Lily Greenan is stepping down after a decade of organising many of the 60 in-person events we’ve held in the Scottish Parliament and other Edinburgh venues since 2010. That short sentence cannot do justice to the mountain of work needed to get each event off the ground and the month she contributed every year to gather the info needed to write a report for each new Scottish Government grant application. In 2022, at last, Lily will have the bliss of a real guilt-free summer holiday without trying to find Nordic speakers for a September event! A massive thanks for her calm optimism over the years.
Mike Vickers has stood down as Treasurer – an onerous task with any bunch of volunteers but more arduous for Mike during the decade of in person speaker visits complete with receipts for their flights, food and hotel accommodation. Mike V has handed the job onto steering group member Professor Mike Danson – a big thanks to both.
We could really use another couple of livewires on the steering group – especially folk with IT, zoom or Nordic experience. Please contact Lesley via [email protected]
Finally, a huge thanks to everyone who contributed to our crowdfunder at the end of 2021. We exceeded our target of £4k to finance another year of virtual events, online platforms, audio & video editing, website maintenance and a few podcasts. Your generosity and belief has given us the chance to keep making connections with our nearest, most successful Nordic neighbours – and the morale boost we needed to keep going.
We are planning four online events in 2022 on the following subjects;
- Cyber literacy – focusing on Finland.
- Truly local municipal government (to coincide with elections in our own vast ‘local’ authorities) focusing on Norway.
- Iceland’s revolutionary anti-addiction teenage sporting programme.
- Another subject – suggestions and any threads info on the three listed above are welcome via [email protected].
Our Director, journalist Lesley Riddoch will also record a few podcasts on subjects that come up in the news during 2022.
It’s going to be busy – braw! A good way to keep up is to join our Facebook Group.