This is an archived version of https://civic-europe.eu/ideas/exploring-pathways-to-an-ecological-renaissance/
Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance | Civic Europe
Environment and sustainability, Youth participation and empowerment

Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance winner

Community walk from the past to a sustainable future for Vukovar

Creators

Who is behind this?

Goran Jelenic

PRONI - Info Centre for Youth Vukovar

https://proni.hr

Croatia

Who is joining forces?

Association “TATAVAKA”

http://www.tatavaka.hr

Croatia


Green Network of Activist Groups (ZMAG)

http://www.zmag.hr

Croatia


Technical School Nikola Tesla

http://ss-tehnicka-ntesla-vu.skole.hr/

Croatia


Satelit (with Croatian Permaculture, pioneering NGO founded in 1995) is a team of experienced educators on integrative sustainability and participatory teamwork. Contribution: participatory leadership

Idea

Idea pitch

Vukovar in Croatian means sacrifice, war memories, divided community tied up to the past. Past engulfs the present tightly as 2021 marks 30 years since the city fell.
Mindful of unhealed wounds our group explores a chance to open up a bit more space, a few more hearts to tackle challenges of present-future:climate/biodiversity crisis, consumerist culture, outdated economic model. Our learning circle of community leaders is to co-create a vision: an ecological & peaceful renaissance for Vukovar

Where will your project idea take place?

Vukovar, Eastern Croatia, confluence of Vuka and Danube rivers

What is the specific societal challenge faced by this region?

In 1991 Vukovar went from being one of the most prosperous cities in ex-Yugoslavia to bomb shelled rubble devoid of what makes a city. In the words of Siniša Glavašević, Vukovar’s last standing journalist, “The City, that is You.” Silence that followed is still felt.
Many returned. Many didn’t. Next generation grew up with the burden of loss and the weight of belonging to conflicted groups.
November 2021 will mark 30 years since the city fell. Reflections of past dominate and very often cloud the challenges of today and tomorrow. Climate change is felt already, with droughts and floods hitting the region. Ways defined by a consumerist culture don’t support the development of sustainable lifestyle. People’s focus is on the past and there is not enough capacity to deal with what’s coming.

Who are you doing it for?

According to the 2011 census 27,683 people live in Vukovar. Before the war the population was ethnically mixed while now Croatian and Serbian groups are dominant groups. Some parts of industry recovered but unemployment is still high, especially among young people. For them it is often difficult to find means to stay. Conflicts motivated by national differences still occur.
Our project will focus mostly on young community leaders and young people with leadership potential. We want to give them a chance to learn about the challenges our world faces today and to build their capacity to respond to them.
It is important to stress that our intention is to foster conversation of resilience and adaptation to a changing environment. Not to impose any kind of external reconciliation practices.

How do you plan to get there?

Our walk will take us through four stages of the implementation:

I - INCEPTION PHASE
We will set up team communication and project management protocols. We will define a communication strategy and activity timeline. We will establish contacts with all community stakeholders and external collaborators.

II - LEARNING PHASE
Based on the input provided by PRONI and Nikola Tesla school, with their support Tatavaka, ZMAG and Satelit will design a 5-month educational program. It will focus on local action for responding to climate crisis, forming a vision of a common, sustainable future for Vukovar and gaining management and communication skills needed for translating this vision into concrete community actions. Agroecology will be a prominent theme as food is a connecting factor for people.

III - ACTION PHASE
In learning phase at least 3 groups will be formed, defined by participants needs and interests, around specific climate action themes they chose. Groups will work on implementing their plans, supported by the project team. A toolkit will be devised, documenting the process and providing additional resources for the groups.

IV - REFLECTION PHASE
We will gather for a final event presenting the results of all 3 (or more) direct actions undertaken. Aside from a public event (in accordance with health situation) we will do a reflection circle to evaluate our work.

What are the expected results?

