Our project partner Digital Cities of Central Greece SA – CITIESNET constitutes the first Digital Community in Greece and participates in many European programmes. CITIESNET has its roots in 2008, when the simultaneous need arose in 10 Municipalities of Central Greece to serve current and future needs of their local communities, based on new technologies.
These 10 Municipalities are the Municipalities of Veroia, Volos, Grevena, Ioannina, Karditsa, Katerini, Kozani, Lamia, Larissa and Trikala and represent 10 prefectures and 4 regions of the country.
In 2009 this public limited company was created, with members of these Municipalities and a vision “Always ensure the direct and efficient telecommunications interconnection between citizens, visitors and companies to improve the quality of life and develop our place by providing the required content from sources such as state, society, culture, environment and citizens”.
One of the major disciplines that CITIESNET offered to the participant cities was the delivery of education and training services to the Municipal and other local organizations located in the partner cities. In this regard, CITIESNET equipped facilities that are hosted in the city of Trikala and supported by the Municipality of Trikala, while it has organized several relevant events to engage the cities. Additionally, CITIESNET has been a partner of several European project consortiums (worth mentioning the recent ACTIVEAGE project regarding tele-care services and smart-buildings).
Objectives of the company are:
- the information and the technical and consulting support of each Municipality-Shareholder, of the neighboring Municipalities and companies of the area
- the distribution and provision of know-how
- the production, information and provision of information
- the training
- the cooperation between, among others, with the State and with companies for the promotion of programmes and business activities as well as the utilization and implementation of international, community & National financial programmes
- the mediation with specialized scientific bodies and other persons for the local enterprises on technological and digital issues for the Municipality and the companies of each Municipality and Prefecture and
- the dynamic support of each local company (public and private) for its further development and productivity in the places of the member-companies but also in other geographical areas. (http://dccg.gr/)
As a partner in Smart-DevOps project, CITIESNET will participate mainly in the following activities:
- Specification of the job role description
- validation and standardization of the training methodology and contents
- Selection of trainees (MOOC and specialization course)
- Participation in Work Based Learning
- Participation in Assessment and
- Participation in Dissemination activities
The role of CITIESNET is quite important since it brings Smart-DevOps project close to a network of small and medium size cities and their workforce. The professionals that will be trained will come not only from these 10 Municipalities but from most of Greece’s Municipalities due to the fact that there is a very strong relationship between CITIESNET and the Central Union of Greek Municipalities.
After the end of the project, most of the cities involved in it will enter the era of Smart Cities and will be able to offer to their citizens qualitative digital services, through the change of every city’s vision and the specialized training of their professionals.