Description of organisation

Established in 1982, Piispala is a youth center located in Kannonkoski in the north of Central Finland. Our primary mission is to promote youth activities and support the good life of children and young people. We also serve as a versatile centre of leisure, sports and wellbeing for families, seniors, businesses, and sports groups. Our clientele consists of camp school groups, sports groups, confirmation camps, family groups and international groups. In general, 90% of our customers are children and young people.

Piispala is one of the 9 national Finnish Youth Centres that are supported by the Ministry of Education and Culture and guided by the Youth Act and the National Youth Work and Youth Policy Programme. The common goal of Finnish Youth Centres is to promote the participation, influencing opportunities and conditions to work in society for the youth, and support their growth, independence, and community spirit. Piispala operates on local, regional, national, and international level.

The values that guide Piispala’s work are: Respect for life and environment, respect for individuals and sense of belonging, equality and participation and caring and appreciation. International youth work has been and will be one of the activities that we will keep on conducting, developing, and promoting. Main target groups for our international activities are mainly 13–30-year-old young people, youth workers, and municipalities. The international activities we carry out are youth mobilities, youth worker mobilities, volunteering activities, strategic partnerships and bringing and internationality to our region. We also promote and help different organisations, individuals, and municipalities to carry out international activities and projects. We also aim to develop international activities.