Kateřina
Javůrková

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Supporting Materials for political education strive to build an concept and make materials for young people education in political field (educational training and workshop). Project is run by nonprofit organisation YMCA and is lead by it core program group YES. Concept and printed materials are created to be complete basic set of informations and as much user-friendly and well-arranged as possible. Materials consists everything what future lector and participant needs and they can be easily reproduced. The goal was to create comprehensive file of materials (printed and virtual) which can in first wave (educational training) help future lectors to be able to pass the information on second wave (workshop) to future participants. And help participants to absorb information and take away with them an overview. Target group of first wave are leaders from czech YMCA from 18 to 30 years old. They become lectors of workshops after completing the trainning. These people are long time leaders of some activities in their local YMCA. Target group of second wave (workshops led by lectors from wave one) are young people from 16 to 20 years old which are interested in becoming an responsible informed citizens. It was very important to make this content and appearance of the whole project friendly and understandable. For our chosen target age group and engage young active audiences. 

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Why?

Politics and citizenship are not very popular among young people. Hardly anybody is oriented in the given topic and hardly anybody is willing to explain it to the adolescents clearly. Usually we are dependent on what we hear at home from our relatives, and often take on strange views and attitudes before we realize how important it is to shape our own. On the one hand, we live in a very fast and informed time, and "google" is part of our daily routine. And so it would seem that there is nothing easier than to search the internet for example how our state works and get the information to make a responsible decision about who you want to vote for. On the other hand once you start searching on the Internet for political topics, you will see a great deal of personal preference for colored pages or unintelligible text. Throughout the process of this work, it seemed to me that those pages were not intended to inform us, but to discourage us from being a responsible, active and informed citizen. There is another danger. The information rolls on us from all sides and no school lessons teach us how to deal with them. So we listen to voices in our neighborhood that repeat their guaranteed "truth" over and over, and despite their uncertain origin, their authors are willing to fight for it. So where is the way to understanding? I am not saying that everyone should be a policy expert, and it would be completely wrong to think that this should be the goal of this work. But to build, you always need the basics. I perceive that every disputed debate, every reflection on whether and why to be interested in politics is important. In fact, not being passive, but active, it is in itself a win and the goal of this project.

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Design

Throughout the work, it was important to keep thinking about making manufacturing and handling as easy as possible for the user. The materials needed for stage one (YES lectors training) will be printed by me, so I could afford more complex formats or different jigsaws. Materials for phase two (training workshops in local YMCA groups) will be printed by YES members themselves. That is why it was very important to use the A4 format. Another reason was the financial site. Local YMCAs often do not have a budget for complicated and costly prints, and if they try to print out the formats that are not adapted to their home leaser printers, the work would probably resign to the quality I want it to have.

All parts of this work had to be processed in such a way as to be as user-friendly, transparent and appealing as possible. The individual parts must contain everything necessary for YES members (later lecturers) who will organize educational workshops. The thesis contains the following types of materials: presentation.ppt, handbooks containing information and methodology of information transfer, advice on lectured topics and activities, aids needed for specified activities, materials for good promotion of teaching workshops, YMCA and YES, more specific guide to brief overview of topics and notebook. All these materials are based on the boards I have suggested.

Last but not least, the format of the material has to withstand the change of content, which will change according to the subject on which yes-uni will respond. My goal is to keep the design and material system the same and change only the content. This will ensure the compactness and relevance of all future themes to the yes-uni project. With a repetitive system, users get used to it quickly and make the process easier.

