Danube Day 2004 in Ukraine

n the Carpathian region there are the Danube river tributaries ? the Tisa, the Syret and the Prut rivers. NGOs in the Carpathian region ? ?Rutenia? (Uzhgorod , Agency of regional development (Rakhiv) ? took an active part in the ?Be an Artist of Danube? School Competition. In particular in Rakhiv region (Transcarpathians) the event ?From clean Tisa to clean Danube? was prepared. The participants were schoolchildren and the members of the scaut organization ?Plast?. For two weeks children took trips along the Tisa riverbanks and inflowing streams and cleaned them from garbage.
The School Competition ?Be an Artist of Danube? was organized in school # 3. The best children?s masterpieces were selected by a jury, that consisted of the vice-chairman of Regional administration authority ? Mr. V. Khoma, NFP DEF representative ? Petro Hrytsyshyn and a school director ? Ms. T. Hrynyk.

The following pieces were selected for the All-Ukrainian competition:
– ?Storks? (where is the water ? there is a life, where is a life ? there is a love, and where in a love ? there are storks.
– ? From a tree root found on the Tisa bank a sculpture was prepared by a specialplastics method
– ? ?Clean Tisa ? clean Danube?

The School Competition in the Ukrainian part of the Danube Delta was well organized too. Members of the Humanitarian Center of education and training of schoolchildren, pupils of Odessa schools No 56, 38, 4 took part in the ?Green school? training.

A team of young naturalists was formed to take part in the regional event in Izmail town. In total 347 schoolchildren took part in artistic workshops and competitions.

In Reniisk region the ?Be an Artist of Danube? competition was organized in 14 educational institutions, with participation of 91 schoolchildren. The competition was organized on the basis of the Reniisk regional station of young naturalists in the village of Novoselsk school-lyceum that represented Reniisk region at the regional stage of competition.

In Kilian regional competition 19 educational establishment were involved with participation of 60 pupils: 10 teams (6 pupils in each), while in Izmail regional competition ?Be an Artist of Danube? 52 pupils from 16 educational institutions took part.

In the town of Izmail the Station of young naturalists organized the competition in schools. 12 educational center were involved with participation of 98 pupils. The artistic works have been made on the Danube riverbank; children also took part in the nature protection actions ? cleaned the riverbank from the garbage. Two teams ? a collected team from different schools and a team of young naturalists, represented educational centers of the town. Many paintings were prepared by the children of Izmail school of arts.

On June 22-23 the final stage of the competition ?Be an Artist of Danube? was organized in Izmail by the workers of ecological-natural division together with the workers of Izmail Station of young naturalists, devoted to the Danube Day celebration. Representatives of Izmail TV and journalists from the regional newspaper ?Izmail reporter? (?Izmailski visnyk?) were invited.

4 teams ? winners from Reniisk, Izmail regions, the town of Izmail and Izmail Station of young naturalists took part in the final stage of competition. In total ? 24 pupils. After opening of the regional stage of competition the participants were invited to participate in the work of creative laboratory on the banks of the Danube River. Participants prepared artistic sculptures from the garbage collected on the riverside.

While the jury was estimating the artistic pieces, the team of young naturalists of the ecological-natural division of the Humanitarian Center of Out-of-School Education and Training together with a volunteer of the Peace Corp (USA) Davis Kenneth organized different games, fun, geographical comp?tition.

The winners of the ecological games were awarded small prizes and every correct answer was also awarded a small prize. The prized were awarded immediately on the riverbank, where the competition took place.

After the creative laboratory work the participants went for sightseeing in Izmail with a visit to diorama.

All the participants of the regional stage of the competition ?Be an Artist of Danube?, young naturalists of the Station of Young Naturalists in Izmail, schoolchildren of Izmail school of arts, schoolchildren of the educational establishments of the town of Izmail were able to see the exhibition of the best sculptures and paintings presented for the competition.

The participants of the competition liked the creative tasks, games at the regional event, and decided to celebrate the Danube Day next year in their villages, districts with the pupils of their schools.

The information about competition was published in the newspaper ?Danube Dawn? (Dunaiska Zoria).

A very interesting event for the Danube Day was prepared by Ecological organization ?Zhaivoronok? (?Skylark?) of the town of Kilia. You can find detailed information about it in the ?Danube Watch?
# 2/2 004.