Final conference of Erasmus+ Project PROMOCITI

On 20.02.2024, the Association of German Folk High Schools invited its project partners, members of the association and national as well as international guests from the interested public to conclude the "PROMOCITI Promoting Active Citizenship" Erasmus+ project with a conference. 

Mina Dennert from #Iamhere as keynote speaker

Over the past two years, the PROMOCITI project has intensively explored the possibilities of active citizenship - both analogue and digital. The great scepticism towards digital methods in education, volunteering and civic engagement was countered with many examples and discussions. 

The conference began with a keynote speech by Mina Dennert, journalist and founder of the #IAmHere network.

She gave an exciting insight into her activism against hate speech and fake news online. Her call not to leave the internet to these mechanisms, but to become active as individuals and educational institutions, made a big impression on the audience.

Workshops to deepen knowledge and exchange ideas

A subsequent round of workshops shed light on various aspects of digital Active Citizenship. 

Mats Ehn and Anna-Karin Raphasha Björnberg from the PROMOCITI project team presented the results of the project in a workshop. In addition to the publications, they also talked to the participants and explored the opportunities and challenges in Folk High Schools for active citizenship. 

Gül Yavuz, an employee of oskar | Freiwilligenagentur in Lichtenberg, Berlin, spoke about the digital opportunities for recruiting volunteers, but also about the possibilities that volunteering can gain through digitalisation. Online volunteering is already a much-discussed option, but the reality is often different anyway. 

Niclas Schmidt, volunteer at xHain hack+makespace, presented the analogue, digital and hybrid work of the makerspace. The analogue space in Friedrichshain is supplemented by digital components and is therefore very attractive to many people. As an example of an intelligent approach to digitalisation, the participants from the Folk High Schools were able to gain exciting inspiration here. 

Katrin Hünemörder, Managing Director of mediale pfade, spoke about digital participation and digital games in educational work. In this workshop, participants were also able to get more involved themselves; they had the opportunity to try out small programmes, online learning platforms and 3D glasses for themselves. 

All workshops focussed on how we can intelligently supplement our educational practice and Active Citizenship with digital elements. There were also repeated calls during the conference for Active Citizenship to be of great importance for the digital space. In future, the internet cannot remain an almost lawless space that harbours hate speech, fake news and violent content. Active Citizenship and education are of great importance here.

Publication of the PROMOCITI curriculum

The final conference was followed by the publication of the Promociti curriculum "Promoting Active Citizenship by Adult Education - A Curriculum for Educational Managers" for educational staff in Folk High Schools and Bildungshäuser, which focuses on the promotion of active citizenship and volunteering within the organisation. The curriculum is the final result of the Erasmus+ project and brings together all the knowledge gained from it. 

Final meeting of the PROMOCITI team in Poland 

Right after the conference in Berlin, the project team met for the last time from 21-23 February in Złotów, Poland. The meeting was hosted by Ogólnopolska Sieć Uniwersytetów Ludowych, the Association of Polish Folk High Schools. 

The focus was on bringing the two-year project PROMOCITI - Promoting Active Citizenship to a successful conclusion. In addition to organisational issues, it was particularly important to evaluate the benefits of the project for the individual project partners and which results could also be put to good use in the future. Reflecting on the final conference and the multiplier events in Sweden and Austria were also on the agenda. 

A particularly nice exchange took place online with project staff who were unable to travel to the project meeting. This gave everyone another chance to say goodbye and share their thoughts on the project. 

The trusting work with the lead partner, the German Association of Rural Education Centres (VBLR), as well as with all other project partners (Federació d'Associacions Culturals i Educatives de Persones Adultes (FACEPA) from Spain, the Färnebo Folkhögskola from Sweden, the SPES Zukunftsakademie from Austria and the Ogólnopolska Sieć Uniwersytetów Ludowych from Poland) was brought to a successful conclusion.  

Thank you very much!

More information about the project HERE.
Facebook-Page of the project HERE.