Checklist for international organisers

WHAT IS A INTERNATIONAL COORDINATOR? International coordinator (IC) is a person (or few persons) who is responsible for making the whole biketour a big succes... Haha

It is hard to give a dry description of this task as Biketour is different every year: different location, different countries to pass, different local organisers and ways of funding. There is no organisation behind biketour, but just enthusiast ex-biketour participants who will start up the project for the next year. Sometimes they are few so they can only arrange some basic funding plus a volunteer, sometimes more can be done (networking with local organisers-organisations, finding extra funding etc). So as international coordinator it is good to be instructed well by ex-biketour participants and organisers and to find your own way to make Biketour happen!

As I (YO) was international coordinator in 2008 I can give u some help with just setting up a basic checklist for organising a Biketour. Feel free to use it and change and add things if neccesary! It can be a big help for coordinators in the future!

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CHECKLIST IC

First period: Collect information on Biketour from ex-organisers/participants (especially if you didn´t participate yourself). Important is to get overview what is already done for this years biketour. Important things to do in this first period:

• Arranging your EVS placement together with EYFA and local NGO/host: sleeping and working place, money issues, etc.
• Getting in contact with local organisers and volunteers (organise meetings)
• Find out where trailers and other BT materials are stored. They will have to be send to starting point of BT
• Find out if there is still money left of last year (ex international coordinator)
• Check out how the website and wiki function and start adding new information a.s.a.p
• read evaluations... can be usefull to not make same mistakes again.
• start with aplications for funding (in 2008 we had a budget of 2000 euro)

preparation period: While keeping in contact with local organisers, volunteers, helpers in other countries (exbiketour) and possible participants you can coordinate and arrange all kind of practical stuff: see checklist for national/local organisers

Extra specific tasks for IC for preparation:

• Make sure there are NC and they know what is expected in organizing BT (see checklist NC). Keep yourself informed about progress of BT parts (go to/organize meetings).
• Inform all others (participants + organizers) on progress of BT and what needs to be done (weekly updates, add actual info on website/wiki). Helpfull is creating an overview with dates of a general route/time plan plus planned actions and campaigns (could be put on wiki and can be updated by local organisers!!!)
• Arrange invitation letters (can be written by local NGO)
• Arranging extra funding
• Administrative issues: collecting receipts, keeping score, arranging refunds for costs local organizers.
• Buying practical necessities: kitchen equipment, spare parts trailers, notebook...
• Arrange (skype)meetings (especially when mayor discussions have to be made fast or in case of conflicts)
• Make sure there will be material for BT publicity (flyers, t-shirts, stickers)
• Make sure there will be a press release which can be send out for actions/events in local language.
• Collect stuff for guidebook with information for participants and make sure it will be printed, translated and distributed
• registering of and contact with participants (ex-BT crew can help here)

During BT: You can take a step back in organisation...During BT tasks should be distributed among all participants!!!! We are a horizontal group and one of our aims is to be a self-organised group. In 2008 we experimented first with personal tasks:

• telephone person: who keeps and answers the phone and informs others about this
• informer for new participants: who introduces the BT to new participant (explains our daily structure, consensus, participant fee.. etc.)
• money keeper: collects participant fee and gives money to shoppers
• press spokes person: gives interview, informs journalists and photographers on our media policy (we don´t want to be followed by camera´s all the time).
• person informed on route and sleepingplaces: has contact with local organisers and informs other participants.
• person informed on actions: has contact with local organisers and actiongroups and informs other participants.
• person who keeps our fans(mum and dad)informed:writes daily sms to our weblog, reminds us to write our weblog and upload pictures.

Later we installed groups instead of persons for the route and sleepingplaces: routegroup and for actions: actionplanninggroup and we had much more groups, but lot´s of them didn´t do anything like the boardgroup (who was going to find us a board to write info on) and signgroup (who was going to find better materials to make signs)...

Tasks IC after BT

• administration of preBT costs and keeps score of funding money
• will arrange payment of bills who come afterwards
• will write report for NJI afterwards
• will take part in evaluation meetings and start up proces next year