Accepted proposal for establishing and strengthening a core network promoting Third sector Studies in the Central and Eastern European region

Introduction

In recent years we can observe a continuously growing interest in University/College level Third Sector Studies in the Central and Eastern European region. Practitioners and academics talk about a "hunger" for such courses. A survey commissioned by the Third Sector Institute in CEE project last year showed that there are NGO courses in nearly every CEE country and their number would increase in the future. The survey also pointed at the necessity of networking and cooperation among practitioners, academic and other interested parties as well.

There are several reasons for the expanding interest in Third Sector Studies:

• the results of several surveys confirmed that practitioners have a great interest in conceptual knowledge on management as science and profession. Existing short-term training programs and seminars can provide the participants with only basic operational skills, rather than with fundamental practical and theoretical knowledge;
• the rebuilding process of societies revealed the necessity for many undergraduate students to learn more about the role and philosophy of the NGO sector in modern societies;
• as the nonprofit sector is now broadly present in several segment of the social-economic life, interdisciplinary teaching is frequent; courses on NGOs are incorporated in curriculums of other disciplines and comprehensive NGO courses incorporate courses on other disciplines as well. Not only NGO practitioners but students from other disciplines as well donors, civil servants should also be educated.

Needs to be met

Taking the findings of previous networking, results of several surveys and conferences into account we identified the following list of needs to be met concerning Third Sector Studies in CEE:

• Need for more involvement of appropriate academic institutions, to bring academics and practitioners together;
• Need for promoting interdisciplinary aspects of teaching;
• Need for East-East transfer of knowledge as different countries and institutions are at different level of development concerning NGO studies or research and intraregional cooperation might often be more useful than the application and use of methods, materials and results developed in the USA or in other Western European countries;
• Need for publicity and for improving the prestige of NGO studies;
• Need for cooperation and exchange of information among academic people both on research and educational matters;
• Need for increasing the number of NGO courses;
• Need for a reference point to turn to when the development of an NGO course starts to take place; need for putting educational initiatives, networks and actually dispersed knowledge together;
• Need for regionally reliable and applicable research, need assessment and curriculum development methodologies;
• Need for comprehensive teaching material and case studies which reflect local-regional characteristics and for comprehensive curriculum database.

Mission, goals

Our mission is to promote further understanding of the Third Sector in Central and Eastern Europe. As higher education is crucial in the sustainability and in the quality development of the sector we believe that promoting University/College level Third Sector Studies is a key for understanding the sector.

Our goal in the mid term is to establish and strengthen a network which would serve as a reference organization for developing Third sector Studies in higher education by:

• promoting cooperation and exchange of information among teachers, researchers, founders, nonprofit organizations and other parties interested in University/College level Third Sector Studies in the region; 
• collecting and circulating regionally sensitive educational materials about the third sector to help the launching of such courses and improving ongoing courses;
• maintaining a free information resource center and a network on University/College level Third Sector Studies.
• linking together and coordinating several individuals, institutions, existing networks and initiatives deliberate on Third Sector Studies in the region.

In the long term we intend to establish an Interuniversity network of Universities and Colleges involved in Third Sector Studies covering the region and to publish a journal focusing on regional higher educational and research issues.

Objectives

1. The network would continuously collect curriculum related material and share it to any interested client upon request and through its web-site. Results, methodologies of past and ongoing Third Sector related research would also be collected as well as bibliographies developed for teaching.
2. Selected materials available only in local languages will be translated into English.
3. The work will require continuous cooperation with practitioners and with several Universities and research centers involved in NGO related teaching and research. Students from NGO courses will be involved as volunteers in ongoing activities Students will also be encouraged to get engaged in collecting data and translation work as well.
4. The cooperation and communication among members as well as the broader community will be eased, maintained and coordinated by the Third Sector Institute network-initiative: the Third Sector Studies in CEE discussion list-group and the Third Sector Studies in CEE web-site (www.thirdsectorcee.info.hu).

1. By the end of the project a comprehensive collection of selected interdisciplinary materials will be available. The selection will be carried out by the core-members and coordinated by the coordinator based on the contribution of all active network members. The collection will serve as base for helping to launch interdisciplinary courses on the NGO sector and help the improvement of ongoing courses as well.
2. A journal on Third Sector Studies in Higher Education will be published by the end of the period including essays on relevant issues with national and subregional focus, and a selected collection of regionally relevant research reports.
3. The final selection of materials and articles in the journal would be preceded by a meeting at the mid term of the project. It will bring together the most active members: experiences and approaches will be shared, and materials from the various courses presently being taught in the region will be made available.

Structure

Initially the core-network would comprise of core-members and of actively contributing organizations and individuals. Individuals and organizations will be encouraged to contribute and involved in our work, meanwhile core-members of the network will be responsible for the outcomes.

Benefits and advantages

We regard the following features as the main competitive advantages of our program:

• Interdisciplinarity is of first importance as courses on NGOs are incorporated in curriculums of other disciplines and comprehensive NGO courses incorporate courses on other disciplines as well. Our group member have different background representing different aspects of NGO teaching: theory, legal aspects, management; while the inclusion of practitioners helps the understanding of educational needs of practitioners.
• Regional sensitivity as participants all work in the region and have first hand experience on regionally and locally sensitive issues. To meet locally relevant needs, locally developed curriculum is a must.
• Regional comprehensivity as participants come from different countries. We believe that this feature enables our network to gather reliable information more effectively. As the network would also rely on the already existing Third Sector Studies in CEE network the broadest possible client group will be reached.
• Continuous presence of a core network secures the reliability of the initiative and make prospective clients getting continuous access to the provided services.
• Academic background of our members guarantees the quality of the outcomes of our network.
• Manageability: the size of the core-network is still manageable while its constitution supports a comprehensive approach to NGO studies.

Participants

Initial core-members:

Mall Hellam

Mikko Lagerspetz

Olga Udovichenko

Jasminka Ledic

Králik Miklós

Marek Rymsza

Actively contributing organizations which already joined our initiative: