Meeting Flyinge 2009
Ten year anniversary of the EEN - Equestrian Educational Network – in Flyinge, Sweden.On February 2-4th 2009, the EEN network celebrated its ten year anniversary during a meeting in Flyinge, Sweden. Eight of the ten member schools were represented at the meeting. The overall aim of the EEN network is to improve equestrian education in Europe by facilitating direct exchange of information about current educational and equestrian methods and new developments between schools. A number of meetings, seminars and workshops has been organised during the last ten years and there has been a large number of students and teachers taking part in exchanges between countries.
During the meeting, Flyinge presented the school and demonstrated their famous “Flyingemodel” for education of young horses. First, students from the Equine Studies showed how to break in a horse. Second, the head teacher in show jumping Peter Eriksson and the head teacher in dressage Susanne Gielen, told about their philosophy of education and training horses. They also demonstrated their skills on some of the nice stallions from Flyinge.
The EEN members decided to make a joint application for a European Leonardo da Vinci partnership programme. It was decided that the first objective is to demonstrate transparency within European equestrian education for riding instructors on level I, II and III to fit in with the European Qualification Framework (EQF). The second objective is to monitor and improve the quality of European equestrian education for riding instructors. Members believe that this initiative will increase mobility of students, teachers and managers within the EEN network, and the various activities should also benefit other interested equestrian centres outside of the EEN. This is a two-year project that will hopefully start in summer 2009.
At the meeting in Flyinge, the Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI) was represented by Dr Harald Müller, Executive Director Development. Dr Müller explained that the FEI is very interested in utilising the combined experience and knowledge of the EEN members to support the development of equine knowledge and understanding in various developing countries. This could for instance be related to the organisation of equine colleges/ schools/ training centres, contents of curricula, basic standards of good horsemanship, quality control and stable management.
The EEN members expressed their interest in such cooperation and it was decided that a small group of EEN delegates will meet with representatives from the FEI in Lausanne in spring to further discuss the scope of such a project.
The members of the EEN believe that the success of the network is due to the open atmosphere of trust, understanding and equality among the members. The next step is to further strengthen the EEN network and to extend the activities within the network.
The following schools were represented in the meeting in Flyinge:
- Deutsche Reitschule, Warendorf, Germany
- Ecole Nationale d´Equitation, Saumur, France
- Helicon Opleidingen NHB, Deurne, The Netherlands
- Norsk Hestecenter, Starum, Norway
- Ridskolan Strömsholm, Sweden
- Ypäjä Equine College, Finland
- Hartpury College, United Kingdom
- Flyinge, Sweden
