Certification of ICT skills for people with disabilities

Acronym of the case:

EasyICT

Web address of the case:

http://www.easyICT.eu

Country of the case:

Pan european

Posting Date:

14 February 2008

Last Edited Date:

09 May 2009

Author:

Dekelver Jan (K.H.Kempen - K.U.Leuven Association)

skills | assessment | digital_gap

Type of initiative

Project or service

Case Abstract

The main aim of the project is to include mentally disabled people in the information society and in this way prevent them from becoming the most disprivillaged society members. This goal is going to be achieved by: 1) the development of a certification framework, which will allow institutions to run internationally recognized examinations, 2) the creation of an online testing environment which will help in assessing ICT skills, 3) the implementation of an administration environment which will help in administrating the whole process, and 4) the training of institutions which will run certified examinations and use the tool.

Description of the case

Domain

eInclusion

Topic

Digital literacy and competences

Sector

Education, Science and Research

Start date - End date

October 2007 (Ongoing)

Date operational

January 2009

Target Users

People with disability

Target Users Description

Project is addressed to different types of educational institutions and thus to people working there as: teachers, administratives, managers etc. All those institutions are linked to the special education sector (special schools, faculties of education, NGO's). Long term target group includes persons with mental disabilities, their parents and employers.

Scope

International

Status

Pilot

Language(s)

Dutch | English | German | Polish | Turkish

Policy Context and Legal Framework

This LLP-Leonardo project addresses following Learning objectives and priorities:
- To promote co-operation in quality assurance in all sectors of education and training in Europe; to support the development of innovative ICT-based content, services, pedagogies and practice for lifelong learning;
- To improve the transparency and recognition of qualifications and competences, including those acquired through non-formal and informal learning;
- Development of high-quality, cost-efficient validation methodologies to be used at European, national and sector level. Existing experience should be used to develop solutions that can be widely shared and disseminated.

Project Size and Implementation

Type of initiative

Training and education

Overall Implementation approach

Partnerships between administration and/or private sector and/or non-profit sector

Technology choice

Standards-based technology | Open source software

Funding source

Public funding EU | Private sector

Project size

Implementation: €300-499,000

Implementation and Management Approach

The project is going to be realized by the international consortium consisting of five partners representing five countries: Poland, Belgium, Austria, Italy, Turkey.

Technology solution

The testing environment will be web based. Youngsters will be assessed by a coach that will assist them during the testing. The test will be standardised, the assessment will be individual in order to be able to design a personal learning path for each younsgter.

Impact, innovation and results

Impact

EasyICT aims at school, teachers, parents, umbrella organisations, academic organasations. In total EasyICT wants to present itself to an estimate of 2000-to 3000 people in the 4 participating countries, within the project time period.

Very important factor which was taken into consideration while estimating the numbers of short term target group was also previous experiences of partner institutions which used to deliver trainings for this target group. As for international information meetings, we estimated the number of attendance taking into account fact that minimum three out five partners participate in other international project meetings or other international networks.

The continued visibility of the outcomes and the long term impact targets were estimated on following basis:
- Two institutions from partnership (higher education institutions) have institutional websites which are visited by c. 15000 people a day! This website will include information of the project and link to the project website (we may make the assumption that 20% of people entering those webpages will read information on the project and maybe 5% of them will follow the link)
- There will be 300 people participating in the training, we may make the assumption that each trainees will tell at least 3 peers about the project and its outcomes, maybe one or two of them will get interested and will have a look at the webpage and the tool.
- Out of 300 people taking part in the trainings there will be 155 of teachers and NGOâ€™s workers, each of them has direct contact with c. 30 parents. We may make the assumption that 50% of them will be informed about the certificate and examinations.
- Each teacher or NGO worker has at least 15 pupils, he/she will also forward the information to them.
- Each institution will be contact organization for the project results after the project is finished
- While presenting the profile of institution (either for other project purposes, or any kind of publication, meeting) partner will include their experiences, this means writing information on the project
- Since each of the partner institutions provides trainings in the educational sector, it may incorporate them in their permanent training offer after the project is finished.
- The project website or link to the tool will be attached to other websites on the same thematic (wai-not.org, bezbarier.pl, psouu.org.pl, eqm-pd.com and many others)
- Monitioring activtes of all trainees taking part in the training â€“ contact them two months after the training

Many other ways of ensuring the cascade effect will be included in the exploitation strategy elaborated within the project. It has to be stressed that the success and future exploitation of the project outcomes lies in the interest of each partner organization, since it directly influences its performance on the market. This is the guarantee of partners involvement and future use of the outcomes.

Track record of sharing

Partners involved in the project:
Spo?eczna Wy?sza Szko?a Przedsi?biorczo?ci i Zarz?dzania - Academy of Management ?Ã³d?, Poland
Katholieke Hogechool Kempen, Geel, Belgium
Social Innovative Network Dr. Pretis, Graz, Austria
Kutahya Milli Egitim Mudurlugu, Kutahya, Turkey
Accademia Psicologia Applicata, Palermo, Italy

Lessons learnt

Lesson 1 - People with intellectual disabilities have little opportunities to join the information society

Lesson 2 - The information society has very few services accessible for people with intellectual disabilities

Lesson 3 - ICT skills are a prerequisite for e-inclusion

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