Active Citizens Latvia
A small group of Frome residents involved in town community projects join a group from Somerset, also involved with community projects, visit Latvia, as part of the Active Citizens project which has been run with funding from The British Council.
This follows a very
successful series of training sessions run by The Voluntary Sector Training
Alliance (ViSTA) in partnership with Vision for Frome involving 30 of the
Frome town’s people. This training sought to
help participants to understand what it means to be an active citizen within
the local and global community and learn how to work with others to achieve
positive action for communities, including intergenerational and cross-cultural
work. The initiative has also been able to help a number of active or potential
projects in Frome with a pledge of small donations to help them on their way.
The project includes an international dimension, with cooperation with similar groups in Latvia and Serbia. Frome was pleased to host representatives from these two Countries in June, where they got to know more about social action programmes locally and in Somerset via participation in events that included talks, workshops and social activities, including meetings with Frome participants to share experiences and ideas. After the Latvia visit, other Active Citizen members will visit Serbia in December.
The project’s
international cooperation reflects its British Council involvement. ViSTA has also been successful in winning
more funding to build on this work to involve more people in new
neighbourhoods, with the hope that in Spring next year there will be over 50
active citizens in Frome and the surrounding areas, with the continuation of
international contact.
Charles Wood, Chairman of Vision for Frome, expressed
his delight that V4F had been able to help in bringing such a worthwhile
project to the town. He personally, and his fellow V4F members that are
involved, got a great deal from the training sessions, and the international
visit. A really rewarding rapport has been established across
several different community groups within the town, and even more importantly
between the very welcome young active citizens and and those at the rather
older end of the spectrum. He now looks forward to Frome benefiting from
the energy and interest in taking projects forward, the international
dimension, and what can be achieved by keeping the momentum going for the
future.
More details for interested people will be issued when available. Meanwhile feedback from the experiences and exchange of ideas coming from the international visits will be made available to help understand the aims of the project.
What exactly is the Active Citizens Project?
A group of Active Citizens from Latvia and Serbia visiting Frome earlier this year.
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UK Learning Provider Reference Number: 10020323