Peer-to-Peer Learning Visit in Hamburg

In May 2025, School to Work participated in a learning visit in Hamburg, Germany.

The ESF+ Support Center is an organization within the EU that encourages Peer-to-Peer learning and expert visits. The main purpose of the visits are to provide an opportunity for organizations to share expertise and learn from each other's experiences.

This Peer-to-Peer learning visit were first initiated by School to Work, the EU-Commission and Kilkenny. We have since then expanded our group by including Vilnius, Hamburg, and Umeå.

The challenges that this Peer-to-Peer learning visit aimed to address were

• youth not in Education, Employment, or Training, NEET:s.
• what challenges do our organizations meet and how do we work with this group of young people
• what can we learn from each other and what are the differences to take into account

We were invited to Hamburg, by Susanne von Bonin, to see how they work in their two projects, Come in and Catch up.

Day one – project Catch up

We started our visit with a meeting with ESF+ of Hamburg and after that we visited the project Catch up and got to learn about their work with young adults between 18 and 25 who are not of school age and have mental health problems. Here the youth are offered short-term psychological support and help with finding their own way to deal with challenges and crises. The goal is to strengthen the youths self-efficacy and resilience.

Day two –  project Come in, Café Eins and Jugend Aktiv Plus project

Day two we visited the project Come in. Young adults between the ages of 18 and 25 not in Education, Employment, or Training, NEET:s. Here the youth get a coach that will accompany throughout the project and help the youth build trust and they meet their coach once a week. Come in offers both individual and group coaching. Here we had the opportunity to meet both staff and young participants involved in the projects.

We also visited Café Eins and the school project run by Jugendsozialarbeit Schanzenviertel and we got a presentation of the Jugend Aktiv Plus project. At Café Eins several young people, involved in the project, work and here we rounded off the program by being served lunch by the youth.

The organizations and participants

• Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Region, SALAR – Gunnar Anderzon and Anna-Lena Hed
• County Kilkenny Leader Partnership, CKLP – Martin Rafter
• Services‘ organization department in Vilnius – Brigita Blavaščiũnienè
• Umeå municipality – Ronnie Eliasson and Lina Westerlund
• Gemeinsam selber machen, gsm, Hamburg – Susanne von Bonin