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• Among the 34 students there are mayors, councillors, agents of local development and other public representatives as well as managers and professionals of several companies.

• The grown interest on this course has made Bilbao Metropoli-30 to plan new training  initiatives in collaboration with its partners. 

The President of Bilbao Metropoli-30, Jose Antonio Garrido, opened on February 9th the Course on Strategic Management of Cities organized by this Association in collaboration with the Bizkaia County Council and EUDEL. The Course is framed in the research and analysis activities carried out by Bilbao Metropoli-30 aimed to the revitalization of the Metropolitan Bilbao. It will offer training in advanced technics of strategic management of cities to the more than 30 managers, public representatives and professionals who will attend the course during eight weeks.

In the opening event have also taken part the director general of Bilbao Metropoli-30, Alfonso Martinez Cearra, and the Director of the Course, Juan Luis Urrutia. Jose Antonio Garrido emphasized the new aspects of this Course that combines theory and practice on the new tendencies and evolution of the cities in the world. The attendants will develop the necessary abilities to be able to approach an effective management in their respective professional scopes. "All -according to Jose Antonio Garrido- in the context of the complex and changing world of the knowledge society towards which the city walks. The continuous formation of the professionals is more and more essential. Among the 34 students enrolled in the Course there are mayors, councillors and agents of local development and other public representatives of Bizkaia, in addition to managers and professionals of several companies and organizations like Eusko Tren, Dragados y Construcciones, BBK, EITB, the University of the Basque Country or Iberdrola. 

The Course, in Friday afternoon and Saturday morning sessions, will end on March 31st. During 64 hours it will offer the students great part of the accumulated knowledge by Bilbao Metropoli-30 in its ten years of experience. Thus, the Course, divided into three modules, will respond to questions related to the city as new centre of regional development; strategy of the cities; and modern metropolitan management. Its structure in eight subjects includes, in addition, questions such as the intangible values, the process of strategic planning or the city marketing. 

The program is conceived to provide a clear vision of the new tendencies that arise from the development of the cities at the present time; to generate between the assistants a common language that enables the understanding of the new forms of metropolitan management; and to adapt the capacities and abilities of the students to the new forms of management of the municipalities and the cities. The academic direction of the Course will be responsibility of Bilbao Metropoli-30, that will count on the participation of experts in the matter, combining the theoretical knowledge and the practice. 

With this initiative the Bilbao Metropoli-30 Association begins a training project, which is thought to continue in the future through other courses, an intention guaranteed by the success obtained in this first call.