The online panel titled "Rethinking combatting discrimination: Online non-formal training methods", which took place within the scope of the project “Towards a new discourse and dialogue”, was moderated by Hakan Kahraman from Sabancı Foundation at 14:00 on Thursday, 12 August 2020. The panel, which was held with the participation of Menno Ettema from Council of Europe and Özge Sönmez from Yuva Association, discussed how the Covid-19 epidemic affected human rights-oriented studies in combating discrimination and hate speech, and the difficulties and opportunities created by online methods.

Menno Ettema, after talking about the work he did before the pandemic, continued his speech by explaining how the pandemic affected the activities of the Council of Europe. Evaluating his activities in the Council of Europe under two headings, human rights education and training methodology, and the fight against discrimination, Ettema underlined that the approach to non-formal training methods should be evaluated during the pandemic period.

Özge Sönmez started her speech by talking about the role of non-formal training methods in the activities of the Yuva Association. According to Sönmez, who stated that Yuva Association has been working on human and nature rights with the non-formal training method since 2010, non-formal training is a method they have adopted in terms of encouraging critical thinking, being optional, being shaped according the need and continuous for life. Stating that they brought non-formal training activities online during the pandemic period, Özge Sönmez expressed that they carried out field research to make sure that online trainings were accessible to all participants.

Both speakers stated that moving non-formal education methods online has the potential to reach more people; however, the pandemic conditions have created new forms of discrimination. They emphasized that while taking educational activities to online platforms creates new needs such as access to computers, internet, and translation materials and developing technological literacy, training activities should be developed in line with the needs of the participants. 

Video in English