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Raising the pedagogical capacity of Network of Estonian Eco-communities
Start date: Sep 1, 2014, End date: Aug 31, 2015 PROJECT  FINISHED 

This project was written by the Network of Estonian Eco-communities (NEEC), which is an Estonian NGO, founded in 2008 by people working in training and teaching of sustainability to adults on various levels and people interested in sustainability in general. The objective of NEEC according to its statutes is to promote the formation of a just and ecologically balanced world. A more concrete goal is to promote the emergence and development of eco-communities in Estonia. We currently have 70 individual and organisational members. The objective of this Erasmus+ mobility project was to significantly increase the organisational capacity and teaching skills of key staff of our organisation according to our European Development Plan. We had the opportunity to send 5 of our key persons, long-time dedicated volunteers of NEEC, to professional and management courses to the biggest and most experienced ecovillages (in specific fields ) in Europe. NEEC needs to increase their qualifications to strengthen our organisation and start to offer more courses on sustainability for the wider public in Estonia and internationally in the future. The project was managed by the project management team who made selection of participants, signed learning agreements with participants, organised mentors for them, communicated with receiving partner organisations, signed lerning agreements for VET Mobility, organised practical issues (e.g travel), monitored the learning process, evaluated and analysed the outcomes, organised dissemination and implementation of the outcomes, evaluated the final impact of the project and composed the final report. The participants of our orgnisation and the courses they studied were: Risto Bakhoff - 2 courses: 1) Technology for Autonomous Energy Supply and 2)Tamera - the model for the future, at Tamera eco village - Portugal; Paavo Eensalu - Strategic planning tool „Dragon Dreaming“ on how to overcome obstacles in projects, in Sieben Linden eco village, Germany; Krista Noorkõiv - „Inspiring the Change“ in Sieben Linden eco village, Germany; Ave Oit - "Group Facilitation" in Torri Superiore eco village, Italy; Maarja Õunaste - “Permaculture Educators' Course" in Friland eco village - Denmark. The results of this project are and will be disseminated widely through all communication channels of NEEC and in local and national media. The participants disseminated and will disseminate their experience and new knowledge: * presentations on the gatherings of NEEC - winter anbd summer meetings; * presentations in evening seminars in October - November 2015; * articles in our newsletter and website and on our Facebook page, on the green news portal www.bioneer.ee and also in national media; * videos on our website; * workshops in permaculture on 12th September 2015 and a weekend training (free for organisation members) in April 2016. * knowledge gained through tis project helped to launch our organisations' own adult education centre - Gaia Academy, see www.gaiaakadeemia.ee. Further on we plan to use social media, our e-mail list and homepage for to advertise our new courses and send also direct emails to our target group. Impact for participants: * considerably increased pedagogical, management skills and professional qualifications of participants in specific areas (sustainable energy systems, permaculture, schooling of an ecovillage, successful project management, fascilitation); * increased intercultural awareness and language skills; * a new perspective on teaching techniques; * more acknowledgement in their area by NEEC members and wider target groups; * improved professional experience in real ecovillage training centres or technological field; * more information about how ecovillages operate, run their seminar centers and technologies; * increased intercultural awareness, language skills, exchange with ecovillages in adult education. Impact for the Network of Estonian Eco Communities (NEEC): * considerably increased competitive position of NEEC because of increased skills of the staff; * wider base to start offering workshops on sustainability: permaculture, sustainable energy systems, group facilitation, dragon dreaming, and implementing these techniques in our organisation; * NEEC opened up a training center for adults Gaia Academy, see www.gaiaacademy.ee, on sustainability in it's different aspects; * new courses about sustainable solutions at climat change, in economic, ecological and social problems in nowadays society; * NEEC can offer new courses in our training centre that are not being taught by any other organisation in Estonia; * NEEC will become more internationalised with better cooperation with the European network of ecovillages; Expected impact on target groups: * raising awareness in sustainability; * changing behaviours - people participating in our workshops, trainings and seminars will be able to use new tools in their surrounding community or organisation; * new target group
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