In October 2018, the twin cities Olonets and Lycksele renewed their Cooperation Agreement, making a special focus on the activities in the field of education and children&youth work. At a meeting in Lycksele in the spring of 2019 the partners finally agreed on the choice of cooperation projects. It was decided, first of all, to develop contacts between schoolchildren in twin cities, which will allow young people to discuss environmental issues, aspects of cooperation in the field of culture, and, most importantly, establish informal friendly ties.
The result of communication between the secondary school No. 1 of Olonets and Tannbergskolan from Lycksele was a school exchange program, the first large event of which was the visit of students and teachers of Tannbergskolan to Olonets on December 1-4, 2019.
It should be noted that direct contacts between representatives of schools from the twin cities took place already in October this year as part of the BEAC Ministerial Meeting in Umea, where students and teachers of the Olonets and Lycksele schools (one student and one teacher each) were invited by the Swedish Foreign Ministry. Students were given the right to speak to a representative audience.
The program prepared for the guests from Lycksele was rich and diverse: getting to know the city and its history; master classes at a children’s art school, introducing students and teachers to the methods of sorting and recycling in Sweden and Russia, discussing problems in this area. In addition, students from Olonets and Lycksele conducted joint research work to study the composition of water in the Olonka and Megrega rivers, the studies were carried out using new microscopes that the Swedes donated to their partners in Olonets
Irina Kornilova, the director of Olonets secondary school No. 1 noted that the communication between students and teachers from Olonets and Lycksele was warm and friendly, young people hope to continue contacts next year.