Comenius, Languages, ICT Kick Off Meeting 2012

ViPi will be present at the Comenius, Languages, ICT Kick Off Meeting organised in Brussels on February 16 & 17 2012.

ViPi @ Com@modemdag

PhoenixKM will attend the Comenius, ICT and Languages Meeting, to be held in Brussels, Belgium on 16-17 February 2012, as well as the Com@modemdag on 3 February 2012 in Duffel, Belgium that focuses on (ICT) AT for people with disabilities.

At both events, ViPi folders will be disseminated, and contacts will be made with local stakeholders.

ATLEC kick-off meeting

The EC funded ATLEC (Assistive Technology Learning Through A Unified Curriculum – 518229-LLP-1-2011-1-UK-LEONARDO-LMP) project, coordinated by PhoenixKM, and contracted by Oak field School and Sports College (UK) organises its kick-off meeting on 16-17/01/2012 in Nottingham, UK. Its output will also be taken onboard in the ViPi portal, as well as its mobile ICT AT training application.

The EU needs to do more to include people with disabilities

“The EU needs to get more people with disabilities into jobs and include provisions on disability in more of its other policies,” says Parliament in a resolution, passed last week, on the European Disability Strategy 2010-2020.
“Over 80 million people, i.e. around 16% of the EU’s total population, are living with disabilities. The Europe 2020 Strategy target of 75% of the population aged 20-64 in Europe 2020 in employment cannot be achieved unless it includes people with some form of disability”, said Àdám Kósa ahead of the plenary vote.
The employment rate for people with disabilities is only around 45 % in the EU and this is one of the groups hardest hit by the financial crisis, says the resolution, which was passed by a show of hands.
Austerity measures must not become a pretext for unjustified cuts in services for persons with disabilities or in projects for their social inclusion, MEPs say.
The European Parliament stresses the need to reach a swift agreement on the proposal for a Council directive on implementing the principle of equal treatment between persons irrespective of religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation. This was approved with 362 votes in favour, 273 against and 23 abstentions.
It also calls on the European Commission to reinforce anti-discrimination and accessibility provisions in the EU’s cohesion policy plans for 2014-2020, public procurement reform proposals and to present a legislative proposal for a European Accessibility Act with strong and binding measures at EU level to improve access to goods and services for people with disabilities.
MEPs call on EU Member States and the European Commission to recognise sign language as an official language in the Member States. The rapporteur himself is deaf and is assisted by an interpreter using sign language during meetings.
Finally, the resolution calls on Member States and the Commission to swiftly ratify and implement the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD). So far, the Convention has been ratified by 17 Member States.
Source: AccessForAll.eu

Keynote speech and presentation at ITAG 2011

On 26 October 2011, PhoenixKM provided a keynote speech at ITAG 2011 (Interactive Technologies and Games: Education, Health and Disability 2011) event in Nottingham, UK, entitled “The end-user at the centre of all AT developments”, also addressing ViPi.

After the presentation, NTU made an in-depth presentation on “Training on ICT skills for people with disabilities around Europe”, gathering the almost final results of the ViPi survey that was conducted by ViPi in 2011.

Below are the presentations.

ViPi workshop – Larnaca, Cyprus

ViPi organised a successful national workshop in Larnaca, Cyprus on 3 October 2011, with following agenda:

14:00 – 14:30 Registration
14:30 – 14:35 Welcoming (George Milis, G.M EuroCy Innovations Ltd)
14:35 – 14.45 General introduction of the ViPi project (Karel Van Isacker, PhoenixKM) – ppt

Cyprus situation regarding education and employability of people with disabilities (invited talks by representatives):
14:45 – 15.05 The School for the Blind “Agios Varnavas” (Christina Eliadou and Anthias Paschalis) – ppt1 / ppt2
15:05 – 15:25 VIScientific (Stavros Papastavrou) – ppt
15:25 – 15:45 Muscular Dystrophy Association Cyprus (Stelios Stylianou)- ppt
15:45 – 16.00 Coffee-Break

