Launch of VIRGIN, a Virtual portal for ImpaiRed Groups Interaction

Feb. 9, 2011 - PRLog -- 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).

Only 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 (www.accessible-project.eu) and AEGIS (www.aegis-project.eu) 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.

VIRGIN 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.

VIRGIN 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.

VIRGIN 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 VIRGIN platform will be deployed.

Furthermore, VIRGIN 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.virgin-project.eu and twitter.com/VIRGIN_project.

The VIRGIN KA3 LLL project has been partially funded under the Lifelong Learning program, subprogramme KA3 ICT.

Project number: 511792-LLP-1-2010-1-GR-KA3-KA3NW
Project acronym: VIRGIN
Project full title: Virtual portal for ImpaiRed Groups Interaction
Starting date: 1 January 2011
Duration: 36 Months

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PhoenixKM is first of all focused towards the integration of people with disabilities, the ageing population and disadvantaged groups in society, and especially in the regular labour market. PhoenixKM aims to achieve its goal by aggregating knowledge, expertise and experience in the field of education, training, and employment, and making it available to the targeted user groups through well-defined initiatives (specialised consultancy, projects). PhoenixKM relies for this on its vast pool of independent experts/consultants throughout Europe, but also beyond. Secondly, PhoenixKM has extensive expertise in the field of valorisation, e-learning, development of accessible websites and intranets, employment of adults and people with disabilities, as well as the organization of workshops and conferences. Primarily to that the company offers an extensive expertise in disability issues excelling in accessibility ones, which are being offered to private, as well as public organizations.