How might rural young people utilise the opportunity to engage in informal education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) to enact their aspirations for development in their community? This presentation chronicles my collaboration with a group of rural young people in one Malaysian secondary school through a participatory action research project, which was submitted to a STEM innovation competition organised by a university in their region. The design of this project followed the Feel, Imagine, Do, Share (FIDS) framework by the global “Design for Change” movement (Gudipati & Sethi, 2017). The project provided a space for young people to enact their aspirations for development through STEM education outside of the confines of the formal curriculum, tied to a problem located in their school community on plastic pollution and the lack of infrastructures.

I describe the young people’s preparation and learning as part of this new experience in school supported by a group of teachers. In this process, they engaged in informal STEM education which we sought to connect with their formal curriculum. This collaboration opened up the space for the young people to articulate development concerns related to their immediate surroundings, whilst also situating their project within the bigger picture of environmental issues. Preparation for the project was followed by the trip we made together from their rural community to the university in the state capital to participate in the STEM innovation competition. This provided an occasion for these rural young people to temporarily experience a new environment among their peers from various backgrounds.

Guided by the young people’s own use of the term “rasa” (thinking, feeling, intuition) to reflect on their participation in this project (Lim, 2003; Yaapar, 2005), I deploy it as the overarching concept to analyse the tentative, emerging nature of young people’s aspirations and agency forged through a novel, informal education experience in a rural location. “Rasa” also points me to the ambivalent swirl of emotions encompassing hesitancy, doubt, nervousness, excitement, and fear expressed by the young people in the course of this collaboration and competition. In analysing this emergent feeling, I bring “rasa” into dialogue with Appadurai’s (2004) “capacity to aspire” and Sellar & Gale’s (2011) new configuration of “structure of feeling” for equity in education.

I argue that this instance of informal STEM education rooted in the day-to-day experiences of young people and applied to their immediate problems signals a kind of embodied, affective strategy where they are able to practice enacting aspirations in their immediate surrounding and beyond. To conclude, I bring together insights from the young people, their teachers, and the university’s STEM competition organiser to suggest that an informal education programme sensitive to place, associated resources and young people’s own emplaced concerns is critical for the development of their agency and capacity to aspire. Such a programme must also recognise the need for collaboration between teachers and other external actors amidst the constraints and pressures of formal education in schools.

This research addresses the case of the Lhotshampas/Bhutanese student-refugees living in the Beldangi Refugee Camp in eastern Nepal. After decades in Nepalese camps following Bhutan’s revocation of the group’s citizenship, more than 100k refugees have been resettled to third countries since 2007 (UNHCR 2023). However, group resettlement has since concluded (in 2016) and due to a lack of repatriation prospects, 6,365 refugees who did not voluntary resettle remain suspended in the remaining camps, approximately one-third of whom are children (Rizal 2004).

Out of the turmoil of statelessnesss, liminality, and political violence, the children of the Beldangi Refugee Camp in eastern Nepal have put into view the multidimensionality of refugee experiences often overlooked in a milieu of narratives on refugees as passive victims or threats to social cohesion. This research locates the multiplicity of child refugee experiences in the Bhutanese refugees’ own photography and writings (referenced below) in the NGO-funded Voices in Exile project, which provides 3000 refugee youth in Nepalese camps with photography, journalism, and editorial resources to express themselves, as well as the children-run newspaper, The Child Creation, in which young camp residents produce and print their own newspaper on camp events, Bhutanese politics, and even their own art. Alongside this community’s assertion of political agency, self-representation, and meaningful community projects, the residents’ publications showcase individuated subjectivity, communality, and quotidian humanness.

Paired with secondary literature on "redignifying" refugees (Ashley 2020) and dominant depiction of refugees as nonpolitical, nonagential subjects (Johnson 2011), this paper conducts a visual and discourse analysis of the published photographic and editorial material as examples of how refugee youth can leverage NGO-funded educational projects to self-empower via political action, self-representation, and community engagement.

Over the last two decades, the EU policies towards education and training consider lifelong learning a priority, specially in the youth sector. The EU has published several documents that express the need to encourage young people to embark on non-formal learning experiences. For instance, one of the main actions of the EU Youth Strategy (European Commission, 2018) is to encourage young people's participation in youth organisations, as well as volunteering and learning mobility programs, both of which are recognised as important forms of non-formal learning. This position is not surprising, given that there are various contexts beyond the school institution where meaningful learning can take place, such as in civil society organisations, associations and leisure activities, as well as in family and everyday professional life (European Commission, 2001). In fact, nowadays there is a proliferation of "educational peripheries" based on "logics of complementarity and/or supplementation of the school curriculum" (Palhares, 2014: 54).

The EU emphasises that non-formal learning allows young people to acquire essential skills that not only contribute to their personal and socio-educational development, but can also improve their employment prospects (European Commission, 2023), especially among young people with fewer opportunities. At the same time, the EU assumes that one of its main priorities is to increase the recognition and validation of skills and competences acquired in non-formal and informal contexts, given that it can play an important role in promoting young people's employability and mobility in the educational system (Cedefop, 2023; Council of the European Union, 2012).

Considering that it is important to debate less saturated spheres of educational knowledge, I propose to present a critical analysis of EU policy documents regarding lifelong learning. More precisely I intend to discuss some ideas related with the utilitarian and economic inclination of the European perspectives on non-formal education, which appears to be advocated mainly due to its importance to the acquisition of skills for employability. I hope to present some social and economic factors that may explain this economic emphasis, such as the European context itself, which is marked by slow economic growth, high levels of youth unemployment and demographic ageing.

