Dear partners,

Welcome to the first 2015 Newsletter of the Global Network of Learning Cities (GNLC). We have started into a year in which we hope to see numerous fruitful events and milestones in enhancing lifelong learning in the world’s communities. 

We begin this newsletter with insights from our expert interview with Mr Suhiko Sampo, Deputy Mayor of Espoo, on the Learning City Development in Espoo, Finland.

We then discuss the main focus of the GNLC Team’s work in this first quarter of the year: the preparation of the 2^nd International Conference on Learning Cities. This Conference will represent a significant milestone towards enhancing the practice of Learning Cities around the world. Invitations to attend the Conference in May 2015 were dispatched and the second preparatory Expert Meeting took place on 3–4 March in Hangzhou, China. Unfortunately, we have just had to announce that the 2^nd International Conference on Learning Cities will be rescheduled. Nevertheless, we are keeping up our enthusiasm and excitement and are looking forward to a successful event later this year!

In this newsletter we also introduce cities around the world which shared their progress and activities with us. Read about actions taken to enhance lifelong learning in Hangzhou (China), Bristol (United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland) and Cork (Ireland).

Last but not least, we would like to extend warm greetings to all our dedicated readers from the GNLC Coordination Team at the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning; Arne Carlsen, Raúl Valdés-Cotera, Mo Wang and our new team members Katharina Lunardon, Michelle Diederichs and Monica Solorzano Soto.

Yours sincerely,

The GNLC Coordination Team

We invite you to submit your city news regularly to learningcities(at)unesco.org.