The Perm-Louisville Project, the winner of the Perm City Grant Competition "We are the City", involved 845 people

This project “Perm and Louisville:   Cultural Heritage of the Sister-Cities” was organized by Perm-Louisville Sister-Cities Committee, Perm State University, Faculty of Foreign Modern Languages and Literatures, Perm Regional Library, and Perm Association of English Language Teachers. Coordinators of the project were Svetlana Polyakova, Perm State University, and Svetlana Kryazheva, Perm Regional Library assisted by co-organizers Elena Grtisko and Elena Yakovleva from PSU.

The project was aimed at popularization of sister-cities movement among young people, establishment of new ties in the field of culture, education, development of cooperation between civil societies of the two countries and dissemination of information about the history of relations between Perm and Louisville.

The age groups of the participants were 5-8 grades (11-15 year olds), 8-11 grades (aged 15-18) and community college students (aged 18-19), university students (aged 18-26) and 41 volunteering teachers and students  from Perm and 10 Americans who took part in Jury Committees.

The project took place from May 15, 2021 to November 15 2021. It included  the following events and activities:

- a competition of translations of excerpts from the works of famous writers from Louisville and Kentucky:  "A is for Alibi" by Sue Grafton; "Peter the Great" by R. Massie  and "The Healing" by Gayl Jones.

- a competition of translations of excerpts of works by famous writers from Perm: "The Territory of God" by Juri Aslanyan.

All in all there were  467 students from 8 universities, and 40 colleges and schools in Perm. We received 593 entries (160 from universities and 433 from schools).

Prof. Michael Losavio, Prof. Tom Dumstorf and his 8 students participated as members of the Jury Panel in the Translation Contest.

The Competition was conducted in 3 stages. The winning  entries (translations from Russian into English)  were sent to Tom Dumstorf and his students to choose the winners.

- 3 online meetings were held for the youth of Perm and Louisville  (mid-May - October), one extra meeting was with another  group of Mr.Dumstorf's students who study Russian (7 students). The events attracted 101 participants.

-  a virtual exhibition of books and materials about Perm and Louisville in Russian and English 

(September-November).

- a photo exhibition "Cities and rivers", 130 pictures from Perm and from Louisville. https://www.gorkilib.ru/activity/project/our_projects/Perm_and_Louisville_2021/photo_exhibition_Cities_and_Rivers_en/;

The exhibition of books and materials "Perm – Louisville: Facets of cooperation" and a photo exhibition "Cities and Rivers: Perm and Louisville"were visited by 160 people.

- a presentation contest "My favorite writer" in English was held for schoolchildren of grades 5-8  (October-November). We received  53 presentations from 75 participants.

All participants were awarded  with certificates, and 61 winners of competitions were awarded with souvenirs of the project.

The final event of the project was the conference “Perm-Louisville 2021: opportunities and prospects". 30 people took part in the online event. The video recording is available at 

A total of 845 people were attracted to the project,  which can be the evidence of its success.

More about the project https://www.gorkilib.ru/activity/project/our_projects/?ELEMENT_ID=8127