The project of a first "European Science Festival 2006", under the title WONDERS, uses the strengths, experiences and capacities of existing major European networks and institutions in the field of Science Communication Events like science weeks, science festivals, science days, science centres and museums and the European science journalists to stimulate Europeans for greater awareness for science, technology and the humanities and dialogues between science and society.

Activities of WONDERS lasted for the whole year 2006 in nearly all of Europe, mainly with the "Carousel of Science", which is an inter-European exchange of the best Science Communication Activities between 21 partner cities and countries. Each partner organisation receives and sends three Science Communication Activities and selects the best one - to be sent to the finals.

During the whole year a special Survey "Click for the Climate", acronym CliClim, for all persons in Europe was organised and marketed by all partners.

Special "Science Cafés" created a direct dialogue between science and society and are moderated and reported by European science journalists.

WONDERS was launched and finalised at special events:

A Launch Event in Vienna, during the EU presidency of Austria on March 30 and 31, 2006, and a major Finals Event with the best Activities of the Carousel of Science, took place in Vantaa, during the EU presidency of Finland, in December 2006.

WONDERS motivated European science communicators to work together with the idea to continue this cooperation in coming years.

How do the sub-projects fit together into WONDERS, why are they necessary? To create a European project for science communication and to find out the best Science Communication Activities, the exchange of these Activities throughout Europe is necessary. Therefore, the Carousel of Science was created - sending and receiving of Activities, and selecting the best ones in each country - and every organisation has to define its Activities for the exchange in detail with a the necessary budget (and all of them did!). Of course, the best Activity of all those individually selected Activities - the "European Best of the Best" - can only be selected at one special event - the Finals Event. And the whole project should have also an official start: the Launch Event. The Launch and Finals should be connected to the EU for European dimension. Therefore, it was decided to hold them at the capitals of the EU presidencies of 2006: Vienna and Vantaa. But, the Activities from the Carousel are only seen in each country for several days. The question was how to interest the Europeans during the whole year? Answer: With a European Survey in the internet, where all Europeans can participate, called CliClim. But there are many serious issues, which cannot be transported easily with Activities! Therefore, Science Cafés with experienced science journalists must accompany the Events. And how do we get all Europeans interested: with good Marketing, with a good Website containing all relevant interesting information. How can we be sure that the project is reasonably well done? Each Partner Organisation will receive a Partners’ Manual and the whole project is continuously accompanied by a close evaluation - and controlled and guided by a Project Management Team.

These are the basic thoughts for the project WONDERS, the first European Science Festival 2006.

The project WONDERS consists of the following sub-projects (in the time-line with the assumption that the project starts in January 2006):

a) Launch Event as the starting event in Vienna, Austria, in March 30 and 31, 2006, during the EU presidency of Austria, announcing the WONDERS programme

b) Euscos, the "European Science Communication Strategy", created in a process started at the Launch, continued by web discussions and being published after a workshop at the Finals

c) Carousel of Science: The exchange of 63 Science Communication Activities around Europe to 21 different Science Communication Events - and selection of the best ones

d) CliClim: The European Survey for all European during the whole year 2006

e) Science Cafés: Discussions in selected cafés about controversial issues concerning science, society, ethics, progress etc. at all 21 Partners

f) Finals Event in Vantaa, Finland, in December 2006; during the EU presidency of Finland; selecting the "European Best of the Best" of all sent and received Science Communication Activities

Additionally, these tasks are performed:

g) Co-ordination: Co-ordination of the whole project.

h) WONDERS Website: a website for internal and external communication

i) Partners' Manual: a manual describing in detail all tasks for the Partner, Participants and others

j) Marketing: detailed marketing for the whole project including logo, "corporate identity", PR and advertising and communication concept

k) Evaluation: continuous valuation of the whole project

Project Management Team

The WONDERS Project Management Team consists of a board, with the EUSCEA general secretary as the project's Co-ordinator.

In addition to that, all members of the board have dedicated tasks for designing, structuring and supervising certain work packages of the proposed project including the integration of these packages into the complete project, and all reporting to the Co-ordinator:

The WONDERS Project Management Team (PMT) and the dedicated responsibilities:

- Mikkel Bohm, DK, director of Danish Science Week, president of EUSCEA - responsible for the operation of the Carousel;

- Paula Havaste, FI, Program Development Manager at the Heureka, the Finnish Science Centre, - responsible for the Finals event in Vantaa, Finland, and for the cooperation with the science centres and museums – on behalf of ECSITE.

- István Palugyai, H, president of EUSJA - responsible for the Science Cafés and principal advisor on media support including electronic media;

- Peter Rebernik, A, director of Pharos International and ScienceWeek @ Austria, general secretary of EUSCEA, Co-ordinator of WONDERS - responsible also for the Launch Event and for the WONDERS website;

- Jan Riise, S, one of the founders of the Science Festival in Göteborg, Sweden, - responsible for marketing support, for the Partners' Manual and EUSCOS, the European Science Communication Strategy – on behalf of EUSCEA;

- Annette Smith, UK, director at the British Association for the Advancement of Science and vice-president of EUSCEA, - responsible for CliClim, the European Survey "Click for the Climate", and for the evaluation of the whole WONDERS project;

Partners

In addition to this, 21 Partners, the participating Science Communication Event Organizers are responsible for:

- Possible participation at the Launch Event in Vienna

- The exchange of three Science Communication Activities - the Carousel of Science - with its sending and receiving Partners respectively, constituting the "Carousel activities triplet" (CAT);

- Selection of the best Activity sent to them;

- The participation and promotion of CliClim, the European Survey

- The promotion of the discussion on the web about Euscos, the "European Science Communication Strategy" and participation until the Finals

- The organisation of the local Science Café together with the appointed local science journalist from EUSJA;

- Participation at the Finals Events at the Heureka science centre in Vantaa;

- The reporting on their part of WONDERS.

The order of the Carousel can be seen when clicking on the appropirate boxes to the left of this website.

Organisers of WONDERS: