February 25, 2020

Spotlight on EYP Iceland

EYP Iceland is one of the youngest members of the EYP family, founded in 2016. We talked with Margrét Benediktsdóttir and Emma Ósk Ragnarsdóttir, members of the National Committee of EYP Iceland about their fresh perspective on EYP, the roles they fulfil and what they hope to learn from it all.

What attracted you to join EYP Iceland and what roles do you have?

Margrét: I was already in the international committee of my university and I’m the international secretary of a political youth group in Iceland, so it made sense for me to join EYP. We’re in the National Committee of EYP Iceland, we don’t have a specific role yet, because we’re still so small. Getting people to join, getting our fundraising going, telling all of our friends about EYP and why they should join: that’s what we mainly do.

Emma: Our friend Ásthildur Andrésdóttir Kjerúlf is the President of EYP Iceland and she kept asking us to come and check it out. From the moment she presented us her presentation about EYP we were sold. It’s so great to be a part of an organisation that brings young people together from all over Europe to talk about contemporary issues.

I immediately rolled into it with finding accommodation for our National Selection Conference in Reykjavik (16-20 October).

What does a National Committee do?

Margrét: We have a really small National Committee and that’s a challenge, but we’re working through it. That is why we were very excited about the Summer Academy in Luxembourg this past Summer. Since we’re so small and just getting started we learned a lot from other EYP countries that was very useful for us, for example about implementing strategy.

Emma: Fundraising, reaching out to schools more, developing EYP Iceland and planning our National Selection Conference in Reykjavik have been our number one priorities for the last few months. We want to get as many people involved in EYP Iceland as possible