The rapidly evolving digital landscape has presented new challenges for young people, particularly around navigating ethical issues like digital AI tools, misinformation, disinformation and biased reporting. There still remains a significant gap in providing targeted education and resources for youth. Formal media education does not always support the context in which the youth live and interact, and often the participants might not see the “real-life” relevance of the teaching contents at schools. ActiveYOU represents media educators, youth workers and the tech industry, and in consortium we are presenting a horizontal project on media education contributing directly to NGOs, non-formal education and civic organisations working with youth in Europe. It will also contribute to the further training of teachers and media educators. The project develops the active skillsets of young people to learn how to responsibly navigate the information highway and actively develop their critical media literacy skills for the benefit of themselves and those in their communities. We will incorporate an innovative bottom-up non-formal training program utilising ethical journalism methodologies.