On September 15-16 the Netherlands Interdisciplinary Demographic Institute (NIDI) and the Generations and Gender Programme (GGP) welcomed seven talented national champions who came to learn more about communicating the benefits of longitudinal studies to people outside academia and research as part of the broader effort by the COORDINATE project.
Having agreed that the life-course has become a prominent term among policy makers, politicians and NGOs, the national champions underlined that there still is little understanding that data is needed to make sense of the life-course and its determinants. That is especially the case in children and youth well-being. On the first day of the training participants worked together with Daniela Vono de Vilhena, the Deputy Executive Secretary of Population Europe, to explore, process and plan their strategies on engaging non-scientific national stakeholders in the field of children and youth as well as other age group well-being. In the afternoon of day 1 and on day 2 the national champions focused on individual or group work lead by Vytenis Juozas Deimantas, the GGP Research Infrastructure Manager. Not only have the participants gone through an extensive set of material prepared to equip them to communicate the value added of longitudinal studies and panel data, but have also exchanged the know-how in terms of material relevance and stakeholder engagement culture in domestic contexts.
The national champions are now off to their respective countries to hold workshops making longitudinal data accessible, useful and relatable to national stakeholders.
If you happen to be interested in longitudinal studies and the value they bring to policy makers, public servants, NGOs and other actors in societies, follow us on Twitter to keep up to date on workshops to be held in Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Finland, Lithuania, Republic of Moldova and Poland.
Twitter: @coordinate_eu
