Erasmus+ Books Without Covers project 2025

This school year has allowed for a new Erasmus+ project at Gimnazija Vič that has the focus on allowing us to deal with issues of prejudices and stereotypes.

The project is called Books Without Covers and is based on meeting a variety of different people who tell us things about their lives and experiences. By hearing about the difficulties that some people face because of how they are viewed as being different in some way, students in our group are able to understand what other people have to deal with and how we can work to help make sure that they always feel included. This includes issues such as religion, gender, nationality, and anything else that can make a person seem to stand out or feel as though they are not the same as those around them.

In October, we attended an event called Living Library. For this, we joined up with others in one of Ljubljana's central libraries to hear a group of people talk about their lives. We heard so many interesting stories including about how people deal with physical and mental health issues, problems faced by the LGBTQ+ community, and wider concerns dealt with in other local communities.

In December, our group invited the writer and translator Zarja Vršič to our school to talk to our group and another Erasmus+ team who are dealing with the theme of how important storytelling is in different societies. As well as a fascinating talk about the creative process, we were able to hear her views about languages and social attitudes in different cultures.

This is only the start of a project that we look forward to expanding in the months ahead. We are already planning an exchange with students from Germany that will focus on how prejudices are dealt with in our countries. In addition, we are looking forward to building up more opportunities for students at our school and beyond to be able to be open about the difficulties they have faced and overcome in their lives.

We would like to thank our project mentors for all their work with us so far and we very much look forward to sharing more news about this important project through the rest of the school year.