In its coverage of the Visby Agenda, the Swedish Presidency has sought help from IT experts of tomorrow – students from five Swedish IT upper secondary schools. They will make use of new communicative solutions on the Internet to talk about – and encourage discussion on – the issues discussed during the meeting.

“We will act as reporters at the conference and be its public face for everyone who’s interested,” says Meryem Aktas, who attends the IT upper secondary school in Sundbyberg. “It will be exciting to pick up the viewpoints and opinions of all the young people, which we will do through Twitter, Facebook, blogs and so on.”

Many steps

Åsa Torstensson met the students ahead of the meeting and feels that this is an excellent way for the Presidency to gather relevant opinions from those who are actually affected by the issues.

“When policies are to be formulated, there are so many steps that must be taken along the way. It is important that people participate in all these steps so that they don’t find themselves in a situation where they can only comment on matters that politicians have already finished negotiating,” Ms Torstensson told the students. “That is why it is so important that you will be on hand during the Visby Agenda.”

New perspectives

John Winroth Berggren, who attends the IT upper secondary school in Skövde, sees the task as a challenge and appreciates the opportunity to listen and meet prominent industry personalities at close hand.

“Above all, I hope we can provide different perspectives than those of people in the business sector and politicians. After all, we represent external perspectives. Our being there shows that this issue interests us.”

Everything in English

The students will attend lectures and debates, and interview invited speakers and politicians. They will also gather viewpoints and questions from those who follow the conference on the web and present them to the participants at the conference. All external communication will be in English and has the potential of reaching interested parties outside of Sweden as well.

To follow the the students coverage of Visby Agenda, click on the link to the right.