ELAICH Project Ends Winning Support from Governments and NGOs

March 26, 2012 - PRLog -- The ELAICH (Educational Linkage Approach in Cultural Heritage) project concluded successfully, winning praise from government and NGO’ officials participating in its closing conference at the end of January.

The closing conference brought together decision makers and experts in the areas of education and cultural heritage conservation. Participants included high school managers, educators in science, arts and history, representatives from local, regional and national government institutions and NGOs related to cultural heritage conservation.

“ELAICH’s educational approach was well received and we laid the basis for ELAICH sustainability after the project period,” said Dr. Anna Lobovikov-Katz, coordinator of the ELAICH project. “The eLAICH Educational Toolkit proved to be an excellent tool to help in educating and involving the general public in cultural heritage preservation and conservation.”

The Israel Antiquities Authority and the Israel Nature and Parks Authority, as well as the Society for Preservation of Israel Heritage Sites expressed interest in integrating ELAICH’s educational approach in their efforts to develop new and innovative ways to reach young audiences. Initial discussions have already been conducted to explore ways to continue ELAICH’s activities in Israel.

In addition, progress was made with the education ministries of the participating countries – particularly Israel, Greece, Malta and Italy – to integrate ELAICH’s materials into school curricula. It is envisaged that the eLAICH e-learning Toolkit will be implemented by different schools – from Haifa to Venice – already in the coming months.

“During the last stage of the project important innovative inter-ideas, triggered by the ELAICH courses, workshops, pilot simulation on-line e-learning course, and all types of dissemination activities, started to stream to us from different educational and heritage players,” Lobovikov-Katz said. “As many of them mentioned, our project served as a catalyst for heritage awareness educational and preservation activities. We hope that new initiatives will grow from this spontaneous international brain storming.”

ELAICH’s approach is unique in that it combines class-based lessons and exercises (including interactive) with educational activities at historic sites. During the three and half years of the project more about 150 high school students have participated in pilot courses held in Greece, Turkey, Italy, Malta, Israel and Jordan.

The ELAICH Project launched the e-learning platform, which made the eLAICH Educational Toolkit, designed for educators and heritage authorities to introduce the values of cultural heritage and principles and challenges of its preservation to youth, accessible to its target audience. The eLAICH Educational Toolkit, http://www.elaich.technion.ac.il/e-learning, has been available on-line since early this year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7j8kH21wmM



About ELAICH
The ELAICH Project is an EU-funded project as part of the Euromed Heritage 4 Programme aimed at contributing to raising awareness of cultural heritage by providing modern and innovative tools for teaching its essence to the general public, especially the youth.

The ELAICH consortium is a multi-disciplinary team comprised of specialists in various areas of cultural heritage conservation and education from five highly rated universities.

For more information about ELAICH, visit http://www.elaich.technion.ac.il.

Contact Person:
Dr. Anna Lobovikov-Katz
Project coordinator
anna@technion.ac.il