Rural women's network

 

Working Plan

Working day 1
16/11/2008

In the afternoon, after the arrival in Petralia Soprana, the group participated in a session aimed at knowing each other and team building. In the evening it took place the welcome dinner.

 

Working day 2
17/11 /2008
The first day started with welcoming speeches by CE.S.I.E and an introduction to the program. The participants were reminded of the objectives of the training course, the methodology chosen for the TC (four pillars of Education) and the schedule of the following days. After the introduction, the trainers facilitated name games and ice breaking activities that helped initiate contact between the participants. They started to approach the gender issue (Positive discrimination, Gender participation, Sensitivity - gender and culture VS. relativism); also they started to reflect on problems and difficulties faced by woman in the rural area: at this point, everyone shared their experiences.
In the afternoon, the trainers animated creative games on the project key words, on European notions and values. This gave, in a creative and active approach, the participants a common background and made them aware of larger structures and changes in the area. The game was followed by the lecture that analyzed the key words, European notion and values that interested us during this project.

 

Working day 3
18/11/2008

In the morning, a first group composed by half the participants (Estonia, Latvia, UK,  Romania) gave a short presentation (power point, video or oral) about the situation and problems faced by women in rural contexts. In the afternoon, also a second group (Bulgaria, Portugal, Cyprus, Ireland, Greece) gave a short presentation (power point, video or oral) about the situation and problems faced by women in rural contexts.
These individual presentations - created at home based on research, concrete elements and interviews - analyzed many aspects: political and economical presence of women, social representation (stereotypes), situation of women in rural areas, problems faced in daily life and rural women's perception of Europe, expectations and possible solutions. The presentations helped the participants have an idea of the global and particular aspect of the problems and situations faced in different European contexts and feel part of a common Europe. These presentations were open to all other participants and to other members of local associations working on the same issues and were followed by discussions.
In the evening, half of the participants prepared an international dinner and presented something from their home country. These informal moments were dedicated to the intercultural discovery between the participants. Participants presented their culture and their traditions through songs, dancing and food specialties. These presentations had to take in consideration the conception and the social role of women. This was a good opportunity to share the beautiful aspects of each other.

 

Working day 4
19/11/ 08

In the morning, all participants talked about two big themes: "how gender policy can address the different problems faces by women in rural area: policies at different level including EU policy" and "how rural development policy at local level interferes with the situation and problems of women in rural areas". They reflected together on priorities and solutions, general remarks, practices, needs.

In the afternoon they visited a rural area of Sicily, the village of Petralia Soprana. Participants met women and men from Sicilian rural areas active in rural development of their local community. This was meant to be an example of the action that the participants could undertake to develop their local areas. It was also an occasion to meet some people active in this field, to get to know actions done and to use these ideas in the strategies they develop in the future.
In the evening, they had dinner with local people. It was a particular moment because they spent some time with them and tasted a typical dinner prepared by the people of this community.

 

Working day 5
 20/11/2008

In the morning, they reflected upon which legal instrument can prevent gender discrimination in rural Europe and on the problem of helping spouses (implementation of EU directive and its revision); the participants were divided in some groups and after the reflections they opened themselves to a common reflection about the prevention of gender discrimination in rural Europe. Later on, there was a mid-term evaluation.
In the afternoon, participants were invited to meet the mayor and his colleagues at the town hall in Petralia Soprana, and he informed them about the political system and the economical and social situation in Petralia society. The participants presented their country and professions. Then, they moved to Palermo. From that moment on, all other activities were performed in Palermo.

 

Working day 6
21/11/ 08

In the morning, the group focused on the future of rural women reflecting on how rural women see the evolution of their situation in their context.
Also, in the morning the participants worked on the possible strategies to improve participation of women in rural Europe. They based their work on funding opportunities and they made a toolkit.
In the afternoon, participants received information about the kind of funds and EU organization they could refer to in projects solving the problems and needs of women in rural areas. They were given printed material regarding this issue; this material was useful even at a later stage of the project. In the evening, half of the participants (Slovakia, Estonia, Bulgaria, UK) prepared an international dinner and presented something from their home country. These informal moments were dedicated to the intercultural discovery between the participants. Participants presented their culture and traditions through songs, dancing and food specialties. These presentations had to take into consideration the conception and the social role of women. This was a good opportunity to share the beautiful aspects of each other cultures, to improve intercultural knowledge between participants and to promote cultural diversity.

 

Working day 7
22/11/2008

 In the morning there was a lecture by an expert on "Rural Women & Europe" to see how Europe can have repercussions on their daily life as European women and how they can make good use of the opportunities offered by Europe to develop new projects valuating positively their role within European Rural development.
After that, they used the knowledge they had and the experiences they had during the 4 previous days to work in creative group through non-formal expression on "How Europe can improve rural women life quality".
In the afternoon they visited the historic part of the city of Palermo.

 

Working day 8
23/11/ 08

During the whole day participants focused on the creative development of strategies to improve participation and European identity within women coming from rural areas. The participants developed general strategies on how to improve events and activities that can promote women involvement to local development with a European dimension.
These events had to

1) answer to the needs of the rural population through the realization, by groups of women and men reflecting together, of actions promoting its development (1st session),

2) be applicable to specific local contexts (2nd session) and

3) to have a huge European dimension (3rd session). The experts played a key role this day because they could provide information about good practices that aimed to reach these aims.
The trainers guided the participants through a process of finding strategies to answer to the needs together. The solutions had to be sensitive to cultural differences and they were not the same in all countries. Participants  tried to come up with general strategies that could  be adjusted to different local contexts

 

Working day 9
24/11/2008

In the morning  the participants worked on the preparation of the creative dissemination tools to disseminate the project results.
From all the work done before the participants had to extract what was important to put inside of the creative dissemination tool to improve the involvement of European women to the local development of rural areas. All participants thought about how they could- in a creative way- develop tools that could have a huge impact in rural contexts. The publication and the CD-Rom  focused in reaching the civil society directly/ the website to spread the information to the authorities and other organizations.
In the afternoon participants participated in the Open Space Technology. They choose the partners that they would like to work in the construction of new projects and on a second moment had the time to develop them together. In order to facilitate the project development was given to participants a step by step guide:
1)Projects Title
2)Aims and objectives + target group
3)Methodology
4)Time frame/timetable
5)Partners
6)Funding opportunities
7)Deadlines
During the whole session trainers were available to support the diverse working groups in better develop the own idea.

Working day 10
25/11/2008

In the morning, before the evaluation of the creative workshop, participants presented the projects developed the day before. This way it was created the occasion to open the projects to new partners.
After that participants answered to an individual questionnaire concerning the learning achievements and the project in itself. They had also the chance to express themselves verbally in the group.