The following individuals were the most implicated into the youth exchange on the Slovene side, outside of the workshop leaders. They are mainly coordinators and organizers of the project. In other words, they are the glue holding everything together.

Petra Aškerc - Coordinator

Petra is studying pedagogic and Slovenian language and literature. Always involved in many projects, she is also a tutor to younger students in the faculty of Arts at the University of Ljubljana. Petra was the main coordinator on the field during the exchange. She kept stimulating the whole group by entertaining the participants with interactive activities. In other words, she was the motivator and “energy dispenser” of the group. Her communicative personality was developed over the years by traveling, teaching and organizing social gatherings. Nevertheless, she enjoys relaxing with saunas, theater nights, dancing and writing poetry.

Simon Černelč – Architect of the project

Simon is 30 years old and he studies art on the faculty of Education at the University of Maribor. He is the mastermind behind the concept of “Paths to each other”. His head is always in turmoil since he is already juggling with new ideas for other youth exchanges. In his free time he reads books, writes stories, takes pictures and plays with his music band MALIK in which he is the singer. Last year he was the youth leader of the Slovenian group, which participated in a youth exchange in Modena, Italy. Occasionally he works in the student radio MARŠ and in the book club CIPROŠ.

Irena Rudolf – Coordinator and leader of youth exchange

Irena was born in April 1981 in northeast part of Slovenia. She has finished the study of ethnology and cultural anthropology with thesis ‘Velenje is Ghetto – Narratives of Youth About Living in Town’ in June 2006. Velenje is her home town and is especially known as ‘socialistic miracle’ which was established in 1959 because of industry. While Velenje was made a hometown for a lot of immigrants, ethnicity, identities, stereotypes and prejudices have always been her main topics of interest.
The reason why such a local patriot as Irena is moved to south part of Slovenia is love. Now she is very actively involved in volunteering work with youth and is part-time employed by the Youth Association of Bistrica ob Sotli. Happy mother of a beautiful young girl named Zarja.
The Paths to Each Other project is her third youth exchange project as an organizer/coordinator which makes her the veteran of our group. She likes nature, especially forests and hills, picking up herbs and mushrooms. She adores cooking and (unfortunately) also eating.