Hosting Berlin into a learning city?

Last Wednesday the Berlin Calling Team for a next Art of Hosting training in Berlin met. We had a very energetic circle with 7 people and we mainly clarified questions around roles and tasks for organizing a local training.

However, the calling question(s) for a training has been part of our conversations with a circle of practitioners on the phone and has been hanging around for a few weeks now. From the phone conversations this question emerged: „How do we learn and lead in change and complexity?“ and patterns from local conversations can be viewed in this picture.

Here is a daily account of things popping up in my head related to the calling question since last Wednesday:

THURSDAY
Stepping out of the shower, this calling question pops up in my mind How do we learn and lead in change and complexity to transform Berlin into a thriving learning city? And the need to go through the harvest of different conversations again to add sub-questions and burning topics in Berlin to the calling question.

FRIDAY
On Facebook this morning, I catch the City Innovation Book in the news feed of Shikshantar with lots of stories from around the world learning to create more vibrant cities.

I realize that I have the webpage of The Festival of Ideas in New York City open in a browser window for days now – waiting to be read and happening today! „The Festival of Ideas for the New City, May 4-8, 2011, is a major new collaborative initiative in New York involving scores of Downtown organizations, from universities to arts institutions and community groups, working together to effect change.“

I brainstorm on other learning city tools…

– the UrbanCamp in Hamburg as a barcamp format
– the Pro Action Café in Brussels
– the Learning Lab in Basel and the Community Skill Share Day in London
– the Art of Hosting Community in Columbus, Ohio 
– the Invisible Learning Tour co-hosted by the Knowmads
– the Transition Movement

Maybe this can be added to the invitation: What’s your dream for (a healthy) Berlin? What’s your dream for your city?

SATURDAY
In my inbox this morning the Hub DC newsletter with Citizen Circles co-hosted with the Peer2Peer University.

At the Education Summit of the Green Party in Berlin, I meet again the project coordinator of seven One Square Kilometers of Education in Germany. We talk about possible spaces in the Berlin Square Kilometers to host this Art of Hosting Training.

SUNDAY
On the local train from a beatiful sunny day in the Werder fruit valley outside of Berlin, the harvest from the Hub Amsterdam/Rotterdam Summer School comes to my mind that closes with the questions: „What if we were a learning city? What would a city learning festival look like?“.

MONDAY
Before writing this blog artcile, I note down in my mindmap as draft for this article „The importance of connecting translocally with learning centers mentioned in the book ‚Walk Out Walk On‚.

Two hours later my US copy of ‚Walk Out Walk On‘ is delivered to my door steps from my flatmate!

My brain opens another dusty drawer and the KaosPilot Urban Recipe Cookbook from Team 15 appears.