International Youth Forum is the largest and most important single event organized by IDEA. The Forum is organized in a different country each year and since its first edition in 1995 it has provided unforgettable educational experience to over 2,000 secondary school students from over 40 countries. Participants develop invaluable skills of critical thinking, research, communication and public speaking, which lead them to excel in their educational and professional careers. Read their most memorable experience and what they do nowadays here.

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Debate Research

Debater in Action

Participants of the Youth Forum grow not only personally but translate this experience and knowledge into actions within their communities. They engage in local and international projects like initiating after-school activities for their peers who are marginalized and often lack access to such activities (Kosovo), participating in debates and workshops in prisons (USA), and empower others peers to let their voices be heard and lives changed (Uganda).

The Forum provides a unique opportunity to promote communication, debate and youth engagement in the Forum host country too. Both IDEA and the local host organization make all the efforts to involve media and public figures in promoting the Forum; the previous Forums have been endorsed by Nobel Prize Laureate Lech Walesa, Gandhi Peace Prize Laureate Vaclav Havel; and personally attended by the President of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina Zeljko Komsic.