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DissMark - Dissemination, Marketing and Networking Conference for Socrates Project Coordinators and Partners.
| DISSMARK’s aim is to bring together the European actors, mainly project coordinators, involved in education with a linguistic component and experts in marketing educational products in order for them to share experience and expertise and to specifically identify effective dissemination and promotion strategies for products and best practices resulting from the implementation of completed and ongoing Socrates projects and other projects confirmed as relevant. This will be achieved through the organisation of a full scale international conference and fair for Socrates project co-ordinators and partners, Socrates National Agencies, marketing experts, educational policy makers, publishers, mass media etc. The event will allow for the exchange of theoretical knowledge, practical experience and expertise, will encourage new partnership building and networking, and will occasion the dissemination and marketing of valuable projects and project products, leading to a more coherent image on and consistent approach to education at a European scale. Furthermore, the conference proceedings will be elaborated in the form of a freeware Dissemination, Marketing and Networking Survival Kit to guide present and future project co-ordinators and partners towards the successful implementation of their educational aims. | Legal Representative Euroed Foundation
Participating institutions: European Cultural Interactions, Soros International House
Target groups:
Teachers (school), Teachers (higher education), Teachers in adult education, Teachers / organisations operating in open and distance learning, Language teachers in schools, Language teachers in the higher education sector, Language teachers in adult education, Educational staff in schools, including head teachers, Educational staff in higher education establishments, Educational staff working in adult education, Trainers of educational staff, Political decision-makers / Administrative staff at national level, Political decision-makers / Administrative staff at regional level, Political decision-makers / Administrative staff at local level, Inspectors, Advisors, Publishers, Other (please specify): media The aims and objectives of the project.
The aim of the current proposal is twofold: to strengthen collaboration and networking among the various categories of individuals and organizations involved in both the design and implementation of educational policies, and to bring together and identify effective dissemination and promotion strategies for products and best practices resulting from the implementation of completed and ongoing Socrates projects.
In achieving this aim, the project identifies the following objectives:
· to organize an international conference and fair for Socrates Agencies, Socrates project co-ordinators and partners, educational policy makers, mass media representatives etc. The specific objectives of the event are:
· to deliver structured theoretical training aimed at optimising the marketing and dissemination strategies, to share best practices of marketing and dissemination strategies;
· to create a network of Socrates project co-ordinators and partners, and help build a learning environment of collaboration, support, exchange of experience and expertise;
· to find solutions to common difficulties;
· to raise the awareness of the decision makers on the importance of developing and implementing Socrates projects and on the existence of valuable educational products resulting from these projects;
· to offer an opportunity to the project co-ordinators and partners to present their products to the general public in a big international event (projects‘ fair);
· to elaborate a marketing and dissemination ‘survival kit‘ addressed to past, present and future project co-ordinators and partners, including theoretical information, simulations and best practices, as it will result from the conference proceedings .
-All projects need to elaborate a coherent action plan to strategically approach the beneficiaries of the project results both during the active life of the project as well as after the funding ceases. In this context, to provide project co-ordinators with experience, expertise and training on how to better cope with this challenge is a necessary task to be undertaken. In fact, much of the ‘tradition’ of projects until now has been to build the partnerships focusing mostly on identifying the best professionals in the respective field of activity, not necessarily with the knowledge and skill to reach beyond the inner circle of the project. Few projects have selected in their partnership an institution capable to efficiently market and disseminate the information about the project results in the correct direction and with the appropriate time and money investment. Also, not all projects really focus on their dissemination from an early stage, and in many situations, when the product of their project is ready, the funded period is over. Moreover, there is a psychological element involved into this as well. Since the project outcome developers are professionals who do not have enough practice in ‘selling’ services or products quite often there is a sort of feeling of embarrassment among them when it comes to promoting one’s own work, assimilated to a pro domo approach.
Consequently, a project that could address this common problem, specific to so many project promoters and partnerships, would have a positive impact on how the strategy of the Socrates programme will bare fruit. At the same time, project co-ordinators and partners would be directly encouraged to take measures for the optimisation of their project dissemination and marketing strategies. The organization of an international dissemination, marketing and networking event, such as the the object of this project proposal, will only add further value, eficiency and multiplying effects to the hard work of many organizations and partnerships throughout Europe in the vast field of education.
Envisaged outputs
The project is planned to have two main outputs:
the DISSMARK International Conference and Fair represents the main output of the project. The event will take two full days and bring together at least 80 interested participants from all over Europe. The event will be structured in two main parts: the international conference (with the participation of key-note speakers and with the organization of both plenaries and workshops) and the projects’ fair (with space reserved to all participatns to disseminate and market their projects and results). The event will deal with the dissemination and marketing strategies for achieving the full potential of project results in the field of education. Examples of experience and good practices of both finalized and ongoing projects will be presented and discussed. The participants will be encourage to interact and share ideas, experience and expertise in light of building new partnerships and increasing the networking within the European educational community. The official language of the event will be English, but interpreters for French and German will also be available. International media coverage will be available and the conference proceedings will also be drafted and circulated. The success of the conference will also depend on technical details such as as the availability of equipment for presentations, exhibition and recording, internet connection etc., for which the necessary budgetary provisions have been made accordingly. The DISSMARK Dissemination, Marketing and Netwroking Survival Kit for project co-ordinators and partners. This will in fact be a resource based on the conference and fair proceedings and the participants’ consultative input. The Survival Kit will be made available to everyone in free downloadable format online, as this is a very cost-effective yes far reaching way of dissemination.
DissMark II - Dissemination, Marketing and Networking Conference & Project Fair DissMark II - Dissemination, Marketing and Networking Conference & Project Fair for Socrates Project Coordinators and Partners - was held on 11-14 October 2007, in Tallinn, Estonia. Dissmark II Conference was meant for project coordinators from different Socrates Actions involved in educational projects with a linguistic component. Soros International House was one of the main conference organisers.   The project coordinators were offered the opportunity to present their products to different professionals and the general public at the fair. Daiva Malinauskiene, Soros International House director presented Socrates/ Lingua 1 project "Learning by Moving" to conference participants.
The first DissMark conference October 12-14. 2006 the first Lingua project dissemination and marketing conference "DissMark - Dissemination, Marketing and Networking" was held in Iasi, Romania. The conference was organised by EuroEd Foundaion (Romania), Soros International House (Lithuania) and European Cultural Interactions (Greece), and it was financed by EU Socrates program support foundation. EU representatives were supporting this initiative because over the past six years in the framework of Lingua projects many great products have been prepared (teaching and visual aids, portals, supplementary materials for teachers, etc.), which are ready to be shown for a wider potential users circle.   
Over 40 projects from all over the Europe, which were financed not only by Socrates but also by Leonardo da Vinci foundation, were presented over the three-day conference. Media, representatives of world wide known publishing houses, specialists in search of marketing and finance were presenting different dissemination and valorisation possibilities. These project presentations gave new ideas for project coordinators to prepare future projects. Besides, everyone had a great networking possibility and to find new partners for future projects.   
Next conference is being planned for October, 2008 in Tallin.
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