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Auli Wallenius and Lauri Keskivali

29/01/2020 - Faces of EGL

Behind every EGL Project there are people - those incredible, energetic and enthusiastic humans who make things happen on the field. People who manage the activities, build relationships, share knowledge, inspire local communities, keep an eye on the social impact of their work. Who are the faces of EGL? We want to get to know them, hear who they are, what are their passions, dreams, goals, how did they find themselves in the Europe Goes Local network. Youth work needs many talents and the people of EGL are bringing in a diversity of resources - skills and knowledge together with their vision of how empowered youth looks like. Meet them. Hear their story: Auli Wallenius and Lauri Keskivali from Finland.

Who is Auli?

I am a 38 years old drama coach from Lahti, Finland, working with unemployed youngsters age between 17-29. We do drama and culture projects and main goal for the youngsters is to find out the way to their dreams. I’ve studied as a drama instructor in a university of applied sciences. I love theatre because it connects all the art you can think of. I’m very much interested in communication and people and how they “work” when they communicate and take part in things. Also, what happens in our society and all over the world is very interesting.

I am a mother of two nice kids (age 8 and 10) and we live in a nice neighbourhood in Lahti with two cats. That’s the reason my hobbies are quite much driving kids to their hobbies. But audio books and music and walking in the nature are my friends while kids are playing soccer or are in the scouts.

Finnish National Agency contacted us to take part to find out how to present Europe’s Youth strategy in a different way. It was also an important decision how to involve youngsters to take part of that process. The project started with drama workshop in February 2019. I was inspired by the youth strategy and the thought that together in Europe we have similar values. I was curious how they are seen in Finland? And is Europe the same for me and for my youngsters? It was an interesting work to do, something with drama without having drama as a tool in the last version of the work.

Who is Lauri?

I’m 37 year old drama coach from Lahti, Finland. I like good books, movies, music, theatre and people. My motto is - if you try your best no one can ask for more. In my free time, I try to relax as much as possible by reading, writing, talking walks, listening to music and audiobooks. I think of myself that I’m pretty much the same person as in my work, but with a different action plan. We started working on the European Values roadshow – project in late 2018. From the beginning it was a very inspiring project where we were invited to create a concept that would make European Union’s Youth strategy easier to understand. Our starting question was - what are the instruments that could help Youth workers in learning what the new Youth strategy is about?