A meeting of students from Duga Resa Secondary School and the First Sušak Croatian Gymnasium was held at the RiHub, dedicated to participatory budgeting and the inclusion of young people in decision-making processes. The event was organised as part of the “Think Squad” project, implemented by the Local Action Group Vallis Colapis in cooperation with Duga Resa Secondary School, with financial support from the Ministry of Science, Education and Youth.
Representatives of the City of Rijeka, Dragica Fadljević, head of the Local Self-Government Section, and Tatjana Perše, senior adviser in the Department for Digital Development and Smart City, presented Rijekan examples of good practice in encouraging young people’s participation in local community development. Fadljević introduced the students to the Rijeka Local Partnership Programme, which encourages citizens to actively participate in the arrangement and improvement of public spaces and has been implemented since 2005. Through the programme, a number of projects have been realised for the arrangement of parks, children’s playgrounds, green areas, tree-lined avenues and promenades, in which citizens participate through volunteer work and donations. For the implementation of projects in 2026, the City of Rijeka has secured 37,197.37 euros, and financial support can amount to up to 5,500 euros per project.
Tatjana Perše spoke about the possibilities for connecting young people with European projects and their inclusion in urban regeneration processes. She presented the European project FREELAND, in which, alongside Rijeka, the Italian cities of Florence and Prato and the Polish city of Gdańsk participate, as well as secondary schools and a higher education institution from Gdańsk. The project is aimed at developing educational modules for secondary school students, encouraging them to participate in urban regeneration, design proposals for improving urban spaces, and collaborate with city services, experts and other local stakeholders. An international student hackathon planned for February 2027 was also announced, in which secondary schools from across Europe will participate. Prizes in the form of STEM equipment for schools worth 1,500, 1,000 and 500 euros are foreseen for the most successful teams, with the award ceremony planned for a closing conference in Rijeka in April 2027.
Ivana Josipović-Florijan, a biology and chemistry teacher at the First Sušak Croatian Gymnasium, spoke about the school project “School and Community”, which was presented by about ten students at the meeting, as well as student activities within Erasmus+ projects. Over the past six months, students have cleaned the space, planted flowers and shrubs, procured benches and waste bins, and arranged and painted certain parts of the space. In the coming period, they plan to further enrich the green areas and content, and better present the arranged space to the local community.
In Rijeka, 19 third-year students from Duga Resa Secondary School stayed as part of the “Think Squad” project. Antonija Benčić-Milčić from the Local Action Group Vallis Colapis in Karlovac highlighted that the project is financed by funds from the Ministry of Science, Education and Youth in the amount of 34,000 euros and is aimed at educating young people on project writing and participatory budgeting. The visit to Rijeka is part of the second phase of the project, during which students familiarise themselves with examples of good practice, including the experience of the First Sušak Croatian Gymnasium in the field of participatory budgeting and the arrangement of school space. After returning, students will continue to develop their own project ideas, with the aim of realising some of them.
“We want to show young people that their voice matters and that they can truly influence their school, city and the place they come from,” Benčić-Milčić said. The meeting enabled students to familiarise themselves with examples of participation in decision-making and to exchange experiences useful for developing their own ideas in schools and local communities.
