The Y20 India Summit conducted consultations with young people to reflect on the G20 priority areas and to suggest policy recommendations. SDG4Youth Network members Sofía Bermúdez, 28, and Ulises Brengi, 25, were selected by the government of Argentina to participate.
The 18th G20 Summit will take place on 9-10 September 2023 in New Delhi, India. Prior to this forum for international economic cooperation, young leaders from the G20 countries were invited to the Y20 India Summit, to share their ideas and proposals to address challenges, including access to quality education.
Sofía Bermúdez and Ulises Brengi have been young education advocates for many years. Ulises says: “I became a youth activist at the age of 16 when I co-created a project for recycling in public high schools from Buenos Aires, with the collaboration of the Ministry of Education.” Meanwhile, Sofía has been raising awareness on the education crisis since 2020, particulary via her social media channels.
Both spoke at the ‘Education Reforms’ session, at Symbiosis International University (SIU) in Pune on 11 March 2023. Sofía shares: “I talked about young people's role in transforming education, the need to dismantle barriers to access education and the importance of acting now to tackle the learning crisis”. Ulises focused on skills development, school-to-work transition and youth employment, and the challenges of implementing educational reforms.
This session, attended by 500 participants, aimed to highlight the necessary education reforms in a changing and complex world. Ulises explains: “Educational reforms are key elements for an overall change in how we approach education, in a holistic way.” Sofía confirms: “Spaces like this are essential to keep creating awareness of our role as young people in the transformation of education.”
On their way back home, both Sofía Bermúdez and Ulises Brengi reflected on their main takeaways from this big youth gathering. Sofía says: “Even when much improvement has been made, young people are still only seen as recipients of learning rather than active actors in creating educational policies. We need to go beyond consultations and consider young people as key actors in shaping our education systems”. Ulises concludes: “It is important to create safe spaces for young people where they can share and discuss their insights. They must be involved in co-creating policies at the decision making table.”
