YouthBank International News

<div class="page side-photo"> <article> <div class="image" style=" background-color:#f4d82f; background-image:url(/uploads/5566519974110.jpg); "></div> <div class="container" style="background-color: #f4d82f;"> <header style="font-family: ; color: #f4770e;"> <h1>Interview with Adrian Covaci, YouthBank Bucharest</h1> </header>  <div class="main"> <img src="/uploads/556651aec8b15.jpg">In a recent TEDx talk in Cluj Napoca, Adrian spoke about the shortcomings of Romanian education and the pressure of not being allowed to fail. Watch his presentation by clicking <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLq9VfJ5I2w">here</a>. Describe your local YouthBank in 5 wordsSupportive. Open-minded. Empowering. Welcoming. Opportunity-maker.How did you first hear of YouthBank?YouthBank is a name of great resonance to me. This name has been following my life for four years. It all started with 13 year-old me, stressed about the next Chemistry Olympiad. I was sitting in the lab doing some titrations, a process where you pour an acid drop by drop to neutralize it. In came the other pupils whom I was learning with. One of them (in the 11th Grade back then) put a stack of leaflets on the table. She had just finished distributing them in my school. They were mostly red, in matching the color of the chemistry indicator showing that the reaction was approaching the neutral point.‘What are those?’ I asked.‘It’s an awesome program you’ll hear about in High School. I encourage you to join it’ she replied That was the first drop, the first drop of “acid” that showed me a little bit of a world beyond the mundane school-home life I was used to.What was your motivation for joining YouthBank? In the years to come, until 10th Grade, tiny drops would continuously come from people going to the Chemistry Olympiad, all members of YouthBank. I did not have time to join the program until 2012.But then, my family decided we should move to Bucharest, from Iași.The feeling I experienced, though I exaggerate slighty, was similar to what Katniss Everdeen felt when taking the train from District 12 to the capitall. Bucharest's population is six times larger than my home town's. I can’t describe the feeling of knowing no-one and having no idea where to start.Once the school year started, I decided to apply for joining the YouthBank team, as it was a good place to start. All the tiny drops of “acid” finally came together and accounted for my decision.After the interview and the assessment center, I was sure I wouldn’t be accepted. But then, the phone rang.‘Hello, I’m sorry to tell you that…’ a few seconds of excruciating silence followed, ‘you have been accepted into YouthBank Bucharest’.That was the phrase that took me into a rollercoaster of emotions.Describe the context of your YouthBank/YouthBank network: what did you see happening in your community, culture, social context etc? How significant to you is the human factor your YouthBank is addressing?There’s a lot happening in Romania now. Everything at the same time. For starters, there is a big gap between the development of the capital city and other cities. As I described before, I experienced the difference, but it goes deeper than wages, infrastructure or life standards. The gap is also present between people’s mindsets and opportunities. In my home town, which is between the 5 biggest cities in my country, there are 4 or 5 programs you can join. YouthBank is, thankfully, one of them, and is helping clearing the gap by providing the same access to resources in every city it is present in.But of utmost importance to me is people’s vision of LGBT-related issues, as I myself am gay. Last year I happened to monitor a project that has applied for funding, called Youth Festival. It aimed to promote acceptance in high schools toward gays and lesbians. They organized a lot of activities, among them being watching a short film and discussions with openly LGBT people. In that environment I made the really important personal decision to come out. I will forever be thankful to this program for that opportunity. Through that project, acceptance was promoted amongst many High Schools, and in many, being gay or lesbian is not problematic anymore, at least with regard to other students.How do you see your local YouthBank developing in the future?I can see myself letting go of the same drops of “acid” on people I interact with.To put everything into perspective, when I joined the high school I currently attend, everything extracurricular was seen badly. Most thought it is a waste of time, and wouldn’t realize the things you can learn.But, in the last years, that perspective shifted. The new people joining YouthBank this year were eager to start doing something besides schoolwork. And I think this is because lots of people started promoting extracurricular activities.I see a lot of young, innovative people joining. I see a few leaning towards entrepreneurship, the path I think I will follow, and promoting YouthBank further and further. YouthBank is the gateway I went through into a whole new world of possibilities. It has given me a lot. Mainly, a sociocentric point of view and the YouthBank spirit. The first one is straightforward to explain, it is the urge to set your community’s wellbeing as a priority. The latter is more abstract. It is the warmth in your heart, the feeling you get when you help somebody, the joy of taking the initiative.I see the program changing even more mindsets and empowering more and more high school students to be the change they want to see. I see YouthBank Bucharest titrating the problems of society. I see YouthBank Bucharest becoming The YouthBank Bucharest. </div> </div> </article> </div>

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Issue 5