RESULTS MANIFESTING CHANGE:
• 20 community leaders (majority under 35) gained insight into main challenges of our time complemented by basic skills for responding to them
• at least 3 meaningful and concrete community climate actions prepared and implemented
• at least 50 school children educated on basics of climate change
• 1 toolkit for tackling climate change locally designed and published
• results of local projects presented to at least 80 people from Vukovar and local/regional/national decision-makers

LONGTERM CHANGE: A common vision for a path towards a sustainable future gave inspiration and hope to people, leading to greater engagement in community life. Young leaders bring innovating projects and work together to achieve a peaceful and ecological renaissance in Vukovar.

How does your idea strengthen active citizenship at a local and community level?

Focusing primarily on youth, our educational programme is devised with the pivotal purpose of building self-confidence by giving youth a solid ground of skills and experience to stand on.
Participants will get a better understanding of climate crisis marking our time through the Climate Collage game as a collaborative process. They will map the resources of Vukovar community using tools such as “8 Kinds of Community Wealth” and devise strategies on how to protect them through the Fresco of Ecological Renaissance. They will analyse stakeholders influencing local policies shaping their local ecosystem.
They will put this knowledge to use through their own community actions and we will together distil the experience we went through into a manual for tackling climate change on a local level

Why is this idea important to you?

Our team is a mix of people from Vukovar and other small communities thematically linked to sustainability issues we work on:
Ivana and Dubravka (Tatavaka): 15+ years in project management/(non-)formal education
Goran (PRONI): 20+ years in PRONI & Vukovar Youth Centre
Veljko and Ana (Satelit): (inter)national project and learning experience in sustainability of small rural places
Drazen (ZMAG): 20+ years of research and innovation in regenerating social and food production relationships
Maja (Nikola Tesla school): extensive experience in management of schools’ ecological projects
What brought us together is a sense of hope, grounded in experience we gathered in all of our communities. We have a track record in change making and a seed of vision of a sustainable future in Vukovar.

€ 45000,-

Total budget

€ 35000,-

Funding requested from Civic Europe

Major expenses

Personnel costs: 25000 EUR
Salaries of team members, all project partners (%)

External services costs: 3000 EUR
Subcontracted external experts (e.g. design of visual identity, collaborators).

Travel costs: 3000 EUR
Costs of travel and stay in Vukovar over 12 months of the project, incl. rent of premises.

Local actions costs: 7000 EUR
Costs of implementing actions devised by community groups.

Communication and administration costs: 7000 EUR
Public events, communication, admin.

What do you need from the Civic Europe community?

We grow through feedback and learning. For this reason, we would be grateful to get advice and experience from the Civic Europe "living practice of democracy" community. Most concretely, we would love to hear the experiences of organisations working in divided, post-conflict communities.

Project Journey

Success

Final event of the project

On Thursday, October 20, the final conference was held as part of the Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance project, which has been successfully running since November 2021.

This festive event was held in the Vukovar City Museum and with over 70 participants, it was a networking place for various institutions, civil society organizations, educational institutions, educators from the informal and formal education system, experts dealing with the topic of sustainable development, activists in the community, and most importantly young people and volunteers who understand how important personal action is for this topic to come to life.

Representatives of Civic Europe from Berlin, which finances this project, were also present at the conference.

More about the importance of the theme of sustainable development in the education system was learned from the lecture of Mrs. Marina Ništ from the Education Agency, an expert who connects these two areas in her work.

The ecological actions carried out in the community and the Manual for teaching about sustainable development were presented.

In addition, panel discussions were held with young people who participated in the project and with experts from this field.

In the afternoon part, it was possible to actively participate in three parallel workshops: Fresco of ecological renaissance, Creative workshop - upcycling and Activism in local communities.

