Russian-German youth cooperation is carried out in accordance with the Agreement between the Government of the Russian Federation and the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany in the field of youth cooperation of December 21, 2004.
One of the priority areas for the implementation of the Agreement is the holding of joint youth events in the field of sports (meaning mass sports, since the Agreement does not address issues of youth exchange in the field of elite sports).
In 2017, in order to intensify bilateral youth cooperation in the field of mass sports, the Russian Coordination Bureau for Youth Cooperation with Germany initiated the creation of a partnership between the Russian Student Sports Union and the German Sports Youth Association Deutsche Sportjugend (dsj) im Deutschen Olympischen Sportbund e.V. (the corresponding cooperation Agreement was signed on September 14, 2017 in Rostov-on-Don).
Traditional events within the framework of this area of bilateral cooperation have become joint forums of organizers of youth sports exchanges aimed at creating partnerships between Russian and German organizations for the further implementation of youth exchange projects in the field of mass sports. The first forum took place from September 24 to 29, 2017 in Berlin, the second from October 7 to 12, 2018 in St. Petersburg. At the XIV meeting of the Russian-German Council in the field of youth cooperation it was decided to hold the third forum in 2019 in Germany.
From September 22 to 27, 2019 the III Russian-German Forum of Sports Youth Exchange Organizers was held in Dortmund.
The main goals:
- informing about the possibilities of Russian-German youth cooperation,
- acquaintance with the system of sports work with youth in Russia and Germany,
- creating partnerships for the implementation of Russian-German youth exchange projects in the field of mass sports.
The forum was organized jointly by the Russian Student Sports Union and the German Sports Youth Association with the support of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation, MIREA – Russian Technological University acting as the Russian Coordination Bureau for Youth Cooperation with Germany and the Foundation for German-Russian Youth Exchange.
The forum was attended by the representatives of organizations from Russia and Germany engaged in sports work with youth in basketball, handball, football, chess, cross-country skiing, athletics, taekwondo-wtf, windsurfing, boxing, choreography, roller sports, swimming, mountain tourism, people and interested in creating partnerships to implement joint youth exchange projects in the field of mass sports. In total 45 people participated there.
The key results:
As part of the educational program of the forum the participants got acquainted with the possibilities of Russian-German youth cooperation, the system of sports work with youth in Russia and Germany and were trained at seminars and master classes on the topics "Intercultural learning through sports", "How to organize a Russian-German youth exchange ", "Financing of international youth exchange", "Visa support for Russian-German youth exchange", "Language animation" and also visited regional and local German organizations involved in sports work with youth.
The result of the forum was the creation of 16 Russian-German partnerships within which the agreements in more than 40 joint youth exchange projects in the field of mass sports were reached for implementation in 2020-2021.
