Happy new year to you, young people, you who were not spared the previous year! You have not been sick much of the Covid, but you have been touched by this “messed up year of 2020”. You have been touched by the reputation we have given you: that of spreading this virus through the parties and encounters that you have tried to continue to enjoy. And yet, you felt a twinge of guilt sometimes when you participated. Let’s be honest, were we, the older ones, blameless? Have we never played hide and seek with police checks? Have we never tried to deal with the reasons for movement during confinements? Have we never pretended stronger family ties than they are, to gather today, sometimes in excess? You are right to throw “Ok Boomers” at us when we criticize the straw in your eye instead of looking at all the straw in our eyes…

And what if, in 2021, we devoted more time and attention to you? Because you are the future of this crazy dystopia.

What can we commit to?

• To  support you in your questioning about your future  for those who are in their final year, at the time of the choices of Parcours Sup  in France. Why not a punctual coaching ? Even if more than ever the school system will have to evolve, you still enrol for a few more years in this process, and you need  coherence between your project, your personality, and your desires.

• Listening to you talking about the emotions you are going through, helping you  to put words to the evils – sadness, anger, fear… – both for those who continue to go to school, and for those who can no longer go to school and are running around in circles in an overly small apartment which they pay the rent unnecessarily. I also invite you to (re)read the article by Fabrice Gartner which details the situation …. Let us not forget those who are in financial difficulties, who no longer have small jobs to supplement their parents’ scholarships or aid, or to pay the exorbitant tuition fees of certain large schools in which they haven’t set foot for months. I am also thinking of those who had to go abroad, or who study there, stuck in a shared flat to follow courses at a distance without seeing anything of the country where they are. Finally, I think of all those who can no longer dream of an elsewhere far from here!

• Encourage you to ask yourself questions about the current job market, and find ideas to continue working, retrain, or stay the course by helping you create a network that can support you.

• Suggest that you structure your days, because having a framework and a routine are simple ways to stay on your feet. And why not draw inspiration from  astronaut secrets, and organize your life in a bubble?

• Encourage you to get involved in a passion – cooking, writing, photography -, in a humanitarian mission in your school, or in one of the initiatives that flourish on the web, such as the World Youth Summit with l’ IUCN  and the WHO to “Shape a healthier and more resilient post-pandem ic world”.

You are going to find your own resources, invent the jobs of tomorrow, and the world after that. You can count on us, parents, teachers, therapists, coaches, to listen to you, to support you, to simply be there for you. We want you to have confidence in yourself, to be aware of yourself. Believe in yourself because you worth it and that today is the day to build for tomorrow!

In 2020, we have lost part of a generation, let us make sure we do not lose another one in 2021: I wish us to act so that it will be a year of greater solidarity and intergenerationally, a year of “Reliance”.  

See you soon, BS.