Description
The organisations involved are helping most in the transforming the educational system in Romania, especially in the area of teaching methodology. However, regional debate associations are not always working together efficiently, sharing resources and knowledge and have difficulties with assuring financial stability. The objective of the project is to strengthen and expand the network of debate associations in Romania. The expected outcomes consist in harmonizing practices and branding among the organisations, widening the network in order to include 2 new grassroots debate NGOs, and promoting the debate as an educational tool (through formal accreditation). The activities within the project are expected to strengthen the ties between the organisations, help them work better together and also develop individually. The beneficiaries are 9 regional debate associations, 100 debate instructors, 10 teacher -trainers, 40 high school students.
Summary of project results
The purpose of "Building Arguments" project was to strengthen the ARDOR’s extended network, comprised of 9 NGOs. Before this project, the network’s activity was insufficiently coordinated and it was lacking a common strategy and appropriate instruments for sharing know-how. Through this project, ARDOR strengthened the capacity of the network and its members to act as one, in order to increase the educational value, as well as the impact of debating at national level. The promoter organised a series of events in order to increase capacity and visibility of the network and its members: 2 public events; 2 camps for teachers (Debate Masterclass and a sharing camp focusing on alternative education practices); a Train the Trainers workshop for the teachers becoming trainers; 4 workshops with the ARDOR regional coordinators; a fundraising course for the 9 fundraising officers from the regional debate associations and 5 regional fundraising courses for debate instructors (București, Iași, Timișoara, Ploiești, Cluj-Napoca). Regarding the "Debate" course for highschool students, the accreditation for the professional development course for teachers from the body of the Ministry of Education was achieved, a professional development course for teachers was organised and the teacher and student handbook for the optional course was developed. The visibility elements of the regional associations have been renewed and built around the new ARDOR identity while the ARDOR website (
www.ardor.org.ro) has been overhauled to host more resources and a club administration platform. A bilingual start-up kit for new debate clubs (for both Romanian and Hungarian speaking trainers) was developed, together with a debate database with 220 debate topics and 8 video tutorials covering debating basics, with Hungarian subtitles. A research paper on the impact of debate on teenagers was conducted. Due to the project, a better inter-regional coordination and transparency (from a baseline of 1 annual meeting covering very general issues to 4 inter-regional meetings covering a range of specific issues) was reached. Also, the debate clubs are more sustainable - they now have basic fundraising abilities, better training abilities and more effective resources.
Summary of bilateral results