CRESTART - CReative rESilienT leARning communiTies meeting COVID challenges

COVID brought unexpected challenges in every aspects of our lifes. For the subject of our proposal we chose cultural activities, because during COVID lockdown these activities had to be redesigned in a significant level. During the project implementation we were focusing on these changes. Although COVID lockdown and crisis seems to be over, but we have a lots of lessons learned from this crisis: - Lack of experience for handling unexpected crisis situations by both the goverment/local governments and the local communities. - Local communities have fast and flexible reaction at local level - There is no "best answer" for the crisis situation, but there are several very good answers. In this project we collected all the lessons learned during COVID crisis, good practices for answering the needs of local people during crisis, and also we created a learning content for similar crisis situations. During the project implementation we faced two new crisises: war in Ukraine and economic regression with energy crisis.

We wanted to equip local community organisers and stakeholders with the knowledge and toolkit to organise local communities’ events, activities in challenging times: a good answer has an effect on the mental health of the community, also contributes to the community cohesion. Our project focuses on community organisers from the field of culture, but knowledge can be used in other fields as well.

Partner organisations from Hungary, the Netherlands, Bulgaria and Cyprus have been studying the impact of COVID19 on local communities, and have collected and collated community solutions and good practices that have helped these communities to survive and strengthen their social immune systems. The main objective of the programme was to assist local communities in crisis situations and to equip local community organisers with the knowledge and tools to organise local community events, activities and events in challenging times and crises. We implemented an online (google forms) and offline research in the 4 participating countries to map the local communities: traditions and impact of COVID-19 on local communities (related project result PR1). The research report is available on our webpage: https://crestart.org/project-results/research-report/ in 5 languages. Local research results are available in details also in local languages (result of questionnaire and interviews). The result of this activity is a research report which gave an input for further project results: what are the skills and knowledge the community organisers lack, what we shall focus on when we design and create the learning content (PR3). We have created an online platform where all the training materials, related materials and creativity toolbox are available. (related project result PR2). The platform is open for everyone after registration. https://elearning.crestart.org/ We have 5 language versions for the platform: EN, HU, BG, NL and GR which provides a wide access for all the user who want to reach our training content. Based on the research (PR1) we created the structure, curriculum and content for our training ((PR3). This content is available via the e-leaning platform in e-learning format, and also the curricula in our webpage in document format. https://crestart.org/project-results/curricula-on-public-involvement/ This result is also available in 5 languages: EN and the partner languages: HU, BG, GR and NL. A collection of good practices was carried out: 10-10 good practices of local communities have been collected, and published in a structured form (related project result R4). All the 40 good practices are available in 5 languages: EN, BG, HU, GR, NL. These good practices have been shared: - in document format via our webpage https://crestart.org/creativity-toolbox/ and e-learning platform https://elearning.crestart.org/ - by our social media channels https://www.facebook.com/CRESTART.PROJECT - in our events (multiplier events in each partner countries. At the end of the project we prepared a Social Impact Report https://crestart.org/project-results/social-impact-measurement-report/ (related project result PR5). Connected to Social Impact Study we have prepared and shared Social Impact Measurement Tool. Capacity building among local stakeholders is crucial, to support it we organised training workshops, multiplier events: in each partner country we organised a training with 15-20 participants, and a multiplier event with 50-100 participants. Multiplier events in some cases were not a separate event, but organised together with a local thematic event, were a great number of people guaranteed the great access. To provide smooth implementation of professional activities we are organizing four face-to-face Transnational Partner Meetings (TPM1-TPM5), and online meetings in every month. We were active in dissemination: the project webpage was ready at a very early stage of the project: https://crestart.org/. We updated the content regulary, and shared the link of the webpage in several channels. The Facebook page of the project was created at an early stage of the project, and shared news and updates: https://www.facebook.com/CRESTART.PROJECT We shared project news on other events such as: partner meetings of other events, networking events, local events.

According to our project proposal our work plan included the preparation of 5 separate, but closely connected project results: PR1: Research Report: We have collected 400 answers through questionnaires in 4 countries (Hungary, Bulgaria, The Netherlands, Cyprus) to research the effect of covid on local communities cultural habits. Furthermore we conducted 62 personal interviews with the key stakeholders of different target groups in the pilot settlements. The result of the activity is REPORT PROJECT RESEARCH - ABOUT THE IMPACT OF THE COVID PANDEMIC ON COMMUNITY COHESION IN LOCAL SOCIETIES - The report is available via our website in 5 languages: EN, HU, BG, GR, NL: https://crestart.org/project-results/research-report/ PR2: E-learning Web Platform: https://elearning.crestart.org/ where the training content developed during the project (PR3) is available in e-learning format. Besides the training content also the Creativity Development Toolbox (PR4) is available on the platform in document format. The training modules are accessible in a very user friendy format via e-learning and they help to provide theoretical and practical knowledge on the topic of crisis management, active citizenship, public participation, culture and communty building. The four modules are: 1. Defining crisis and culture 2. Reacting smart to crisis – preparing yourself and your community 3. Bottom up crisis management – step by step 4. How to use culture based activities in crises PR3: Curricula on public involvement for community organizers - in this project result we created the curricula for the training which is available on the e-learning platform. The curricula provides theoretical and practical knowledge on the topic of active citizenship, public participation, as well as to present the best practices we collect during the project. It was elaborated with co-creation method for community professionals such as educators, youth workers, and community organizers, cultural managers, who can learn the methodology of public involvement and co-creation and share good practices. The curricula is available via our webpage: https://crestart.org/project-results/curricula-on-public-involvement/ PR4: Creativity Development Toolbox: The toolbox contains good practices that are relevant in the event of a crisis such as COVID. These are community or cultural customs, programs based on past traditions, or even initiatives created during the crisis (both bottom-up or organized). The toolbox containes 40 good practices (10 per each partner countries), and available in document format via our webpage and e-learning platform. These good practices have been shared: - in document format via our webpage https://crestart.org/creativity-toolbox/ and e-learning platform https://elearning.crestart.org/ - by our social media channels https://www.facebook.com/CRESTART.PROJECT - in our events (multiplier events in each partner countries. PR5: Social Impact Measurement Report: We aim to move from only measuring tangible results to implementing an ongoing quality assessment of change a methodology that is user friendly and easily adaptable for any project/program in the field of community organising. We implemented a research based on google forms questionnaire at the beginning and the end of the project measuring the changes happened. The report is available via our webpage: https://crestart.org/project-results/social-impact-measurement-report/ Other tangible results: Project webpage: https://crestart.org/ Project facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/CRESTART.PROJECT Other results: Multiplier events organised at all the 4 partner countries. Pilot trainings organiesed in all the 4 partner countries.