Our Goal and How We Hope to Achieve It
Since its creation in 1994, the Deutsche Kinder- und Jugendstiftung - German Children and Youth Foundation (GCYF) - has pursued an ambitious goal: to improve conditions for the younger generation growing up in Germany by creating a democratic environment to grow up in. By emphasising the strengths and interests of each individual, the GCYF encourages young people to play an active role in society and to take their lives into their own hands. To achieve this, the GCYF involves different actors (parents, adult counsellors, institutes) in their programmes to initiate reform at every key stage of a young person’s life: kindergarten, school, transition between school and work, family life, and regional youth politics.
The GCYF programmes and projects provide practical answers to pressing questions regarding children and youth issues. Solutions are sought together with adult educators, government authorities, companies, academic experts and the young people themselves. The GCYF utilises its politically independent status to bring together different communities to bridge the fragmented areas of responsibilities public administrations and welfare bodies that currently exist in Germany.
The German Children and Youth Foundation (GCYF) was assigned the task of providing an umbrella organisation for all those who act as advocates for the interests of children and youth. The small trust fund (Children’s Hour), made up mostly of donations, provides the foundation with an independent economic status and free grant-making policy. However, in order to achieve sustainable results, the foundation has developed a reliable and successful culture of public-private cooperation. The GCYF cooperates not only with public administrations, but also with private companies (both national and international), foundations and independent youth welfare organisations. The GCYF is also part of the international network of the International Youth Foundation.
In order to analyse the impact of the programmes on the lives of young people, and to draw conclusions for future work, the GCYF evaluates all programmes - either itself, through an internal evaluator or externally through a third-party evaluator. During the first years, the foundation was only active in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR). Today, it works closely with regional partners in fifteen federal states across Germany.
The GCYF focuses on four main themes:
