In March 2023, "school forums" were held at five secondary schools in the Vysočina region. Their purpose was to encourage the young generation to be actively involved in the development of their school and the place where they live. The events followed on from dozens of similar Healthy Cities events, municipalities and city regions throughout the Czech Republic, but here in the Vysočina region, a significant innovation was added - finance and concrete cooperation for the implementation of ideas.

5 events took place in Havlickuv Brod, Trebic and Pacov. Their goal was to involve students in joint decision-making about school and city priorities. Students learned not only about discussion, argumentation and decision-making about priorities and options, but also the financing and implementation of ideas/projects, thanks to the connection with the Youth for the region program. As part of the piloting of school forums in Vysočina, there were several fundamental connections that gave school forums a new and interesting dimension:

1. School forums took place in secondary schools where there is a school student parliament, which is involved in the emerging Student Parliament of the Vysočina Region. This results in a gradual continuity of students' work from the school to the regional level.

2. The students were given the opportunity to implement their priorities which made it into the TOP10 - to obtain funds for implementation within the Youth for region. This connection is important because it tells the students - if you come up with an interesting project, you can immediately take responsibility for its implementation. As part of a weekend training implemented by the Vysočina Council of Children and Youth, the students then prepared and defended their projects and subsequently obtained funding for implementation. For the year 2023, 26 projects were supported in this way in an average amount of approx. 20,000/project - samples here: https://vysocina.mladezkraji.cz/projekty

All school forums were held in cooperation with HCCZ, the Council of Children and Youth of the Vysočina Region and the Vysočina Region. A representative of the given city (HEalthy City coordinator or a member of the city council) always attended. As part of the guided discussion, the students defined TOP10 topics for the school and TOP10 topics for the city. All topics were recorded and forwarded to representatives of the school and the city for further resolution, the topics should be evaluated at the next school forum in a year. In this way, young people will take away not only the fact that they were able to get involved, come up with something and implement their ideas, which is already happening in many places, for example with participatory budgets, but also that it is necessary to stand up for your idea, realistically plan and actively put it into practice. Young people will learn a lot in this way, including how to write a project, account for money and so on, which will surely be very useful for them in their future life."

Linking with the Youth for Region program (implemented by regional councils for children and youth in individual regions) is very suitable. More at www.mladezkraji.cz .

This will allow students not only to come up with topics and priorities, but also give them the opportunity to implement their ideas. In this way, they learn to take responsibility for their own actions and also to see things through. The connection with regional councils for children and youth is very beneficial in this aspect (more at www.krajskeradymladeze.cz)

The events were promoted on social networks (https://www.facebook.com/rdmkv). In Havlíčková Brod, there was also a report for the local media (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSZBxBo0dWY at 5:45)