Kick-off meeting of the POWERS Network which gathered together representatives of partner institutions: Voronezh State University, Georg-August University of Goettingen, Institute of Political Sciences of Bordeaux, Kore University of Enna, Dokuz Eylul University, Center for Strategic Studies (CSS) - University of Jordan, Kuban State University, Perm State National Research University. The kick-off meeting took place at the premises of the Centre for Strategic Studies – University of Jordan.
After the welcome address delivered by Prof. Musa Shteiwi, Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies, the meeting started with presentations of research and teaching activities of each partner institution those gave a comprehensive overview of the POWERS Network potential, its strengths and opportunities for not only joint activities within the project workplan but also collaboration beyond the project life contributing to the Network sustainability.
Dr. Alla Akulshina, coordinator of the POWERS Network, briefly recalls the objective of the POWERS and the roles of key people within the network. She described its activity plan highlighting what kind of results they ought to produce. The partners discussed in details the activities that will be realized over the three academic years until August 2021 with specific focus on workplan of the 1st year (until December 2019) agreed on the exact dates of events, namely Research Workshop in University Goettingen presented by Prof. Martin Tamcke, International Conference in Voronezh State University presented by Dr. Alla Akulshina, and Research Workshop in Science Po Bordeaux presented by Prof. Daniel Bach.
Also, the partners from Dokuz Eylul University, Voronezh State University, Kuban State University and Perm State University briefly illustrated the kind of teaching modules which are to be involved into the POWERS programme of activities since September 2019. They agreed to involve as many students as possible (e.g. undergraduate students, PhD students, post-doctorate) as well as representatives from civil society and policy makers during all the activities. They are committed to ensure multidisciplinary synergies among academic disciplines. With the aim to make to make study programme more multidisciplinary and involve more both students and teachers Voronezh State University proposed to make a change in the scope of the module to be taught at VSU. In discussion and with agreement of all partners it was changed from “International humanitarian law: a role of the European Union” to “Regional and national security: stability and conflict potential” which will incorporate a series of lessons on international humanitarian law but will allow to widen the scope of the module.
Specific attention was paid to the POWERS website which was devoted to comprise virtual platform with content and results of 4 scientific conferences, 7 research workshops, guest lectures, 2 summer schools and all teaching materials of 4 teaching modules. The partners were encouraged to provide all relevant information on time.
Dr. Alla Akulshina reviewed the financial and management rules applied to such kind of projects as Jean Monnet Network and explained how they will be executed for implementation of the POWERS. There were presented templates of a number of reporting documents, since each university will be required to fill in timesheet for reporting working hours on the POWERS activities as well as financial expenditure.
