StArt - the art of beginning

New Steps on Tourism in Covasna

The Steering Team for Community development in the Romanian town of Covasna, has concluded their next steps for action during their meetings in Switzerland during the international Like-Minded Conference 07 in Bern for participatory community development and upon their return home to Covasna.

The update from Cecilia Tordai from May 24, 2007:
Yesterday the steering group from Covasna has a meeting at Mikola Zoli's place to discuss about our trip to switzerland and next steps. Everybody pointed the most important things that happend, lessons, contacts, what we learnt... We are very thankful for your invitation, for great time we had. We experienced unique moments.

Next monday the hole group will be at a meeting with the Hungarian local councilors to present together the touristic office project and to motivate them to elaborate a decision project for the local council in order to decide and then to put into force.

In the next days we will also elaborate a little report about our trip to put on Covasna website, to send to the newspaper. We need transparency in front of people to eliminate all kind of comments and unofficial untruth news.

The wood carvers from Covasna decided to realise a little project from students presentations: two wellcoming gate in the entrances to town.

We decided also to realise a way of mofettas with signs and maps.

We discussed about the next steps to realise the touristic routes.

The Mexican hat yesterday migrated from Marta to Zoli where will remain till the next meeting when will again change the owner.

Once again thank you for your kind hospitality and the great efforts.

I wish you all a great weekend,
ceci

thank you, Ceci for this update!

Like-Minded Conference 07 for participatory community development

61 persons from 13 different countries, 3 continents and from different professional backgrounds met for the first Like-Minded Conference on May 14/15, 2007 in Bern.

The focus for this intensive conference lay on how to create inspiring and meaningful participatory community development processes for lively communities?

• What are meaningful practices?
• What are inspiring examples and stories?
• What are valuable instruments, methods, tools and stories as interventions?
• How can to best stay in touch and cooperate where meaningful?

Like-Minded 07 was organised by the Association stArt and with support from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.

The results from the conference will soon be uploaded on the stArt-website http://www.start-artofbeginning.ch

A first impression in German and English can be listened to on our special Podcast on Like-Minded 07 http://www.podster.de/listen/3980:7

Conference for Community Development in Covasna, September/October 05

Over five days the 3rd Conference for Community Development in Covasna focussed on Entrepreneurial, social, touristic and sports-development for the Romanian town in Transsylvania. Meeting with the different stakeholders and keyplayers gave relevant insights for the project development and the networking. We thank Marta Tatar, Imola Dragomer, Cecilia Tordai, Kati Zsuffa, Tünde and Miklos Bukovinsky and Zoltan Mikoli for their efforts with heart, mind and concrete actions over the last week! Without you, this would not have been possible. Never before could we go home with so many concrete projects: - a swimming pool for the students to be renovated - Zoltan Zielmanns herb project crystallised and the business plan drafted, - touristic ideas discussed and clustered, - collaboration with Swiss, Hungarian and a Romanian Touristic Business School for the further development drafted - support and collaboration between Swiss Heart foundation and patient organisations for children with heart failures with the Cardiovascular Rehabilitation Clinic in Covasna clear - further development of the Culture House of Körösi discussed and Cecilia Tordai and Kati Zsuffa and Janos Thiesz invited to the final Forum of Phoenix in Timisoara on October 20 for the next exchange. - Information and links established for local entrepreneurs to get cheaper loans (with http://www.oikocredit.ro) - drafts for collaborations between the County responsible for Tourism, to search funding for the small steam train from Covasna to Commandou - clear profiles to search for partner communities for Commandou, Miklos Bukovinskys reformated Church Community and Covasna itself. - draft for a leadership and project management training for the authorities on County level. For questions, get in touch! stArt - the art of beginning, c/o changels GmbH in Bern, +41 31 371 69 79. or mailto:start@changels.ch More updates on the conference days see also http://www.covasna.ro (Hungarian version), http://www.bailecovasna.ro (Romanian version) or http://www.changels.ch for the English and German version. Also great thanks to my Swiss colleagues Trix Angst, Bettina Büchler, Annette Lüethi and Jodok Kobelt for your support, the good collaboration and your commitment to stay on the case and make things work! Lets rock and roll! Matti Straub, President of stArt - the art of beginning

the art of blogging.

Why a blog for stArt?

We believe that interaction and commitment, both personally as well as virtually is growing immensively. It seems as if also the new paradigms of journalism and the development side to it are increasingly becoming necessary in order to communicate in the most effective ways.

Imagine all projects of stArt would be accessible and its processes and experiences available to read online. Or how about you wanting to contribute with ideas, network or financial resources if you also feel a burning need within this area?

Imagine the blog to be part of the network of local change makers globally - how would that look?

Imagine..

stArting.

When the KaosConsultancy arrived in Bern on the 21st of Mai Matti, the founding member of stArt and the four Kaospilots only imagined what the week could look like.

First impressions were shared, good moods and foods as well, and the picture of stArt began to form towards our final goal and mission:

creating a clear, effective overview and documentation of the work, that both Matti and his team members put into stArt since its first assignment in Covasna/Romania in 2001.

bringing good spirits from four corners of the european world into changels, and learn as much as possible from each other.