History Competitions Continue in Four Countries of the Eastern Partnership
The cooperation project supervised by Körber-Stiftung and DVV International and funded by the German Foreign Office just started in its second year to carry on the history competitions in Belarus, Georgia, the Republic of Moldova and in Ukraine.
"Migration – Restarting Life From Scratch" is the official topic of the Georgian History Competition 2019/2020. But „starting from scratch“ is definitely not the motto of the whole second competition edition as all organisers of the project „History Competitions in Four Countries of the Eastern Partnership II“ profit from the experiences and lessons learnt of the very successful previous competition edition in 2017/18 which – as an additional benefit – also brought the two new members Georgia and Moldova to the EUSTORY family.
Once more the project teams in the countries consist of several local NGOs (Historica in Belarus, SovLab and GAHE in Georgia, ANTIM in the Republic of Moldova and NOVA DOBA in Ukraine) on the one hand and the responsible DVVI project managers on the other hand.
The following priorities for the new competition edition were set by the project teams in the four countries:
In Belarus they kept the topic of the previous edition "Behind the Scenes: From the History of the Family to the History of the Community" and just changed the time frame. All participants at the age of 15 to 25 are now invited to conduct their researches for the time period of 1945 till 2000 using an old family picture as the starting point. Their entries have to be essays presented in a creative way, e.g. by using a short video or a website, etc.
The project organisers in Moldova also decided to stick to the same topic. "Discovering Local Heroes in Your Neighbourhood" is the task which the participants have to fulfill. According to their age (8th grade till second university year) the concrete requirements differ. The accepted entry forms range from the rather classical posters and essays to cronological journals, PowerPoint presentations and short videos. To involve as many ethnic groups as possibe, entries can be handed in in three different languages.
Georgia accepts even four languages to foster the partcipation of students with Armenian or Azerbaijani backgrounds. Dealing with the already mentioned migration topic, the 15 to 18 years old pupils should follow the traces of their ancestors, their uncertain departures and restarts. Due to its topic the Georgian competition 2019/20 is officially supported by the International Organisation for Migration - Mission to Georgia. The organisers are looking forward to all sorts of entries ranging from essays and photo collections to posters and short movies.
Whereas all other countries accept individual and group participation alike, the Ukrainian project team forms an exception: it allows only collective entries to the topic "Soviet Past: Rethinking the History". As a further particularity the Ukrainian pupils aged 14 to 18 are obliged to present the results of their researches publicly to their school or local community.
As with history competitions in all EUSTORY countries the teachers in Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine play a key role for the success of the competitions. That‘s why several tutors‘ workshops were conducted in different regions of all four countries.
Therefore the foundation is laid and the second competition edition gains momentum!