The purpose of the transnational meetings was to exchange on tools and methodology by creating innovative social services. Each country learned therefore lessons from the other national EQUAL project. The French Guyana could describe the following best practices, drawn from the Italian and Slovak national projects:


The best practice drawn from Italian project was the important financial and human resources used to fulfil and realize the objectives of EQUAL national project. By regarding Italian project, it appears necessary to have consequent and appropriate means, on financial and human resources level, to run efficient project. One interesting point was the mixture of human resources from different professional areas. The example of the children’s care service at the University is to be pointed out: the fact that inside the University children are being taken care, so that the University is providing a concrete care service, but as the same time that students or teachers in the area of children’s education are involved in this structure leads to a permanent thought on the way to take care of children, and guarantees as a consequent an efficient and appropriate care of children attending this service. This is only possible if the human (and financial) means are available.


The best practice drawn from Slovakia project was the strong involvement of civil society. This can be explained by a different national context, compared with Italy and France, since state structures in Slovakia have been rebuilt after the end of communism. The impression was that the state and public institutions are less involved in the social care system, but as a consequent, the civil society and private actors were strongly involved in the social area. This leads to a great dynamism of the EQUAL project and also to the possibility for EQUAL project to be very close to field issues. The involvement of private actors guarantees efficient projects, which can adapt themselves to changing social context. As an example, the project aims at creation job opportunities for homeless people was slightly modified during EQUAL project. The purpose was to better fit with the needs and the competencies of the homeless people, as they appeared on the field through the other activities dealing with the same beneficiaries.