VAJA – Association for the Promotion of Accepting Youth Work

The Association for the Promotion of Accepting Youth Work (VAJA) was founded in 1992. Since then, it has become the largest provider of street work/outreach youth work in Bremen. In addition to seven teams working in this area, a youth center and three counseling centers complement VAJA's services.

Within the framework of accepting youth work, VAJA primarily addresses adolescents and young people who are not sufficiently or even at all reached by other youth work services, who define themselves as cliques or scenes, and for whom public space has become the central place of activity and residence in their free time.

VAJA uses an outreach approach to re-establish contact with marginalized young people, supports them in coping with life, and works together with the young people to make their living environment more positive.

Accepting youth work reaches young people from a wide variety of backgrounds, scenes and cliques.

Currently, eight teams are under the auspices of VAJA. Seven of these provide outreach services within VAJA's core area of ​​operation. A counseling center complements the organization's services.

Teams / Offers

East Regional
Team (R.OST) has been working in the seven districts of the East region since October 1996, engaging in outreach and networking. Its approach is based on the principles of acceptance-oriented youth work and the Bremen concept for outreach youth work with cliques and scenes.

Contact:
VAJA eV
Regional Team East,
Hinter der Mauer 9,
28195 Bremen

Tel: 0421/76266
Fax: 0421/76252
Email: rost(at)vaja-bremen.de

Regional Team South:
The Regional Team South works proactively and collaboratively in the four districts of Bremen's south. It emerged from the former Team Grenzgänger, which was expanded in 2008 to establish clique and scene work not only in Huchting but also in the districts of Neustadt, Woltmershausen, and Obervieland.

Contact:
VAJA eV
Regional Team South,
Hinter der Mauer 9, 28195 Bremen,
Tel: 0421 / 76 266,
Email: sued(at)vaja-bremen.de

West Regional Team
works in an outreach and networking capacity in the five Bremen districts of Mitte, Östliche Vorstadt, Findorff, Walle, and Gröpelingen. Their approach is based on the principles of acceptance-oriented youth work and the Bremen concept for outreach work with cliques and scenes.

Contact:
VAJA eV
Regional Team Central/West,
Hinter der Mauer 9, 28195 Bremen,
Tel: +49 421 / 76 266,
Email: mitte-west(at)vaja-bremen.de

Team Subculture:
Team Subculture emerged from the Punk Project in 2009. This project was initiated in 1996 with the aim of preventing young punks from sliding into drug addiction and homelessness, as they often congregate in places considered dangerous. To adequately incorporate the lived experiences of punks into its outreach work, the team's services were opened in 2009 to young people from various subcultures who wanted to spend their free time together with the punks (…)

Contact:
VAJA eV
Team Subkultur,
Hinter der Mauer 9, 28195 Bremen,
Tel.: 0421 / 76 266,
Email: sub(at)vaja-bremen.de

spot. (until 2018, ‘Acceptance Youth Work with Right-Wing Cliques’)
The ‘spot.’ team has been part of VAJA since 2018. Through outreach youth work and workshops, the street workers engage with youth cliques in public spaces throughout Bremen. Their educational support is primarily tailored to the interests and needs of the young people. Rooted in the organization's history, the team also places a special focus, a ‘spotlight’, on addressing anti-democratic attitudes and aspects of group-based hostility.

Contact:

VAJA eV
Team spot.
Hinter der Mauer 9, 28195 Bremen
Tel.: 0421/76 266
Mail: spot(at)vaja-bremen.de

Navigating
the unfamiliar public space and acquiring knowledge about available resources and integration-promoting opportunities for self-realization demands a significant amount of time and effort from individuals. During such a period of uncertainty, young people with refugee experience may be more susceptible to approaches from individuals who prioritize their own interests over those of others—especially young people seeking connection and belonging—and who attempt to influence them in their own favor.

Contact:
connect / VAJA eV
Breitenweg 34
28195 Bremen
Tel.: 0421 / 514 207 52
Mail: connect(at)vaja-bremen.de

ADERO (formerly kitab until 2021) is a specialist and advisory center.
Holding radical views and challenging the adult world is part of adolescent development. Young people need space for free development. Especially in times when fundamental societal values ​​are being debated and secure living conditions are no longer a given for many, young people need contact persons in their neighborhood, their school, and in institutions who take their needs seriously and approach them with a critically accepting attitude. Creating these spaces for young people and supporting stakeholders in the neighborhoods in their interactions with young people is a guiding principle of the sponsoring organization VAJA e. V. and also a guiding principle for the ADERO specialist and advisory center.

Contact:
adero(at)vaja-bremen.de
Office: 0421 69 60 61 90