6 years of APY development in a nutshell
Today APY is one of the largest youth organizations in Armenia with many local, community based and international programs involving hundreds of young people from Armenia and all over the world. For the last 6 years we’ve been empowering young people, involving them in youth mobility and educational programs, developing their skills and knowledge and engaging them in the community life.
We’ve come a long way from a student initiative to a professional youth organization. This has been a long journey full of ups and downs, achievements and disappointments. The idea to establish an organization for young people came to us back in 2007 when we were studying in Yerevan State University. It was a challenging period for Armenia; few youth organizations existed, the approach of the authorities towards any independent non-governmental organization was rather hostile and few youngsters did benefit from local and international educational activities, training and study trips abroad. This kind of information was carefully kept by ‘non-transparent’ youth organizations and corrupted student unions, so only a limited number of ‘chosen’ people could profit. And this was what we were coming to change.
Grigor Yeritsyan is the co-founder and current Vice-President of Armenian Progressive Youth NGO. He works as an Educational Supervisor, trainer, facilitator and program manager of the organization mainly responsible for Supervision of the programs, development of international cooperation, fundraising and management of youth capacity building projects. He manages APY programs on Gender Equality, Intercultural Communication and Sustainable Development.