The ViPi team would like to announce the release of the ViPi user requirement survey. The survey aims to assess:
- the needs of the potential ViPi community;
- the requirements for ICT training;
- what training material is currently available;
- which teaching approaches and methodologies are employed/most successful.
The survey is tailored to people with disabilities and organisations representing them, relatives, carers and trainers of people with disabilities, and also people dealing with the employment of and policy regarding people with disabilities.
While there are a high number of total questions, it will guide you to those parts of the survey which are relevant to you. The survey length varies dependent on your particular interest in the ViPi project, but should not take more than 15 minutes to complete. All personal questions are optional.
The outcomes of this survey will guide the focus of future ViPi project developments, and hence it is a very important part of the project. It is also your opportunity to express your opinions on ICT training for people with disabilities. Please spare the time to complete the survey, and guide ViPi in the direction that will benefit all stakeholders best.
The survey can be found here:
Many thanks in advance,
The ViPi team.
Accessible Information Provision for Lifelong Learning (i-access) is a one year project of the European Agency for Development in Special Needs Education with the aim of raising awareness of the issues surrounding accessible information provision for Lifelong Learning and developing recommendations on how it can be addressed.This project is co-financed by a European Community Grant under the Lifelong Learning Transversal Programme, Key Activity 1: Policy Co-operation and Innovation.
The conference on 22 June 2011 – 24 June 2011 in Copenhagen, Denmark aims to discuss the implications of accessible information for Lifelong Learning, as well as identifying practical recommendations.
We just also launched our mobile version of the ViPi website. You can now access our site with a mobile theme for visitors on Apple iPhone / iPod touch, Google Android, Blackberry Storm and Torch, Palm Pre and other touch-based smartphones.
ViPi just launched its Facebook page.
From now on, you can also follow our progress via your preferred networking site.
ViPi project will attend the Digital Agenda Assembly in Brussels on 16-17 June 2011. As part of public events around the Digital Agenda for Europe the European Commission is organising this event, which is expected to draw quite a large audience.
As part of that event, the European Commission are setting up a session which will take place in the morning of the 17th of June, and will address the “Digital literacy and e-Inclusion“. This workshop aims to create in-depth awareness and provide practical tools for the EU Member States to engage in structured, long term policies for digital literacy acquisition in the e-Inclusion context (Digital Agenda action 66).
Through a participative workshop in the form of a hands-on training centre, digital literacy courses of various levels (from basic to professional ICT skills), for various target groups and purposes will be available (e.g. employability, re-skilling, social inclusion).
Models of successful and relevant policies and funding mechanisms of all levels will be discussed. A set of stakeholder recommendations as to the remaining challenges to be addressed as priority will be drawn.
ViPi intends to attend AEGIS’ final workshop and international conference entitled “Accessibility Reaching Everywhere” on 28-30 November 2011 in Brussels, bringing together both end-users (people with disabilities) as well as platform and application accessibility developers, representative organisations, the Assistive Technology industry, and policy makers. The first findings of ViPi, as well as networking will take place with participants.
This event comes ahead of the European Day of People with Disabilities that is marked by the European Commission via a policy conference in the first week of December each year, in close cooperation with the European Disability Forum (EDF).
ViPi coordinator PhoenixKM attended the EACEA projects meeting that took place on 7-8 February 2011.
PhoenixKM (Belgium) coordinates the ViPi project that aims to provide a “one-stop-shop” interactive portal & learning environment, targeted towards trainers and trainees, with particular attention towards people with disabilities. The project partnership brings together organizations and companies from Belgium, Cyprus, Greece, UK and Lithuania.
BELGIUM, BRUSSELS – 26 January 2011 – An estimated 45 million people in Europe have a long-standing health problem or disability (LSHPD), being 16% of men and women aged 16-64 in the EU as a whole (2002 EU Labour Force Survey (LFS) and the 2004 EU Statistics on Incomes and Living Conditions).
33% of the people with LSHPD are not restricted in the kind or amount of work they could do or their mobility to and from work. Figures vary largely across EU members (10-50%).
This difference is directly linked to the level of prosperity and the assistance available. Of those that are considerably restricted in their ability to work, 28% were in employment, while for those that are not restricted in their ability to work, this is estimated at 68%.
Today the fast development of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) provides alternative and creative solutions for the employment of people with disabilities. Recent studies conducted by various projects such as ACCESSIBLE and AEGIS have highlighted that people with disabilities (PwD) can benefit enormously from digital competences which are core life and employability skills (see Lisbon Objectives). However, same and other studies revealed also that the main barrier is the lack of specific training support or material. In addition to that, a number of other skills such as literacy and numeracy skills equally form a potential barrier towards employment of PwD.
ViPi project envisages fulfilling the gap of accessible and flexible training, designed to meet the specific needs of people with disabilities, as well as the trainers themselves.
ViPi project will develop an interactive online platform where people with disabilities can access a wide variety of ICT training courses and serious games for acquiring ICT skills, while trainers will be able to upload and download specific learning objects, using a semantically enriched environment to improve the searchability, thus increasing the relevance of the results obtained.
ViPi platform will comprise a virtual collaborative learning environment for people with disabilities and their trainers to interact, providing a vast repository of learning objects (LOs) that focus on basic ICT literacy. This will allow people with disabilities to grasp these core skills and become able to enter or sustain their employment in the regular labour market. The platform will be enriched with intuitive and accessible mobile and Internet/PC based educational/serious games. Additionally, also a mobile Android based social application linked with ViPi platform will be deployed.
Furthermore, ViPi will also develop a customized and localized curriculum on ICT skills and training, with various additional training materials (different formats), and a trainer handbook. All project outcomes will initially be available in Dutch, English, Greek and Lithuanian languages.
The Project partnership consists of Steficon (Greece), Hypertech (Greece), Hiteco (Lithuania), Nottingham Trent University (the UK), and EuroCy Innovations Ltd. (Cyprus), while the Project Coordinator is PhoenixKM (Belgium). More information can be found on www.vipi-project.eu and twitter.com/ViPi_project.
The ViPi KA3 LLL project has been partially funded under the Lifelong Learning program, subprogramme KA3 ICT.
Partners participating in discussion
The first project meeting took place on 17-19 January 2011 in Athens, Greece, organised by Steficon and PhoenixKM. All partners participated, and a workplan has been set up for the next 8 months.
It was also agreed that the next meeting will take place in Cyprus in September 2011, hosted by the Cypriot partner Eurocy.
ViPi user requirement survey | admin | 
09/06/2011 11:39 am | 
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