OREANDA-NEWS. Young and eager to change things. These are the winners of the Charlemagne Youth Prize, awarded by Parliament and the Charlemagne Prize foundation on 3 May. On 10-11 Octobery, they visited the European Parliament, where they presented their projects to the culture committee, spoke with President Martin Schulz and followed several MEPs during their daily routine.

The Charlemagne Youth Prize is awarded every year by the Parliament and the International Charlemagne Prize Foundation to people aged 16 to 30 involved with projects promoting understanding between different European countries. Representatives of the 28 national winning projects were invited to the award ceremony on 3 May in Aachen, where the three winners were revealed.

All three laureates presented their projects during a meeting of Parliament's culture committee on Tuesday 11 October. Later that day they also met President Schulz and observed how MEPs went about their daily work.

The winners visiting Parliament said the award was a great recognition of their work and had led to increased visibility of their project, even abroad. They had received offers for collaboration and are now looking to extend their project.

InteGREAT

The aim of the InteGREAT project is to encourage young people from all over Europe to help integrate refugees. The idea behind it was conceived in 2015 in India during the international congress of AIESEC in 2015.

“The prize helped us a lot, in making the project known in Europe and now there are ten countries participating, not only Italy," said Benedetta Turrin, from the InteGREAT project, which had been awarded first prize. "In the future, we want to expand to the whole of Europe, having more students participate and help more refugees."