Current project work and findings:
16:00 – 16:15 ViPi Survey (Andy Burton, Nottingham Trent University) – ppt
16:15 – 16:30 Basic ICT Training curriculum (Andy Burton, Nottingham Trent University) – ppt
16:30 – 16:45 ViPi platform technologies and integration pathway (Karel Van Isacker and Panagiotis Tsoris, PHOENIXKM/STEFICON) – ppt
16:45 – 17:00 Mobile applications (Panagiotis Tsoris, STEFICON) – ppt
17:00 – 17:15 Semantic Content Management enhancements (George Milis, G.M EuroCy Innovations Ltd) – ppt
17:15 – 18.15 Open (moderated) discussion among participants, to affect the present and future of the ViPi project
18:15 Wrap-up and closing

Below, you can see a short interview with Stelios Stylianou (Muscular Dystrophy Association Cyprus).

ViPi to present at AEGIS final conference and workshop

ViPi will present at the Accessibility Reaching Everywhere – AEGIS Workshop and International Conference, taking place in Brussels, Belgium on 28-30 November 2011.
The paper will focus on the impact of the economic and financial crisis on social services for people with disabilities, including the provision of assistive technologies that is affected in EU member states.

1st National ViPi Workshop – Larnaca, Cyprus

The ViPi project organises its 1st National Workshop in Larnaca, Cyprus on Monday 3 October 2011 (14:30 – 18:30) at the hotel “Henipa Crown Resorts”, Dhekelia Road, Larnaca.

Target Group
The workshop targets and is expected to attract the following profiles of people and organizations:

• Organizations representing people with disabilities
• Individuals with a disability
• Relatives of, or carers of persons with disability
• Training Centers and individual trainers of any level that are experienced or are interested in working with people with disabilities
• Intermediaries (Employment Centres, etc.)
• Policy makers

Objectives of the Workshop
The Workshop will comprise an opportunity for the participants to receive information on the early project’s findings and to discuss directly with the project consortium and affect the future workplan. The high-level objectives of the workshop are summarized as:

• Presentation of project work and findings (Basic ICT Training curriculum, ViPi Survey, ViPi platform technologies and integration pathway, Current work on mobile applications, Current work on Semantic Content Management enhancements, etc.)
• Presentation of Cyprus situation regarding education and employability of people with disabilities (invited talks by representatives of Training Centers and/or Organizations of people with disabilities)
• Open (moderated) discussion among participants on the above subjects, to affect the present and future of the ViPi project

Language
The official language of the workshop will be the English, however, informal translation to/from Greek will be offered wherever required and for the participants’ convenience.

Registration
The participation to the workshop is free of any charge, but preliminary registration is obligatory. In order to express your interest and register to the workshop, please, send an email or call Mr. George Milis at: +357 99587884, by Friday 23 September 2011.

Please provide following information:

• Full Name
• Organization (if applicable)
• Contact details
• Reason of interest
• Transportation required? (please, see Transportation section)
• Interested for lunch? (please, see Lunch section).

Transportation
Considering the fact that the majority of the participants are expected to arrive from Nicosia, the project will arrange for a bus (free of charge) to transfer people from Nicosia to the workshop venue and back.

• From Nicosia to workshop venue: 03 October 2011, 12:00 or 13:30 (please, see Lunch section).
• From workshop venue to Nicosia: 03 October 2011, 19:00.

Please, explicitly state your interest to use the above service at registration.

Lunch
Before the workshop and depending on interest expressed through registration, the project will offer lunch (free of charge) to the participants, at the workshop venue. Time: 13:00.

2nd project meeting in Larnacca, Cyprus

The ViPi project team will organise its second workshop on October 3rd in Larnaca, followed by a 2 day project meeting.

ViPi @ ITAG 2011

ViPi will attend and present at the “Interactive Technologies and Games: Education, Health and Disability 2011″ event in Nottingham on 25-26 October 2011, organised by Nottingham Trent University.
The aim of the conference is to bring together academics and practitioners working with interactive technologies to explore and innovate within the areas of Education, Health and Disability. The event has a particular focus on the use of gaming hardware and software to implement accessible solutions, interaction design using new input/output devices and the increasing impact of ubiquitous computing on our everyday well being.
More information can be found on the conference website.