PRONI Centre on Oct. 24, 2022
Heroines and heroes

"Volunteer promenade" along the Danube

On Monday, October 3, 2022, on the promenade along the Danube in the Borovo naselje district of Vukovar, the fourth and last in the Paths of Ecological Renaissance project, a community action called "Volunteer Promenade" was held. In cooperation with the company Komunalac d.o.o. from Vukovar, wooden houses for books were installed and decorative bushes and flowers were planted. Students from Marko Babić Vocational High School and Nikola Tesla Technical School from Vukovar, as well as local and international volunteers painted houses and helped with planting. The Vukovar City Library has made sure that the bookcases are full of different literature that will be available to fellow citizens for the pleasure of reading along the Danube. The goal of the campaign is to raise the level of awareness about ecology and sustainable development and encourage young people to actively participate in the local community. Prior to this event, students from two high schools in the area of ​​the City of Vukovar went through five modules of education on the topic of ecology and sustainable development, and conducted three ecological actions in the community (composting and planting, information via the web and a creative workshop). By the end of the project, it is planned to create a manual as a tool for using the implemented work methodology and to organize a final event where all the results of the project will be presented. The implementation of the project was made possible with financial resources from the Civic Europe program.

PRONI Centre on Oct. 5, 2022
Join forces!

Creative to smile

On Thursday, July 14, 2022, the third environmental action called "Creative to Smile" was held at Marko Babić Secondary School in Vukovar. The action was carried out as part of the project Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance, in cooperation with the Association of Parents of Children with Developmental Disabilities Who is still afraid of tomorrow? and aims to raise the level of awareness of ecology and sustainable development and the highlighted importance of including children with developmental disabilities.

At the creative workshop, students, teachers, volunteers, children with developmental disabilities and their parents made soaps, creams and baths as environmentally friendly cosmetic products and made puzzles for children from wooden painted sticks.

Prior to this event, students of Marko Babić Vocational High School and Nikola Tesla Technical School from Vukovar went through five modules of education on the topic of ecology and sustainable development, and conducted two ecological actions in the community (composting and planting, information via the web).

By the end of the project, it is planned to carry out another action in the community and organize a final event, all made possible by financial resources from the Civic Europe program.

PRONI Centre on July 18, 2022
Heroines and heroes

The first community actions have started

In mid-May, the third phase of the project began, which involves implementing community actions based on ideas defined by the needs and interests of participants, on specific topics of climate action they chose during the project's educational program.

The action of composting and planting herbs and lavender was realized on Thursday, May 12, in the school yard. Students from the Marko Babić Secondary Vocational School and the Nikola Tesla Technical School, domestic and international volunteers, professors and employees participated and thus joined forces for the benefit of the school and local community. During this action, a composter was made because this school (Marko Babić Vocational School) has a school kitchen that produces a certain amount of biowaste that will be disposed of there. Participants and volunteers painted the composter and prepared everything needed for it. In addition, raised beds were made in which herbs were planted for the needs of the school kitchen. Lavender was planted near the herbs, which will be used by the student cooperative in the production of soaps, creams, balms and other products. The compost that will be ready later will be used for growing herbs and lavender.

At the same time, a virtual action called "Awareness of others" took place. The project participants decided to create a website where they will share information on the topic of ecology. The site is not completely finished, but the participants had the task to follow the composting and planting action, take photos, interview and publish the first news when the site is ready. As part of the initial phase of this action, education was conducted with primary school students of Mitnica Elementary School who showed interest in later participation in the maintenance of this site.

The aim of these actions is to raise awareness of ecology and sustainable development, as well as encourage students, faculty and other volunteers to volunteer and develop volunteering in the community, which is provided by funding from the Civic Europe program.

PRONI Centre on May 23, 2022
Success

Educational program on the Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance has been completed

At the end of March 2022, the implementation of the last phases of the educational program of the project Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance was completed. This phase included the design and implementation of a 5-month educational program focused on local action to respond to the climate crisis, forming a vision of a common, sustainable future for Vukovar and acquiring management and communication skills needed to translate that vision into concrete community action.

