting of all interested people on Saturday after the closing of the last plenary, at dinner time.

Written by Miguel Gallardo Albajar, Comite Directeur & AEGEE-Alicante