The awareness for the Trisomy 21 citizen’s inclusion has been slowly increasing thanks to a number of measures and actions adopted at both National and European levels. The European Parliament adopted a declaration on children with Down Syndrome in 2012 urging the Commission, the Council and the Member States to contribute to their social inclusion though awareness-raising campaigns. The EU also promotes their inclusion in society through the European Disability Strategy but much more can and has to be done. Work in this area is still, mainly, being done by non-profit organizations and associations in the civil society with very few resources. Therefore, this project aims at making a positive difference in the area of Down Syndrome children's support. Thus, this project aims at promoting and facilitating the social inclusion and the employability of European Down Syndrome youth citizens through Tourism and e-skills. The project also aims to foster, safeguard and promote European Cultural Heritage (via the promotion of Touristic and Artistic activities), as well as requalification in terms of cultural, audio-visual and e-Skills diversity in cross-sectorial areas. In addition to this identified need, there is also a major concern about the needs of the participants, organisations and stakeholders towards down syndrome. (i) Regarding the participants, this project not only concerns about their social integration but also, for the inclusion of these citizens in the labour market or towards other employability activities; (ii) Concerning the organisations, and since this project team will directly cooperate and collaborate with key institutions focused on intellectual disabilities citizens, it will enhance their apprenticeship in e-skills, towards a specific learning and adapted teaching/learning scenario. (iii) As for stakeholders, particularly those who share a connection with these fields of impact (social inclusion and integration of citizens with intellectual disabilities) will be able of acquire a set of good practices through the cooperation in the project activities and methodology. The project has two main primary target groups who will be involved across the development, implementation and evaluation of this project. 1. Young people between 13 and 30 years old with Down Syndrome that face psychological, social or physical challenges and that need alternative pathways to engage with education and new technological competences for employability. 2. Teachers and relevant professionals involved in the delivery and development of creative and innovative educational responses for young people who do not engage in mainstream educational settings. These target groups can be found in a first layer throughout the local and regional community of this project, since the involved partners have already made this initial recognition, either through their organisations and other institutions. The second layer, allow us to understand the national and European target groups, where this partnership also recognised throughout research and other actions, the upcoming needs of these citizens, particularly by having statistical data and analysis. The project is designed to ensure meaningful input from all stakeholders, in order to obtain clear accomplishments at all levels and also to develop meaningful measures to gauge success. The outputs, learning activities and two Multiplier Events are related to the specific aims of this project, where each output has a related activity and it owns objectives. With this, the core work plan and each output informs the next. Key stakeholders and participants will deliver input on an on-going basis and will include the identification of outcomes and any adaptation required. This project will provide outcomes and results that will contribute to increase awareness about Down Syndrome citizens and their social inclusion, by developing engaging learning environments for a range of marginalised young people at-risk of educational disadvantage and therefore limited life opportunities. The intended impact is to further develop non-formal programmes and activities in order to maximise the effectiveness of learning and training for inclusion through a creative approach to training design and delivery. It is envisaged that young participants will benefit from the opportunity to develop a degree of autonomy over their own learning process and contribute with the development of new approaches and insights. As the application platform will be created and freely maintained by the Applicant organization, this project has the potential to contribute to further use by other non-profit organizations that can reuse the educational contents later on. Successful dissemination will be facilitated through a range of media and events designed to maximise the sharing of findings and to open a dialogue for future innovation.
The social inclusion of people with intellectual disabilities is gaining increased importance in the EU context. Several measures and supports had been given from different types of organizations as well as from local, national and European policies. Despite the European Disability Strategy (2010-2020), there is still lots of work to be done even considering the emergency and mediatism of this subject. In this context, the T21COMmunity Project aimed at promoting and facilitating the social inclusion and the employability of European Down Syndrome (DS) youth citizens through Tourism and e-skills. Initiatives and strategies in this area are still, mainly, being done by non-profit organizations and associations in the civil society with very few financial resources. Therefore, this project aims at making a positive difference in the area of DS youth support. The project has two main primary target groups, namely: 1. Young people between 13 (preferably older than 17 years old) and 30 years old with DS that face psychological, social or physical challenges and that need alternative pathways to engage with education and new technological competences for employability. 2. Teachers, stakeholders and relevant professionals involved in the delivery and development of creative and innovative educational responses for young people who do not engage in mainstream educational settings. Three specific objectives and related activities were addressed: The first one, translated into sharing good practices at various levels, was focused on the specific target group of disadvantaged and ‘at-risk’ young people, namely DS young citizens. Education systems that maximize social inclusion; developments in the use of technology to create active learning environments that support innovative pedagogies, collaboration and effective practice for disadvantaged learners; and increase the limited research in the area of non-formal learning (especially in e-skills) were impactful results. With the second objective it was meant to identify key components that constitute a successful and engaging educational experience for learners and instructional roles within an online and blended learning environment. The partnership challenge was to identify the unique set of design principles and component parts required to provide an effective solution for education of disadvantaged people. By the third objective, it was intended to explore areas for the application of key components in the development of innovative approaches. It was focused on the learning perspective of “how could we learn more about these thematic”, and as technology continues to evolve, the ability to merge these upcoming technologies with non-formal education also became increasingly relevant to explore viable solutions to address the needs of DS targets. In order to test the new educational materials with gamification tools, methodological and pedagogical guidelines with specific and innovative approaches to the DS target population, and to develop their skills on tourism and e-skills towards their inclusion and employability, learning and teaching activities were undertaken for a group of 6 DS participants per partner country, 18 in total (supported by 2 accompanying persons per partner country), having a huge impact in target population and stakeholders involved. The scientific, societal, technological, policy and economic impacts achieved at the local, regional, national and European scope consisted in the fulfillment of the various workshops and actions that promoted equity and inclusion among these target groups (young adults with DS). Thus, the inclusion of DS citizens in society and in the labor market through the implementation of several actions, initiatives and activities that this project provided were perceived as viable and highly important strategies to the social, digital and professional inclusion of these citizens, having in general a noticeable impact at all levels. In addition, this project provided several outcomes and results that, not only, contributed to the social and digital inclusion of DS citizens as well as allowed the development of specific activities, namely: digital educational contents; methodological and pedagogical guidelines; innovative web platforms and social networks; and also creative short stories eBooks among others. In terms of longer term benefits, this project allowed, due to is relation with stakeholders, volunteers and teachers, the launch of a unique and innovative training course in Higher Education for young people with intellectual disabilities, named Digital Literacy for Labor Market, with the participants of TV COMmunity project, being one of the most important impactful outcome.