Autumn is the time when Field Groups meetings take place. “Field Group” is an official structure created by YMCA Europe aimed at strengthening movements through involvement of partners.
Field Group of YMCA Ukraine – Kiev, 24th of September
YMCA Ukraine Field Group involves YWCA-YMCA Sweden, YWCA-YMCA Denmark, YMCA Calgary (Canada), YMCA Belarus, YMCA of Northwest North Carolina; Gateway YMCA (St. Louis), YWCA-YMCA Iceland. Under Jan Nissen`s leadership, the partners gathered to discuss and plan the development and sustainability of the movement.
Field Group of YMCA Belarus, 28-29th of September, Lviv
YMCA Belarus Field Group involves YWCA-YMCA Sweden, YMCA USA, YMCA Switzerland, YMCA Ukraine, YMCA Thames Gateway (England), YMCA Poland, YMCA Germany. Under Martin Weder`s leadership, the partners were focussed on this main topics:
- the extraordinary conditions for the YMCA work in Belarus
- current activities and programmes of YMCA Belarus
- new national staff
- international partnerships, networking and co-operation including both umbrella organisations YMCA Europe and World YMCA
- YMCA Youth Centre Ponyemontsy: the reconstruction work including equipping bedrooms with furniture is in progress and a manager for the centre could be employed.
The Field Group members usually discuss recent development of a movement, main challenges and priorities. They discuss how to contribute to reaching current strategic objectives of an organization. They mostly concentrate on developing internal strategic priorities, bringing a movement to new levels of institutional sustainability and coordinate assistance, which every partner movement brings Actually, this is a long-term process of movement strengthening involving different type of expertise, support, coaching. So, Field Groups are in line with the current process of movement strengthening, which takes place in YMCA Europe.
This year Juan Simoes Iglesias and Olga Lukina represented YMCA Europe at the Field Group meeting of Ukraine. Olga Lukina represented YMCA Europe at the Field Group meeting of Belarus.
