During the fall of 2009 and the winter of 2010, the first series of regional activities will be held in all the regions of Québec, in collaboration with regional partners.

These activities will be presented in an intergenerational dialog format and citizens of all ages will be invited. These people will be discussing their own concerns and will be asked to highlight the concerns they have in common.

A discussion schedule and an activities guide will be provided to ensure that the groups gathered in different regions discuss the same topics. Therefore, it will be possible to create a coherent national summary for the following steps. The chosen format for this step is the Café des Ages.

re meetings with people from different generations who are discussing their common concerns as well as their differences. One session of a Café des Ages lasts approximately two hours. The Cafés des Ages can gather ten people or 100. If the latter is the case, they are then separated into small groups of four to eight participants. A moderator will start the discussion and bring up questions related to the ageing society issues. This person will ask the participants to compare their points of view and to bring about their common visions and concerns. The Cafés des Ages can be organized by associations or organizations, partners of the approach. Because the structure is flexible, they can also be self‑organized during a family reunion or a union meeting, in a residence or between neighbours. An activities guide is provided (it is available on the Meeting Places Web site) as well as a reference document and a workshop report template to fill out and hand in to the INM to compile the discussion results, create a summary and draw conclusions.

For more information on the Cafés des âges, go to this page