"Banuu - Designing new pathways for employability and entrepreneurship of Iraqi students in Archaeology and Cultural Heritage" draws from the experience and results of the EU-funded Waladu and Eduu projects which provided a substantial impact at different levels in the field of Humanities in Iraq. In order to improve the graduate students employability in the field of Humanities in Iraq, we identified three sectors which can be newly created or improved in order to provide more job opportunities: 1) Preventive archaeology; 2) Cultural tourism; 3) Cultural heritage management.
Preventive archaeology: This field is new to Iraq, although well-know and developed in Europe. The continuous building activities and deliberate destructions of archaeological sites make necessary to create specific private companies of archaeologists carrying out, under the supervision of the SBAH, archaeological excavation prior to the construction activities.
Cultural tourism: Current tourism in Iraqi is almost only focused on religion. We aim at jointly developing job opportunities for fresh graduated students as tourist guides focusing on the historical value of the monuments of Iraq.
Cultural heritage management: This sector mostly concerns museums. Thanks to the expertise of the European partners and the support of two Iraqi museums, we will jointly work to provide to fresh graduated students the expertise to work in the field of cultural heritage.
The main activities of the Banuu project consist in five different steps and they have been summarized below:
1st STEP: The first step of the project will aim at activating internships in this three sectors by the Iraqi partner universities. At the same time the entire project team will work on policy papers to improve legislations in the three field, thus facilitating the creation/improvement of the three sectors. In addition the entire team will organize workshops and events also involving local communities to raise awareness on the importance of Iraqi cultural heritage.
2nd STEP: The second step will be that of carrying out internships in the three sectors. Students from the 5 Iraqi partner universities will participate to the internships. At the same time the team will complete the writing up of the policy papers. These will become new legislations.
- Internship in Preventive Archaeology: Students will participate in archaeological excavations coordinated by the EU project partners, in full collaboration with SBAH, the two ministries and the with the support of UNESCO Youth, AARU and Sana.
- Internship in Tourism: Students will work with existing private companies working in the field of tourism to develop their skills as tourist guides.
- Internships in Cultural Heritage Management: Students will collaborate with experts from the Iraqi Museum and the newborn King Gazi Museum, also receiving the support of the EU partners in order to develop their skill as cultural heritage professionals.
3rd STEP: During the third step students will follow seminars on entrepreneurship. At the end of those a start-up day event will be organized. Student will make proposal for new start-ups in one of the three sectors and the best will be financed.
FINAL STEP: As a result, graduate students in the humanities will be provided with new expertise in the three sectors and with the necessary entrepreneurship skill to create new private companies. At the same time thanks to the support of Iraqi Ministries new legislations will be approved to support these activities.
PROJECT DISSEMINATION
According to the EU guidelines, the project will have its own website, social networks (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram) through which the information, calls and results will be disseminated.
