Communities of Practice
COPs
Being endorsed as a Decade Action is the key to full participation in the global momentum of the Ocean Decade. Endorsed Decade Actions get access to international networking and collaboration opportunities and support through Communities of Practice, to be more efficient and more impactful together.
What are Communities of Practice?
Communities of Practice are voluntary groups of endorsed Decade Actions working on similar themes (i.e. around the Ocean Decade Challenges) or in similar geographies (i.e. around major ocean basins). They allow partners to optimize their collective impact throughout the Decade, by communicating and working together to carry out a range of essential activities to pursue the objectives of the Ocean Decade.
What will Communities of Practice do?
As their core activities, Communities of Practice share insights on the objectives and agenda of Decade Actions, discuss best practices, identify knowledge gaps and collective challenges to fully contribute to sustainable development, and share contacts and opportunities for funding and training.
Many Communities of Practice are supported by a Decade Collaborative Center or a Decade Coordination Office for its coordination and to carry out some of the following suggested activities.
The members of the COP will discuss their specific needs and objectives and decide freely the specific tasks and priorities and will provide recommendations to the DCC to implement the activities.
- Ensuring coordination between members
- Assessing best practice and gaps in ocean science within its scope
- Developing communications and outreach
- Contributing to bridging the science-policy gap
- Facilitating capacity building
- Facilitating data exchange
- Mobilizing resources
- Providing an entry point and information conduit
Existing Communities of Practice
- Deep Sea Research and Management
- Coastal Ecosystem and Community Resilience
- Capacity Development
- Early Career Ocean Professionals
- Ocean-Climate Nexus
- Ocean-Climate Solutions and Innovation
- Ocean Prediction
- Northeast Pacific
- Western Pacific
- Indian Ocean
More will emerge over the course of the Decade to address specific issues or respond to new areas of action!
Who can join?
Endorsed Decade Programmes, Projects and Contributions are the members of the COPs. Decade Actions are free to join as many existing Communities of Practice as relevant to their work. They can also apply for the creation of a new COP on a focus not already covered, as long as enough Actions are interested in the COP and commit to contributing to its coordination.
If you are interested in creating a new Community of Practice, please contact us at oceandecade@unesco.org.