UNICEF research on the types and intensity of violence, carried out in 50 schools in the sample of 26,947 students and 3,397 adults, brought the information that 65% of students at least once, and 24% more than once were exposed to some form of violent behavior over a period of three months. The most common forms of bullying are verbal violence, spreading lies, threats and intimidation, but often this behavior exceeds the limit of physical contact.

With the project “Safe Youth – Safer Serbia” we want to enable young people to acquire the necessary knowledge about the violence that is becoming more and more prevalent among them, drug addiction and children trafficking. Through workshops, participants will gain knowledge that will help them to properly understand negative and positive social values​​, but also to improve their personal safety.

Workshops in the field of youth (which cover the above three pressing security problems of youth today) will be implemented in at least 10 high schools throughout Serbia. Workshops will be done by experts of the International Police Association who have years of experience in this field. COTS, in cooperation with psychologists and educators of schools, will announce a call for students to participate in workshops on youth safety and select candidates. As we believe that young people should be given the same chances, the selection criteria will be mostly related to the motivation to participate. Also, in collaboration with school psychologists and educators the priority will be given to young people who, in the past, had signs of problematic behavior. Workshop participants will receive an info brochure created as a part of this project. Brochures will be a summary of the workshop and will serve as a reminder of what the participants learned, while it will serve to the other students as a source of very useful and important information about peer violence, drug addiction and children trafficking as the three most common threats to the security of young people today.