Youth agency encompasses the ability of adolescents and young adults to assert their autonomy and effect meaningful changes, spanning their personal spheres, local communities, and broader societal contexts. This entitlement inherently empowers young individuals to actively shape the course of their personal development trajectories. Aiming to ensure equal opportunity, access to the labour market, and inclusion, entrepreneurship competences can be considered as potential facilitators of youth agency. According to this, entrepreneurship education is focused not only on promoting the creation and growth of businesses but also on fostering sense of initiative (Blenker et al., 2011; Gibb, 1993, 2002; Hoppe, 2016), enabling learners to act on ideas and opportunities and turn them into financial, cultural, or social value for themselves and others. In fact, there has recently been a growth of educational programs on entrepreneurship worldwide, particularly within tertiary education institutions such as business schools (Kuratko, 2005; Mohamad et al., 2015) and non-business faculties (Solomon et al., 2002). Furthermore, entrepreneurship education has extended its reach to primary and secondary schools (Kyrö, 2015; Hoppe, 2016) as well as non-formal educational contexts (Debarliev et al., 2022), and informal educational contexts.

To enhance economic performance and social cohesion, it is crucial to provide all citizens, especially those at higher risk of exclusion, with high-quality opportunities for formal, non-formal, and informal learning throughout their lifespans, alongside encouraging self-reflection to enhance their learning experiences. Acquiring the skill of learning to learn is a lifelong effort. Functioning as a substantial driver of transformation, in adulthood, it holds the capacity to augment employability and competitiveness (Sala et al., 2020). This capability can unleash transformative potential within both individuals and communities, thereby fostering societal well-being and facilitating adaptation to the dynamics of a swiftly evolving global landscape. A key competence emphasized across various European frameworks is critical thinking, encompassing awareness of one's knowledge limitations and biases, as well as the capacity for creative thinking to generate novel ideas. In particular, critical thinking is encapsulated within the creativity skill in the "Ideas & Opportunities" domain of the EntreComp framework (2018); in the "Personal" domain of the LifeComp (2020); in the "Embracing complexity in sustainability" domain of the GreenComp framework (2022); and, finally, in the integration of "Dimension 4" of DigiComp 2.2 (2022) concerning interaction with A.I. systems.

The present study aims to present a set of tools and instruments for the assessment and self-assessment of soft skills within entrepreneurship education environments characterized by informal learning and challenge-based learning pedagogical approaches. Specifically, a selection of tools tested and used to assess critical thinking will be highlighted, and several results will be shown to explore the role of this competence in guiding young individuals through transitions and in the search for individual trajectories.

The government's limitations in containing the virus during the COVID-19 pandemic have had unfavourable repercussions, particularly for those living in socioeconomically disadvantageous areas (Mickelson, 2015; Sani, 2021; Morabito C. et al., 2022). A cluster is represented by minors with migratory backgrounds to whom associations of volunteers provide support, reducing the linguistic and digital divide and providing educational support (Save the Children, 2019; Tageo et al., 2021; Levine AC et al., 2023). A previous study titled The support of the third sector to foreign students on virtual learning platforms during the coronavirus pandemic and presented at the International Mid-term Conference of the AIS-Sociology of Education Research Committee in April 2023 focused on the effort of diocesan Caritas organisations during the COVID-2019 pandemic, which offered various forms of support, including afterschool on e-learning platforms and economic and human help. Using an integrated approach, the questionnaire and interviews revealed that 74% of Caritas initiated distance learning support actions, especially for foreign students in primary school. Volunteers invested human and economic resources to ensure student participation and addressed shortcomings during the transition to distance learning. However, concerns arise about the possibility of student marginalisation due to distance learning. The first monitoring of the COVID-19 pandemic's has unveiled significant insights, prompting a proposal for a comprehensive follow-up study. This proposed study aims to delve deeper into various critical dimensions of the issue, spanning longitudinal effectiveness assessment, integration outcomes analysis, and horizontal subsidiarity evaluation (Sen, A. K., 1999; Nussbaum, M., 2011; Bianchi, P., 2020). The research avails of the integrated qualitative-quantitative method: a) online questionnaire b) interviews with diocesan operators and foreign student targets of the interventions. Firstly, the proposed follow-up aims to longitudinally assess the sustained effectiveness of the strategies implemented by Caritas in response to the pandemic. Given the dynamic nature of the crisis and its prolonged effects on education, it is crucial to understand whether the support measures introduced during the initial phase continue to address evolving needs over time. Furthermore, the study intends to explore the well-being of foreign students in the aftermath of prolonged periods of distance learning. The extended isolation and disrupted social interactions resulting from remote education may have profound implications for students' sense of belonging, warranting a comprehensive investigation and targeted support measures. Lastly, the follow-up study aims to evaluate the scalability and replicability of successful Caritas initiatives across different geographic regions and beneficiary groups. Identifying best practices and lessons learned from the pandemic response will enable policymakers and practitioners to enhance the resilience of educational support systems for vulnerable populations and better prepare for future crises. This study endeavours to provide a comprehensive assessment of the long-term impact and sustainability of Caritas interventions in supporting foreign students beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. By addressing key research questions across multiple dimensions, this study aims to generate actionable insights to inform evidence-based policy and practice in the fields of education and social welfare.