Pilcrow has delivered a workshop with students from the Higher Technician in Sociocultural and Tourism Animation (TASOCT) program at CIPFP Faitanar (Valencia), aimed at strengthening key competences for working with young people and examining how genuine participation spaces are created.

The session formed part of the testing process for the toolkit of the European project Beyond Tokenism: Youth Leading Inclusion (BETYLI), which develops practical tools to help youth professionals recognize, avoid, and transform situations of symbolic participation (tokenism).

During the workshop, students took part in activities designed to:

• Understand what tokenism is and why it can be harmful for young people as well as for educational, participatory, and community programs.
• Identify, through real examples and group dynamics, when participation is superficial and when it truly encourages meaningful influence.
• Analyse practical cases, map power relations, and propose improvements that move towards authentic participation.
• Explore how small, everyday decisions can reinforce fairer, more transparent, and more inclusive practices.

The group contributed valuable insights that will help improve the clarity, applicability, and usability of the toolkit before its launch. For Pilcrow, testing with future sociocultural animation professionals represents an essential step to ensure that the tools work in real educational settings and respond to the needs of those supporting young people.Beyond Tokenism: Youth Leading Inclusion (BETYLI) is co-funded by the Erasmus+ program and brings together organizations from Croatia, the Netherlands, Germany, and Spain. Its mission is to promote authentic and sustainable youth participation across organizations throughout Europe.