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1. Promotional component
The promotional component consists of plates, stickers, stickers, pencils, tattoos, key rings and posters. Plates are folded from B1 format, which is printed by screen printing. Only trainees receive them. In the state they get in, the boards are designed to fit all the necessary materials. This means a brochure for trainers, a first part of promotional materials, a notebook and a working folder. Only the first part of the promotional materials because the other one is built directly in the plates. They are therefore provided with a rubber band only. The materials are placed in the individual pockets for clarity. Divided into a pocket with promotional, information, work and note materials. After training, the YES members of the home take the boards inside and, according to the instructions on the boards, they can tear off two large stripes. These lanes can be used as posters that invite their future workshops. After breaking these stripes down
a very simple composition of the rest of the previous boards puts a new, simpler type of boards. These new boards can accommodate the remaining materials that the trainer will no longer need actively during his training workshop. He can then clean up these boards and return to them when he needs them. The entire instructions for editing the boards are placed both verbally and pictorially on the boards and, moreover, they can still be found in the dropbox, in the manuals folder.
 

The flare-breaking posters are designed to invite YMCA participants to a lecture workshop in local YMCA activities. I designed a date and place of workshops exchange system to make the posters more usable and no need to print them again. Labels can be found in several copies in the promotional pocket and just fill in the necessary information according to the instructions. All other fixed information is already part of the poster's graphic design. I left the posters with their unusual, elongated format, which distinguishes them from other posters and allows them to dominate space. Only the YES member receives this folder and continues to use it only by the YES member.
 

As additional promotional materials, I chose stickers, stickers, pencils, tattoos, keychains. This type of promotional item was chosen for its simplicity, need and popularity. The motifs are the same as on the plates for a uniform visual appearance and complemented by the word yes-uni.
 

2. Working component
This folder is designed in the form of A4 worksheets and contains all the auxiliary prints that the tutor might need. In particular, they are used in activities that have been created to provide more fun and efficient information. These activities have been tried many times in other training sessions. I chose the A4 format for this folder, because it is so easy to copy and it is easy to create work shop aids. The design is black and white and simple. It was not necessary to invent a new and innovative form, because the life of this component is very short and lasts only one use. If needed, it can be traced in the dropbox and printed easily. These work materials are accompanied by links inside the trainer brochure and their affiliation to individual training blocks or lectures is clearly marked. Only the YES member gets this folder and only the YES member continues to use it.

3. Information folder for trainers
This folder is a brochure. It contains an overview of training information and is also accompanied by various notes and advice to help them. The printing of this folder is very easy, because it is based on A4, which only has to be folded horizontally in half after printing to create a narrow compact booklet. For brochure consistency, a rubber band is used to make it easy to make and to exchange embedded news sheets information is often changing. For reinforcement and protection of the booklet, a cover made of stronger A4 paper is designed. This way of packaging has one extra function, it is a right flap that can be used as

a bookmark. Only the YES member receives this folder and continues to use it only by the YES member.

4. Information folder for participants of the training workshop
This folder is made in the same form as a booklet as a lector's information folder. It contains a brief overview of information from the workshop. The training workshop participant receives this component and can keep it.

5. Notebook
The notebook gets both tutors and participants. It is a clean A5 notebook

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6. Virtual data
All of the mentioned folders can be found in electronic form ready for printing in the dropbox. Two dropbox folders were set up - for trainers and participants. The trainer folder contains instructions for compiling all the materials that have been prepared for this project and their data for printing. It also includes an introductory document on the proper use of materials. There is a media component where various formats can be found for web sites (facebook, instagram, etc.) and used to effectively promote educational workshops. Only the YES member gets access to this folder and only uses the YES member.
The Participant Folder contains an introductory document on the correct use of materials, freely accessible materials such as a brochure for participants,

a notebook and information on possible involvement in YES. This component is open to the general public.

7. Design
For all the work with text I chose Source Sans Pro, which is freely available. To make printing as low as possible, the whole work is designed in one color. The boards are printed in B1 color with one color and match the color of the booklet color. The transition to the black and white version is thus quite simple and still aesthetically and conceptually functional. Other materials are printable in black and white on a regular home printer. The paper used is slightly yellowish without any structure. However, a completely classic white paper can also be used. Thanks to the large text range, the whole work is rather typographic. I used additional illustrations at times. The aim was to create a simple, uncomplicated youthful look.
 

YES* – YMCA Czech Republic core youth group.

Yes-uni – educational program of YES. Fouder of Yes - Káťa Javůrková