On 8 and 9 July the second flagship conference of the European Year of Creativity and Innovation will take place, organized by the European Commission, DG Education and Culture, in Brussels.
The main objective of EYCI flagship conferences is to stress the importance of creativity and innovation for Europe, in particular in a context of crisis, and the added value of EU policies to bring them to fruition. Common to all conferences are the showcasing of good practices and the contribution of a wide range of actors from education, research, business, culture, and the arts, including both the public and the private sectors.
The main characteristic of this second conference is its regional/local approach. In other terms, the conference should explore creativity and innovation from a people's point of view, demonstrating how they relate to everyday life and to societal priorities and concerns.
The three themes chosen to this end are employment, wellbeing and education. There are clear linkages between all three, and the conference should highlight this mutual dependence, and the need for holistic approaches.
To this end, each theme will be presented by an expert in the subject, and it will be illustrated by means of a selected number of cases of good practice. It will be a specialized conference, addressing policy makers, practitioners, academia and business. The parallel workshops will be structured as panels, to stimulate and facilitate a debate and produce policy conclusions
All three areas are closely interrelated, as selected good practices will demonstrate. This interrelationship will also drive the conference's organization, by a holistic approach to the description and analysis of projects as well as by providing opportunities for cross-disciplinary debate.
F.U.N was born when a friend asked how he can help the United Nations? "What does the UN need most" he asked? Friends are what the UN needs most, was our answer, and it just happens to spell F.U.N. 
