On 11-12 March 2026, the EcoStories partnership gathered at the CIP Impact Hub in Nicosia for one of the project’s most hands-on milestones to date: the Transnational Training and Co-development Activity (A3.5). Representatives from all five partner organisations – RWTH Aachen University, C.I.P. Citizens in Power, Perifereiako Gymnasio Akakiou, the 5th High School of Agrinio, and Prirodoslovna škola Vladimira Preloga – met in hybrid format, to do something that proposals can only plan for: sit around a table, review real materials, and make them better. 

Two days, one shared standard 

The meeting had a clear purpose. Partners were there to be trained in using the EcoStories Citizen Science (CS) Repository and STEM-based Lesson Plans, to evaluate the materials critically, and to co-develop a shared template that any teacher across the consortium and beyond could confidently pick up and use in their classroom. 

Day 1- Setting the quality bar 

RWTH and CIP jointly led a session establishing two core dimensions for the lesson plans: scientific quality, meaning each plan must link to a recognised Citizen science project and contribute to authentic research data; and pedagogical quality, meaning clear learning objectives, curriculum alignment, realistic timelines, and instructions replicable by any teacher. Partners then evaluated each other’s lesson plans through a structured online survey, generating frank, constructive feedback that shaped the rest of the meeting. 

A dedicated session on inclusive STEM education, facilitated by CIP, reinforced one of EcoStories’ founding principles: that Citizen Science is particularly powerful for linguistically diverse classrooms precisely because participation depends on observation, not language proficiency. Visual materials, collaborative tasks, and real-world environmental contexts were identified as essential design features for reaching migrant and local students equally. 

Day 2 – A model lesson plan and what comes next 

By Day 2, the consortium had agreed on a standardised lesson plan template, using an eBird-based activity as the reference model of good practice. The template covers everything from title and learning objectives to data collection protocols, reflection activities, and annexes with ready-to-use worksheets. Partners also reviewed the full set of lesson plans co-created by the consortium, categorising them across three thematic areas — Life Sciences/Biology, Environmental Science, and Design & Technology — with at least five lesson plans per category. 

Gaps were filled on the spot. Partners developed additional shorter activities, including a Zooniverse-based exercise using the SquirrelMapper project, where students classify wildlife camera images to support real ecological research, which is a compact, fully online activity accessible to any classroom with an internet connection. 

The meeting closed with planning of future project steps, including local training activities, and the first pilot implementations with students, scheduled for autumn 2026. 

From co-development to classrooms 

What the translational meeting demonstrated is that the quality of educational resources is not fixed at the point of creation but refined through dialogue, peer review, and the kind of honest professional exchange that only happens when practitioners sit together with a shared goal.  

The next step is bringing these Citizen Science resources into schools.  

Watch this space for updates: Project Results – Eco-stories