How to make European Universities accessible to Students with disabilities and special needs! 4 days event addressing the main challenge of mobility!

According to the European Commission, during the academic year 2011-2012, only 0.14 % of Erasmus students and 0.09% of Erasmus trainees were students with disabilities.

Going abroad for a period of time is not always easy for young people, especially if it is the first time away from their familiar environment or the first time they are studying and living together with other young people they didn’t know before. It is even more difficult for young persons with disabilities as they face inaccessible environment or disability related stereotypes. After in-depth research on the state of art in Europe, ESN identified as main challenges for students and young people with special needs such as: physical barrier at Universities, accessible learning materials, limited personal assistance, freedom of choice, lack of financial resources, accessibility of cities and transport, lack of information about mobility programmes, incompatibility of services in terms of mobility, employability after studies.

In order to overcome these obstacles ESN decided to run a sub-project called MapAbility to strengthen the accessibility of European HEIs to students with special needs and disabilities. The project is part of ExchangeAbility project initiated by Erasmus Student Network in early 2009 thanks to the European Commission funding.

In early 2013 the project has been granted from the European Youth Foundation of the Council of Europe. The main aim of the project is to create a map of the level of accessibility and services of the European Higher Education Institutions for students with disabilities in order to: provide practical information, promote better services to HEIs for students, and raise awareness on the social cohesion and inclusion of student with special needs.

The first results of gathering the information will be presented at the MapAbility training and launching conference. The event will last four days and will be attended by national project coordinators, students involved in the project, partners of the project as well as important stakeholders in the area of inclusion of students with disabilities. The launching conference will be the conclusion of 3 days intensive training sessions, best practices exchanges and knowledge sharing of national coordinators.

The event will take place from the 29th of May to 2nd of June and will be kindly hosted by the European Economic and Social Committee on 2nd of June 2014 from 9.00 am to 5:00 pm.

The project is supported by several key stakeholders organizations such as Association for Higher Education Access and Disability (AHEAD), WheelMap, Network of Universities from Capital of Europe (UNICA), JACCEDE, Autism Europe, European Disability Forum (EDF), European Network on Independent Living (ENIL) and European Association of Service for Persons with Disabilities (EAPSD) and a few associate support organization such as European Students’ Union and European Commission. To learn more about our partners visit our website.

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Agenda in a nutshell!!!

The 1st day of the training will focus on the results of the mapping process started in early 2014 and training of participants:

  • Training sessions and workshops focusing on the following areas:
    • Disability and me, presentation on inclusion and social model of disability!
    • Defining "disability" and Intercultural integration of students with disabilities
    • What are the EU policies and how are they implemented?
    • What is the role of stakeholders and policy makers?
  • Presentation of results and open discussion from participants on the main findings

The 2nd day will focus on best practices sharing about accessible organizations, networking and cooperation with stakeholders, as well as gathering best practices on the following areas:

  • Outgoing students: how can ESN increase the mobility of students with special needs?
  • Incoming students: how to better welcome student with disabilities?
  • Internationalization at home: how to make ESN an accessible organization for local students with disabilities?

The 3rd day will focus on drafting the recommendations and planning the follow up of the project for local coordinators: national and international coordinators as well as stakeholders and decision-making alike.

  • Revising and updating the student handbook
  • Drafting recommendations for the different target groups

4rth day the launching conference will gather different stakeholders to discuss and the main headlines of the event will be among others:

  • Welcome and official opening words by keynote speakers representing key institutions and organizations in the field of mobility of youth and students with special needs among which EESC, ESN, UNICA, AHEAD, EDF.
  • Presentation of partner organizations and their work of inclusion of young people with special needs and disabilities and their collaboration with ESN: AutismEurope, ENIL, EASPD, JACCEEDE, WheelMap, UNICA.
  • Presentation of the mapping results and the three days training outcomes and policy recommendations for stakeholders.
  • Panel discussions on the following topics
    • moderated by partner organizations: Mapping HEIs, welcoming international students and internationalization at home: recommendations from the 3-days training from ESN
    • Accessibility of abroad programmes for students with disabilities: opportunities under Erasmus+ from European Commission
    • Strengthening social cohesion: improving the access of students with disability to HEIs from AHEAD
    • What is the role of stakeholders and policy makers, from Higher Education, Disability and Youth sector to take inclusive study mobility to the next level from EDF
    • The specific case of Autism in HEIs from AutismEurope
  • Conclusion of the conference

Coming next! The 4 days event will help us defining how to bring the project forward and multiply its effects on the national and local level. A new revised version of the handbook for local project coordinators will be launched after the conference, a map of more than 150 European HEIs reached in the first phase of the project will be released and will be developed further for the coming year; and more will follow after the conference! Stay tuned!

If you are interested to learn more about the project follow up and the outcomes of the 4 days event please contact us by sending an email to [email protected].