"""Creative Ageing"" is a strategic partnership project about developing innovative strategies through cultural education to reach senior citizens who have difficulties to find access to and participate in social and cultural life due to low skills, health or financial reasons, and to engage them in non-formal, participative and inclusive projects of cultural education. The project will run from September 2019 to November 2021 and involves the cultural departments of 6 city administrations from 5 different European countries: Munich (DE) as applicant and coordinator, Leeuwarden (NL), Ostend (BE), Brighton & Hove (UK), Gothenburg (SE) and Berlin (DE) as partners.Life expectancy is increasing and while many senior citizens enjoy their life after work, there is also a growing number of elderly people who are at risk of social exclusion. Increase in old-age poverty, less mobility due to age-related disabilities, life in isolation and no link to today’s digital world make those senior citizens more vulnerable and prevent them from access to social and cultural participation. This trend widens the disparities in society. “Creative Ageing” wants to respond to this societal challenge with the help of cultural education. While the positive impact of cultural education in the work with young people has been established, this knowledge needs now to be transferred to the target group of disadvantaged senior citizens. Participative cultural projects are to engage senior citizens actively and self-determined so that they become motivated to develop key competences such as relearning how to connect to other people. Cultural education includes lifelong-learning processes and can help to maintain and increase social networks, reduce loneliness and delay the onset of cognitive and health disorders.The partners want to learn from each other by sharing and reviewing good practices in their cities to develop new strategies on how to create sustainable structures and settings in European cities, which will allow for high-quality, customized offers to disadvantaged senior citizens and for overcoming the multiple access barriers. New practical ideas are to be brought back from the partners and be incorporated into the local strategies of how to reach the target group more effectively, how to work more inclusively with elderly people and how to involve them in social life. The project is meant to provide extra impetus and as a catalyst to push forward a new way of working in each city.To do that the partners will set up a cross-sectoral project team with staff from the municipal departments of culture, education, social services and health, but also from the local networks of cultural practitioners, NGOs, initiatives and carers – an innovative approach. Out of this community, 4 to 5 participants per partner (28 in total) will be selected to attend the 5 transnational meetings where the exchange and peer learning will take place. Each partner will organise and host one meeting with a focus on their expertise. These meetings after the kick-off will consist of on-site visits, presentations, discussions and evaluation. A survey among European cities will run in parallel and provide further insights. The final meeting will end in a public symposium in Munich and the results will presented in a best practice document. The participants will ensure that the gained knowledge is brought back to their cities and the local professional community is involved. In parallel, each partner will conduct local project activities. The project teams play a major role, as they will not only provide thematic input, but also influence the design of local strategies and inspire the local networks to develop participative cultural educational projects targeting senior citizens at risk of social exclusion.The project activities will result in a collection of good practices and their transferability to other European cities. The collaboration between the municipal levels and the local stakeholders will ensure that solutions are provided on a strategic (necessary funding and structure) and an operational level (customized participative projects). Cultural education will be increasingly recognized as a facilitator for social inclusion, also for target groups other than young people. All partners together will disseminate the project results and the collaboration with the network Eurocities with 152 major cities from around Europe will see to a wide coverage. Regarding the target group of senior citizens, the result of the project will be a visible increase in tailor-made cultural offers.In the long run, the partners remain connected via Eurocities where all partners are members. It will provide the platform to continue exchanging ideas on creative ageing and on developing joint projects. At local level, “Creative Ageing” will flow into the partners’ cultural educational projects for senior citizens, in particular those who are at risk of social exclusion."

The overarching objective of the PATH2LC project is to support policy makers and public authorities at local level in the transition process towards a low carbon society. Through a holistic network approach, stakeholders in public authorities are linked among municipalities in order to enable peer-to-peer learning and increase the engagement in energy and climate transition. The network approach shall also accelerate the implementation of Sustainable Energy (and Climate) Action Plan (SE(C)AP) measures. The PATH2LC project will foster the exchange of existing knowledge and experiences among municipalities, enhance coordination among different administrative bodies within the municipalities and improve cooperation with local stakeholders and civil society. It will furthermore provide stakeholders in public authorities with the necessary planning and monitoring tools to implement transition roadmaps. The following five existing networks are the starting point of the project: UCSA - Joint Office for Environmental Sustainability (Italy), Sustainable City Network (Greece), OesteSustentável (Portugal), Cities Northern Netherlands (NL), Rhône Network (FR). They benefit from a well-established network process of the so-called learning energy efficiency networks (LEEN), supplemented with in-depth capacity building and support regarding heating and cooling topics. Due to the international composition of the networks, cross-country experiences can be shared. The project is accompanied by a socio-scientific evaluation in order to make the results transferable to other municipalities as well as by a dissemination strategy in order to make network activities visible.

As stated by the EC, renovation by the private housing sector towards increased energy efficiency is seriously lagging behind. As more than sufficient technological solutions are available, focus must be on removing non-technological barriers. The main barriers relate to fragmentation of the renovation offers, resulting in inefficient or only partial solutions. In addition to financial restrictions and unclear benefits, house-owners do not have a structured way to obtain all the necessary information related to renovation measures. One of the ways to solve this, is the use of ‘1-stop shop concept.’ Many initiatives have already been put into practice. Some of these projects were successful, but several were not. They often lack an understanding of the concerns and demands of the house-owners. REFURB 2.0 will tackle the complex interplay of these barriers through coordinated process organisation, innovation and optimization. REFURB 2.0 will bridge the gap between supply and demand side by: • developing a holistic approach to the renovation process in which technology combinations trigger step-by-step deep energy renovation of existing, private residential buildings towards NZEB-standards. • accommodating the technology solutions to the decision-making psychology and ‘language’ of residential house-owners; this will provide the drivers for empowerment and mobilisation of house-owners for deep renovation. • developing a quality and performance protocol to build trust on the demand side. The above mentioned activities will result in dedicated renovation packages for different market segments and regions in Europe, starting with the private residential sector. A small scale pilot will be carried out in order to validate and demonstrate the REFURB 2.0 solution. This will be followed by a roll-out plan to stimulate EU wide uptake. In addition, a transferability plan will be established for other sectors, whereas the social housing sector will be the first ‘follower.