yearofthebrain2015The EBC’s Year of the Brain, runs over the academic year 2014-2015 and has the vision‘To protect, preserve, develop and nurture our most vital asset: The Brain’ via three key aims:

  1. To educate society about how to nurture and protect the brain and prevent brain disease.
  2. To improve care and treatment access for those affected by brain disease.
  3.  To increase investment in brain-related R&D for the benefit of future generations.

Throughout 2014, Year of the Brain (YotB) has raise awareness of the importance of the Brain and have spread the key messages across Europe with 60 Year of the Brain branded events and 11 key, high profile events. Furthermore, YotB President, Mary Baker has delivered 21 YotB presentations. This has generated some great press coverage including articles in the Times and the G20 Summit publication. YotB further has 80 high profile Ambassadors who support the project. A full list of the Ambassadors can be found on YotB’s homepage.

The YotB team has worked hard to support National Brain Councils (NBCs) and National Action Groups (NAGs), including two big events in 2014 organised by the Belgium Brain Council and the Bulgarian Brain Council and the creation of a toolkit. The toolkit has been created on requests from NBCs and NAGs and includes templates and guides on how to e.g. create a stakeholder map and social media strategy, together with details on how to set up a Year of the Brain event with best practice examples. The toolkit will be launched in 2015.

In 2015, three flagship events will be held. The first one will be held in Norway in February. The YotB team has built great momentum for 2015 and has the support of some key, high profile stakeholders which is reflected in YotBøs plans for 2015.

If you have any events that you would like to badge with the Year of the Brain logo, please send your request to yearofthebrain@braincouncil.eu