BRUXELLES, 22 September 2013. AEGEE-Europe will focus a big part of the activities of its 13000 members in a broad campaign to engage students, young citizens and all first time voters in the campaign for the European Parliament Elections of May 2014. This campaign is launched now with a convention called “Ignite the spark of youth” hosted by AEGEE-Valladolid, one of the local branches of AEGEE-Europe in Spain.

AEGEE-Europe understands democracy as a big process where the voting is just the visible step. But there is no democracy without the possibility to make an informed choice, therefore we have prepared a great set of activities, which aims to provide young Europeans with opportunities to learn more about the European institutions and how to vote in the elections, even if you are abroad; but also to interact with Members of the European Parliament and candidates, to debate the topics that are relevant for young people and issue recommendations for the newly elected Parliament and to break the pessimistic view about the European Union and create a constructive debate which brings solutions to the current gap between Europe and its citizens.

The campaign is composed by several Youth conventions all over Europe, 4 bus tours (in Spain, Greece, UK and Croatia), a voting guide, and local actions in the 200 cities where AEGEE is present. Moreover a special edition of the successful project Europe on Track, winner of the 2013 Youth Charlemagne Award for the Best European Youth Project, will also be included under Y Vote 2014.

The Y Vote 2014 kick-off convention Ignite the Youth Spark is currently taking place in Valladolid, Spain, from September 18th to 22nd. The participants will take ownership of the whole project and contribute with their ideas and suggestions to improve the process and to create guidelines for local activities.

AEGEE-Europe gathers 13000 students in 200 cities of 40 European countries and is the biggest interdisciplinary student organization in Europe. Our aim is to bring Europe closer to students and young Europeans, and to create a platform for intercultural communication and cross-border cooperation.

Contacts: Miguel Gallardo miguel.gallardo@aegee.org +32 487 41 08 09 

AEGEE