RESTI TIME!

Dear readers, 

The first days of July, for the participants and members of the ReSTI project team, have passed in a working and festive atmosphere. Magical Prague was a place to meet, socialize and share ideas. The Excellence-in-ReSTI award ceremony was organized in the impressive Ceremonial Hall at Charles University.

Course attendees of the ReSTI.academy provided the project team with a lot of valuable feedback, which will help to further improve the programme. In addition to new knowledge, the participants gained new acquaintances and new friends. Therefore, the final ceremony in the beautiful Prague has passed in a special atmosphere. It was the ReSTI TIME.

THIRTY PARTICIPANTS FROM 14 COUNTRIES AWARDED FOR SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETING RESTI PROGRAMME

After two semesters, 5 modules and 20 courses, 30 pilot participants successfully completed the programme. The Excellence-in-ReSTI final event and award ceremony was held in Prague, on 1st July 2019.

The award ceremony was the highlight of the meeting organised in the magnificent Ceremonial Hall at Charles University where the audience also had a chance of finding out the most up-to-date details on relevant project outcomes, as well as listen to a topical panel discussion organised with other DTP project representatives and experts dealing with innovative blended learning programmes. Priority Area 7 representatives were present to give their official support to the project elected as ‘strategic project’ for EUSDR purposes.

There was a lot of material for participants to tackle and they got through it. The success rate was about 80 percent. The head of Excellence-in ReSTI, Gábor Szüdi of the Centre for Social Innovation in Vienna, referring to the entire project, stated about the final award ceremony:

“Today we are basically celebrating the end of the project Excellence-in-ReSTI which was financed under the Danube Transnational Programme. It ran for two-and-a-half years and the main idea was to create a blended learning program covering early stage project management. For graduates to get better in research, development and innovation project management. The result was 20 courses across five modules.”

“The project was so developed that it included a survey and interview process and in this way we were actually able to respond to what people all around the Danube region were really interested in and were able to react. We really wanted to provide something that people could apply practically in everyday life.”

If interested in more details about the Excellence-in-ReSTI project, please check out the latest interview made with our project manager, Gabor Szudi.

FROM EXPECTATIONS THROUGH EXPERIENCE TO VISION: TELL ME YOUR EXCELLENCE-IN-RESTI STORY - WORKSHOP

Back in Prague on 2nd of July, 27 participants took part in a final ReSTI workshop in the Skautský Institute, a creative co-working space in the historic city centre. The workshop provided 3 hours of intensive exchange and creative brainstorming and was intended to become a platform for networking of ReSTI participants giving impulses for future matchmaking and partnering. Partner of the ReSTI consortium supported the workshop in manifold roles as facilitators. The workshop was developed based on the appreciative inquiry approach and followed a set of calling questions:

1. What are your main takeaways from the ReSTI project?

2.  What can you do to make a difference in your region?

3.  What can you do to build sustainable partnerships for future?

These questions were reflected in all parts of the workshop keeping in mind to harvesting the nine months of ReSTI.academy. An appreciative inquiry is an effective way - and one practice of the art of hosting AoH portfolio – of harnessing collective wisdom and the self-organizing capacity of groups.

The workshop was structured in two parts  starting with a cycle followed by an energizing exercise requesting individual definitions of ReSTI project management and a group work on individual ReSTI expert and project stories by participants. These stories were selected on the basis of submitted projects and ideas to an online survey.  Furthermore, four consortium partners supported as facilitators with a soft moderation. In the second part of the workshop participants were invited again in the cycle and then to an individual storytelling and group work working collaboratively on new project ideas.

The workshop was developed and implemented by Pamela Bartar, Centre for Social Innovation in Vienna.

THE SIXTH STEERING COMMITTEE MEETING HELD IN PRAGUE

Prague was the place of meeting and exchange of information and ideas between participants, project team members and stakeholders. It was also an opportunity for the participants of the two-and-a-half years project to give each other the best wishes. Numerous events such as workshops, lectures, panel discussions, as well as many opportunities for socializing and networking, marked the first two days of July.

PARTNER IN FOCUS: APPLIED RESEARCH AND COMMUNICATIONS FUND (ARC FUND), BULGARIA

The Applied Research and Communications Fund (ARC Fund) is a private, non-governmental and independent research institute, with a history of more than 25 years at the forefront of policy support in the fields of science, technology and innovation.

ARC Fund is initiates and is actively involved in public debates on the challenges faced by research and innovation stakeholders. It mobilises actors from civil society, business, universities and research organisations, as well as citizens, policy and decision-makers, towards a shared understanding of forthcoming transformations and challenges related to technological developments and innovations, and steers them towards a shared vision for the integration of responsible research and innovation principles into science and policy-making.

Each year, ARC Fund hosts policy stakeholders at an annual Innovation.bg Forum, presenting a year of research into a particular sector of the Bulgarian knowledge economy, and commenting on trends and imminent transformation in the performance of the Bulgarian R&I system.

ARC Fund has been repeatedly recognised by the Bulgarian Ministry of Education and Science as the most productive private research institute in terms of participation in successful research and policy coordination projects supported by the EU Framework Programmes for Innovation and Research (Framework Programmes 6 and 7, Horizon 2020). The organisation has a strong capacity in the management of research and innovation projects – an expertise, which it has successfully contributed to the Excellence-in-ReSTI project as well.

You can follow the most important developments at ARC Fund at https://www.linkedin.com/company/arcfund/.

EXCELLENCE-IN-RESTI ON SOCIAL MEDIA

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