The Odense Fjord Collaboration is an association of the primary stakeholders of Odense Fjord, a waterbody located in the region of Southern Denmark. The partnership was formed in 2022 and is collaborating to reach the goal of good ecological status for Odense Fjord by 2027 as set by the Water Frame Directive.

The Odense Fjord catchment is 1050 km2, making it the region's largest catchment. Five municipalities share the legal management of the area, which is composed of agricultural land, water- and nature-protection areas, forests, villages, bigger towns, and the city of Odense, with 200.000 inhabitants.  

The global crisis of climate change, as well as localised challenges with nutrient pollution and subsequent loss of biodiversity, is highly present in Odense Fjord. As the primary stakeholders, the partnership acknowledges its responsibility and obligation to connect the various strategies to holistic, multicriteria planning. This will allow targeted investments in nature-based solutions to reestablish positive ecosystem services in the catchment and fjord, improving the region's water quality and biodiversity. 

The goal will be achieved through the development of a governance setup that enables the stakeholders to plan and implement solutions faster and more efficiently and with the ability to raise local engagement through, for instance, citizen science.

The partners of the collaboration are:

• Faarborg-Midtfyn, Nordfyn, Kerteminde and Odense municipalities.
• The utility companies FFV Energi & Miljø, VandCenter Syd, Odense Renovation and Fjernvarme Fyn.
• The agricultural organisation L&F Centrovice and the affiliated research- and development organisations SEGES and VELAS.
• Local industry in the form of Odense Port, HJHansen, Marius Pedersen and Dansk Gartneri.
• The regional green and recreational NGOs, such as Danmarks Naturfredsningsforening.
• The University of Southern Denmark ensures evidence-based decision making.

The partnership has expertise in Horizon, LIFE and Interreg projects, both as partner and coordinator.

The proposed project is part of the theme of “Roots Tourism”, a broad phenomenon which is finding particular interest in Italy, which is increasingly seen as an important lever for the development of conscious and sustainable tourism, capable of developing a strong impact in the territories where it is developed.

Enit (the Italian National Tourism Agency) has calculated that in 2019, about 6 million people visited Italy for reasons related to their family history, with an induced revenue of about 10 billion euros. It is estimated that the phenomenon affects around 80 million people worldwide. At the basis of the phenomenon, according to considerations recently expressed by Giuseppe De Rita "There are now fourth or fifth generation emigrants, who do not speak Italian but who have a strong attraction to Italy, because they want to get to know this place they have heard about through the traditions of their own family". 

Signalling the phenomenon's importance, Italy will declare 2024 the Year of Roots Tourism. 

It is also worth mentioning that this is not only an Italian phenomenon. A recent project the Storytelling lab was involved in on the heritage of WWII in Brabant showed how many Polish residents are interested in visiting the Netherlands and Breda in particular because the Polish army liberated this at the end of WWII, and many Polish citizens have remained here. This new generation of Poles also wants to find their roots by visiting Breda and the country.

The project proposes to use technologies based on artificial intelligence, suitably trained, to create a platform capable of valorising objects, classified as artefacts, that take on value solely by the relationships that bind them together and, consequently, their ability to refer back to the lives of real people and their stories. This is the sense of networking and processing in a systemic logic a mass of information already available today, which is inhomogeneous and comes from many different sources. "There is in fact no pure aesthetic interest, in the classical museum sense, if one considers the single object taken out of context and not as an isolated element, but in the set of relations that gives things mutual attraction, congruity, meaning and value". (Andrea Carandini - La forza del Contesto - Ed La Terza). 

Starting from data and with the help of AI technologies, it is possible to extract connections with which to reconstruct a network of relationships and histories of real people, family sagas, report property rights that were never claimed, and return to life through memory, places that are now abandoned or, in rare cases, gentrified and lived only as places for tourists and visitors.
In other words, it is a work of archaeology of the human being to create the pathos that can capture us and arouse the desire for a visit or a stay, experienced with an attentive and participatory gaze.
 

Pionii Regelui Chess Club, a non-governmental organisation focused on educating rural children through chess from Romania, is seeking partners to join their Erasmus+ Small Scale Partnership project in sports, concentrating on developing an educational experience through chess.

Our project aims to improve access to education for children from rural areas and those in vulnerable situations, including foster care children and those of Roma ethnicity. Our initiative aims to use chess as a valuable educational tool, promoting cognitive development, mental discipline, and social skills through this ancient game.

Our project activities include online and physical lessons designed to provide a deep understanding of chess and its strategies. Additionally, we will organize a verification tournament to serve as a platform for evaluating the participants' progress. Meritorious children, distinguished by performance and commitment, will have the opportunity to participate in an educational camp, a conducive environment for further developing their chess skills and interacting with their peers. The project will conclude with a competitive tournament and a closing ceremony, marking the recognition of the participants' achievements and celebrating their success. During the project, mutual visits will be organized between the project partners to exchange best practices and actively involve each other in the project activities.

