Connect Global Youth Forum

By Thomas H

On Friday 28th July a small handful of our year 10 students had the opportunity to attend the Connect Global Youth Forum.

For those who don’t know, the Connect Global Youth Forum is a virtual one-day event that brings together young people from a regional cluster of Victorian schools with their peers from schools in the region and across the Asia-Pacific.

It allows students to connect and work together to examine a locally-relevant issue that impacts their communities. During the live, synchronous forum, Asia Education Foundation will facilitate activities that encourage collaboration, discussion, and intercultural understanding with the goal of promoting engagement and global citizenship.

We had 2 year 10 students attend the forum alongside over 40 other students from Victoria, Malaysia, India and more. Here’s what they had to say about the day:

“I’ve been to a lot of events that bring together young people to develop leadership skills and discuss tackling issues in their communities, but the Connect Global Youth Forum really stands out for me. Despite the online environment, the forum managed to incorporate a strong social focus throughout the day that played to the strengths of the overall event. What were these strengths? That fact us students got to discuss our own issues and experiences with not just students in our state, but students from completely different countries and backgrounds. With this global focus the event was able to not just allow us to look at the issues in our communities, but see the similarities across all the issues discussed and overall gain a greater understanding of the increasingly globalised world we live in and our role in it as global citizens. I have no regrets about sacrificing my curriculum day to take part in this incredibly valuable experience.”