Human Rights Defenders of the Future – Apply to our spring human rights course!

What will we do? 

• We will learn about opportunities for social participation in Hungary.
• We will explore ways to get involved in society that are accessible to Hungarians, refugees, and foreigners living in Hungary.
• We will discover how young people can take part in community and civic life and make their voices heard.
• We will invite experts working on social participation projects to learn about their work and inspire us.
• We will use creative drama methods to learn, share experiences, and think together about participation and we will create a cool social action together.

How do we work with youth?

We work using the philosophy of critical pedagogy:

• we respect youth;
• we treat youth as experts;
• and we allow youth to shape our programme. 

We use human rights focused interactive, creative and experiential education methods. So, we will count on your active participation!

What youth said about our courses:

• “The course was a very good experience for me. I have never met a group where the members were so open to refugees or foreigners. It is so cool to be a part of the teams and the workshops, because it is the participants, us who come up with ideas for our projects together with the mentors. New members don’t need to worry about not having experience because the mentors are there to help and they teach the things that participants need to know.” (Basbibi, 19-year-old Afghan participant)
• “I would say to others that  you can feel important here. You are dealing with important topics. And our HHC mentors make us feel important. It is a whole new experience. One year ago I was a lot shier, I wasn’t that confident to speak out in front of others. Nowadays I am much more confident. I think it is because of you, you taught me how to relax myself and to be more confident.” (Dávid, 20-year-old Hungarian participant)
• “Helsinki uses a new approach to human rights and what they do. Group projects, social rounds and open conversations might be the approach to multiple things at different places, but making a human sculpture of a concept, or describing yourself through a toy, or roleplaying a human right violation scene to actually see where the problem comes from are definitely not common. What I felt whenever we were doing a task was that I’m not memorising something or simply learning something, but I’m actually experiencing it and learning it by heart. Helsinki’s ways of teaching engage everyone and create a safe environment for everyone to express themselves and what they took from the task, and the effects of these ways of teaching would be evident, especially in the long-term; as it’s easy to forget words but hard to forget actions and experiences.” (16-year-old Iranian participant)

When? 

We will have 10 weekly sessions between 9 April and 9 June 2026. We will meet every week in the late afternoon for 2.5 hours. 

We will meet every Tuesday or Thursday – please indicate which days you would be available in your application. 

Where? 

Most of our sessions will be in our office in Budapest close to Arany János and Deák Ferenc tér metro stations: 1051 Budapest, Nádor utca 15.

Who can and how to apply? 

• We take applications from youth who are between 16-22 years of age. 
• Refugees, migrants and Hungarian youth are all welcome to apply. 
• English speakers are needed, because we will work in English. 

The course is free of charge for participants.

You can apply here!

Application deadline: 11:59 PM, 29 March 2026