Students of the Nikola Tesla Technical School and the Marko Babić Vocational High School have designed several environmental actions that will be organized and implemented in the coming period.

The project is followed by a phase of implementation of at least 3 actions in the community based on ideas defined by the needs and interests of participants, around specific topics of climate actions they chose, as well as developing tools as an additional source for implementing these actions.

PRONI Centre on April 14, 2022
Join forces!

The fourth educational activity has been completed

Students from the Nikola Tesla Technical School and the Marko Babić Vocational High School from Vukovar participated in another educational activity as part of the Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance project.

In this two-day workshop, students expanded their knowledge of ecology, the goals of sustainable development, and were introduced to applicable models of sustainable living. In addition, they worked in a team, made decisions and elaborated plans for environmental actions that will be implemented in the community.

The workshop was held at the Social Center in Vukovar on March 4 and 5, 2022, and the workshop leader was Dražen Šimleša from the Green Network of Activist Groups (ZMAG). The continuation of the learning phase, ie the next educational activity, is planned for the end of March 2022.

PRONI Centre on March 14, 2022
Take this idea!

Sustainable development goals and tools for constructive teamwork

As part of the project Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance, and as part of the learning phase, a workshop was conducted with students from the Nikola Tesla Technical School and the Marko Babić Vocational High School from Vukovar.

The topic of this two-day workshop was the goals of sustainable development as a tool for planning integratively sustainable actions in the community, and tools for constructive teamwork.

During the educational activity, the participants nurtured a culture of communication and cooperation, and passed the technique of pair conversation, division in a circle, deep listening in pairs, free discussions, facilitated discussions with hand signs, decision making by consent, group work, presenting their work, giving concrete positive and constructive feedback and asking and answering questions.

The workshop was held at the Social Center in Vukovar on February 18 and 19, 2022. It was designed and prepared by Ana and Veljko Armano Linta, and facilitated by Veljko Armano Linta from Satelite Education.

The continuation of the learning phase, ie the next educational activity, is planned for the beginning of March 2022.

PRONI Centre on Feb. 24, 2022
Impact Story

Fresco of the Ecological Renaissance

As part of the project Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance, and as part of the learning phase, a workshop The Fresco of the Ecological Renaissance was conducted with students of the Technical School of Nikola Tesla Vukovar.

This two-day workshop focused on solutions to ecological transition and the development of ecological awareness among students in order to fully understand the environmental and social challenges of today.

They were introduced to the Fresco technique, which was designed as a tool for free expression and their empowerment around ecological topics and creating opportunities to become active carriers of ecological transition.

The workshop leaders were Ivana and Maja from the Tatavaka Association from Zagreb and employees of the PRONI Center, and it was held on January 27 and 28, 2022 in the premises of the social center in Vukovar.

The continuation of the learning phase is planned for the second half of February 2022.

PRONI Centre on Feb. 1, 2022
Road to impact

Beginning of the Ecological Renaissance in Vukovar

As part of the Exploring Pathways to an Ecological Renaissance, a learning phase has begun, which includes the design and implementation of a 5-month educational program focusing on local action to respond to the climate crisis, forming a vision of a common, sustainable future for Vukovar and acquiring management and communication skills visions into concrete community actions. For this purpose, students of the Technical School Nikola Tesla from Vukovar on November 29 and 30 participated in an interesting and educational workshop called Climate Collage, which aimed to raise awareness of the problem of climate change. In addition to providing scientific facts, this activity develops the creativity and communication of the participants. The workshop was held in the newly opened Intercultural School Center, and the leaders were Ivana and Dubravka from the Tatavaka Association from Zagreb, which is one of the partners in this project. The continuation of interesting workshops is planned for the end of January 2022.

PRONI Centre on Jan. 11, 2022

Team

PRONI Centre

drazen

Veljko Armano Linta

Idea created on April 26, 2021
Last edit on Nov. 10, 2021

Write comment