ESC: ESCape to Crazy Hill - 2nd edition

LUMEN is youth non-governmental non-profit organization established in spring of 2000 with the aim to improve the quality of life of young people in Ludbreg town and northwest region of Croatia and to bring their social inclusion and activism to a higher level. Our main objectives are to develop cultural, democratic, social and ecological conscience among youth, to encourage cooperation of young people with different interests and activities and to increase influence of young people on work of local community. We continue with our goals from past years as we manage to help young people from Ludbreg and Croatia to see different parts of Europe and world, volunteer and learn through different programs. By this we empower young people, giving them tools and skills for future life and raise their sense of European identity. Our main principles are connected with environmental sustainability, responsibility, inclusion, diversity and active participation. Our main target group are young people, including ones with fewer opportunities. As Ludbreg is rural area without a lot of content for youth, most of them feel disadvantaged comparing to their peers in bigger cities. We also aim to work with local youth workers from formal and non-formal education areas and try to include them in our activities. In last years we started cooperation with members of NGO Ludbreško Sunce which is working with children and youth with special needs. Through our activities besides our standard members and volunteers we try to include disadvantaged and marginalized youth. In international activities we are including youth and youth workers from Europe and around the world. Our secondary target group is our and partners local communities on which we influence with our projects, artistic and volunteer work. Big part of our members, participants and volunteers are with fewer opportunities. Some of them are from rural areas, geographically isolated villages around Ludbreg and surrounding hills. This is also connected to economic and educational difficulties which are often leading to social exclusion. Through our activities we raised identity of LUMEN over our local borders and as a lot of youth from whole Croatia participated in our festival or activities more than half of participants on our projects and partnerships are outside Ludbreg area. We started with youth and projects in Ludbreg and surrounding area but through international activities our volunteers had left trace all around the world, from Colombia to Georgia. LUMEN has also connected with local NGOs so it's not uncommon that we have activities in nearby cities like Varaždin, Koprivnica, Legrad, Novi Marof or Varaždinske Toplice. Through more than 80 partnerships in ERASMUS+ program our young members and youth workers participated in activities in more than 40 countries. In 2012 LUMENs volunteers participated in International festival of volunteers in Tunisia, helping, cleaning rebuilding surrounding area of city of Monastir. In 2019 our members participated in MasterPeace project and street art festival in Medellin, Colombia. To achieve all that, we organize cultural, ecological, educational and other events, we promote humanitarian work through many actions and cooperation with other organizations, we inform young people about important topics, encourage their inclusion in discussion and solving various problems in our community and we cooperate with other similar associations in our country and wider. We educate young people in mentioned areas in order to give them opportunity to spread everything they have learned. Together with young people we also write project applications and apply for funding through different funds. We are recognized as organization with positive impact in local community and are partially founded by local municipality and city of Ludbreg. As member of Community of Technical Culture (Zajednica tehničke kulture) Ludbreg we closely cooperate with other technical organizations like Amateur Radio Club or Aeromodelling club organizing activities for youth. In last years we started cooperation with NGO Ludbreško Sunce (http://ludbresko-sunce.hr/) for children and young people with special needs and together realized some ERASMUS+ projects. LUMEN's annual Youth program as well youth music festival Idemo otok is co-financed and supported by City of Ludbreg from our beginnings. Our regular activities include creative workshops, nonformal education, ecological and volunteering activities, IT and technical education and cooperation with other local and regional organizations. For last 15 years LUMEN organizes international Youth Music Festival Idemo otok on which more than 150 Croatian and International artists performed. Through all years more than 15.000 young people participated as well more than 30 foreign volunteers. As we finished LUMENs volunteer center we plan to get Quality label and start hosting international short and long term volunteers from 2022.