Our goal is to create a collaborative network of dedicated partners who contribute to extending the educational impact of chess on children from rural and vulnerable environments. By directly involving these entities, we wish to provide children with access to valuable learning opportunities, stimulating their intellectual, social, and emotional development through the power of chess. Together, we can build a solid platform for children's education, using chess as an entertainment activity and a profound educational and personal development tool.

Project Budget: 60.000 EUR
Duration of Project: 12 months
Deadline for application submission: 5 March 2024

Type of Partners Sought:

In our innovative project, we aim to collaborate with the following entities to expand and enhance our educational offerings:

• Chess clubs that are interested in sharing their expertise and actively participating in the educational process by providing chess lessons, educational materials, and support for organizing chess tournaments.
• Educational centres or institutions aiming to improve access to quality education for all children, including those from vulnerable or disadvantaged backgrounds. These centres would contribute additional educational resources and could host both online and physical learning sessions to ensure broad and effective coverage.
• Schools interested in integrating chess into their educational curriculum or offering extracurricular activities centred on chess. Partner schools will benefit from support in implementing chess programs, enriching their students' educational experience and promoting their holistic development.

DEADLINE TO SUBMIT YOUR EXPRESSION OF INTEREST: 16 February 2024

CONTACT INFORMATION
Name: Vlad Ionuț Stegariu
Email Address: pioniiregelui@gmail.com 
Organisation Name: ACS Pionii Regelui

Background and context

Being young should be associated with innocence, building experience, new horizons, hope. Experiencing childhood and young adulthood in a country at war means experiencing another reality. When the war started, there were 7.3 million teenagers in Ukraine. According to the UN, ”children across Ukraine are showing signs of widespread learning loss, including a deterioration in learning outcomes of the Ukrainian language, reading and mathematics, as the war preceded by the COVID-19 pandemic have left students facing a fourth year of disruption to education”. Teenagers also have restricted access to culture, activities and distractions and some of them have had traumatic experiences related to war, such as violence, loss and grief, displacement, as well as constant fear and anxiety of an uncertain future. According to a survey conducted by the Dobrodiyiv Club charitable foundation and published 15 months after the war started, among citizens aged 13-19 across Ukraine, ”almost 40% of young people feel fear for their lives and health - their own and their loved ones - because of the war”.

Despite this, Ukrainian teenagers have more confident in themselves and the country. The survey shows that 93% of young people believe in their strength, and 70% know what they want to become in the future. Lastly, 90% of adolescents said they want to be useful in the country's post-war reconstruction. Multinational cooperation around the values of Europe in Ukraine will contribute, through this Erasmus + project, to support and inspire young Ukrainians.

In the EU countries, the perception of the war in Ukraine is worth tackling. In a world dominated by social media, we can observe that, although young people can access abundant information and connect across borders, the war in Ukraine has become normalised and distant for many EU citizens.

Objective

The objective of this Erasmus + project is to place a spotlight on the future of the youth in war-affected Ukraine, both in Ukraine and in the EU. The project seeks to raise greater awareness of the consequences of the war for youth in Ukraine and EU countries while strengthening courage, unity, and community among young people from Ukraine and the EU. Our approach is to highlight hope and courage in a future where democracy should not be taken for granted, and dreams should not be forgotten even in difficult times.

Scope of work and activities

Workshops among young people in Ukraine on the following topics:

• Digital Narratives: Experiment with digital narratives such as podcasts and videos, allowing young people to express their thoughts and emotions in a more personal and dynamic manner.
• Inter-cultural Understanding: Focus on the similarities and differences between young people in Ukraine and EU countries, including traditions, values, and daily life, to foster a broader understanding of each other's backgrounds.
• Digital Dialogues: Facilitate digital dialogues among young people from Ukraine and EU countries through online platforms, enabling ongoing connection and exchange of ideas.
• Storytelling through Art: Enable young people to express their experiences through various art forms like painting, sculpture, or digital art, resulting in an art exhibition conveying the youth perspective on the war and hope for the future where language is not a barrier.
• Education and Training: Implement longer-term educational programs, including training young people as ambassadors for the project, who can share knowledge and build lasting bonds between collaborators.
• Creative Writing and Journalism: Integrate creative writing and journalism into the project, creating articles, blogs, or even a digital news channel run by the youth themselves, further amplifying their voices.
• Innovation and Technology: Incorporate technological elements such as virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR) to create a more profound and engaging experience of the lives and perspectives of the young people.
• Evaluation and Research: Include a research component, evaluating the project's impact and using results to inform future similar initiatives, with feedback from the involved youth to ensure the project's relevance and effectiveness.

Events in each of the partner countries

After conduction of the workshops, materials and results will be brought back to the partner countries to sensitize young EU citizens, in order to proceed to dissemination activities. This will be done through i) one event in each of the partner countries, in the form of an exhibition and/or workshop and through ii) online communication, in the form of a website/blog accessible in all the EU countries.

Implementation actors and collaborators

We are a Danish company specialising in addressing complex issues faced by children and youth, with a main focus on the sea, marine environment, EU, and politics. Our emphasis lies in inclusive practices through workshops, festivals, social media engagement, and school visits. Our multinational team possesses expertise in rhetoric, project implementation, communication, psychology, international business communication, as well as security and defense in a Danish context.