Report from SWYAA Norway at Ex-PY conference 2004

Name of group: SWYAA Norway
E-mail: keyperson@swynorway.org
Homestay Norway: homestay@swynorway.org
URL: www.swynorway.org/

The SWYAA Norway was established in 1996. The members were the 12 participants of SWY 8. After the return of SWY 12 in 1999 the number of members increased to 21.

Organization
SWYAA Norway is organized through an e-mail list were all 21 members are included.

Siri Johnsen (SWY 12) is Key Person and Peter Gjefle (SWY 8 and SWY 12) is assistant Key Person.

The limited number of members have made it possible with a non-bureaucratic organization. When our network will increase with 12 new members it’s time for discussing the need for a more formal organization. All members recieve all important information.

SWYAA activities
Our main activities are informal meetings and discussions through e-mail list. In addition to this list we have three separate e-mail lists for ex-participants of SWY 8 and SWY 12 and for our new members from SWY 16. Most of the unformal meetings and e-mail contact are among members from the same batch

Some of the members take part in the SWY Interest Group Mailing Lists, and many are members of the general SWY-e-mail list.

In 1999 we created our own website which has been a good promotion for SWYAA-Norway. The new delegation of SWY 16 has updated the website a lot and we are now very proud of the result. Big thanks to Alexander on SWY 16! Also during the SWY 16 programme the participants have been able to update the web-site with photos and reports. It will be one of the important activities in 2004 to develop our website even more.

The homestay network is working well, but there are low activity. We realize that most of the ex-pys visiting Europe prefer the more central parts of the continent. EX-PYs visiting Norway often have close friends in the SWYAA and the contact is more direct, and not including the homestay-network. During the last 8 years there have been a big group of Ex-Pys visiting our country.

During 2004 we hope to meet the new members of SWYAA Norway. We will invite ourselves to attend one evening of their reuninon. This meeting will also be a good time for making agreements for the future structure, discuss what we want to do in our organization and deepening the SWY-spirit in our group.

Relationship between SWYAA Norway and the Japanese Embassy
After many years with little contact with the Embassy, we are now in a positive dialoge. It is our impression that the Japanese Embassy might be better informed about the SWY-programme and the possibilities to be in contact with SWYAA Norway. The lack of information about SWY and contact between the Embassy and the SWYAA has made the nomination / preparation process difficult both in 1999 (SWY 12) and in 2003 (SWY 16). We want to be a resource in the nomination-process, but we have not succeeded with our comunication.

As mentioned above we feel that the relationsship between the Embassy and SWYAA Norway is becoming better. In January 2004 the Embassy contacted us and asked for information about SWYAA to at pool for ”Japan related organizations”. The representative from the Embassy has showed an increasing interest for us.

We would like to invite representatives from the Japanese Embassy to our reunion / meeting this year. This could be a good opportunity for us to show them what SWY is all about, and to discuss our future relationship with the Japanese Embassy. One of the topics will also be how SWYAA might be involved in a future invitation to Norwegian youth to participate the SWY-programme.

Relationship between SWYAA Norway and our government
The relationship between SWYAA Norway and our government is not strong.

The ministry of Children and Family Affairs was responsible for information and nomination of the Norwegian delegation to SWY 16 (asked by the Japanese Embassy). SWYAA were in contact with the contact-person several times, but we didn’t succeed in being involved in the nomination process. SWYAA Norway is not happy for the way the promotion and selection of participants is being done.

Preparation Training for new PYs
The SWYAA Norway has agreed on the importance of good preparation for new participants. We feel that we have important and valuable information to share, and there are many of our members willing to take part in a preparation Training for new Pys.

To succeed in a praparation training the information about this should be given together with the information about the SWY-programme. A person applying on the SWY-programme should know that he/she also has to participate The preparation Training. This didn’t happen this year. All the participants didn’t succeed to meet before the arrival. A part of the story is the fact that Norway is a big country, and it’s complicated (and expensive) for all the participants to meet.

Still we succeeded to attend to preparation evenings were the PYs from the Oslo region met. Peter Gjefle attended one meeting and myself the second one. These meetings were important, but there were so much more we would like to do in the preparation process. The national leader of SWY 16 did also have a good dialoge with former national leaders. My impression as a participant of the first Norwegian delegation is that the participants of SWY 16 were given a much better information on the consept of SWY and the needed preparations.

Oslo, 20 February 2004

Christoffer Tjelle (EX-PY SWY8)
Norwegian representative at the EX-PY Conference 2004