e-learning for firefighters on emergency planning and response when involving individuals with disabilities Erasmus Project

Project Title

e-learning for firefighters on emergency planning and response when involving individuals with disabilities

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for vocational education and training

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2019

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Open and distance learning; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; Inclusion – equity

Project Summary

According to the European health and social integration survey (EHSIS), in 2012 there were more than 70 million people with disabilities in the EU-27, equivalent to 17.6 % of the population.

The EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights prohibits discrimination on the ground of disability. The rights of persons with disabilities in the EU are also protected by the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), accepted by the EU in 2010.

Article 11 of the CRPD refers to the safety and protection of persons with disabilities in conflict and emergency situations. To enforce this, it is indispensable that firefighters are trained on how to address the special needs of individuals with disabilities during emergency situations. Unfortunately, nothing further from the truth. Training on how to address the special needs of individuals with disabilities during emergency situations is not included in the firefighters initial training.

In this context, in order to respond to the identified training needs of firefighters across the EU, the objective of the project is to develop the first open and multilingual e-learning platform for firefighters on emergency planning and response when involving individuals with disabilities.

The e-learning platform will be accessible from computers, tablets and smartphones. The platform will be available in 5 languages (English, Danish, Spanish, Finnish and Slovenian) and it will contain four modules:

Module 1: Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Module 2: Visual and Hearing impairment.
Module 3: Physical impairment.
Module 4: Mental impairment.

Each module will include an online training course for firefighters on emergency planning and response when involving individuals with that type of disability, a tool to assess the learning outcomes from the online training course and produce a certificate for firefighters to add to their Europass documents, and a toolkit (set of tools, procedures, and supporting materials) for effective emergency planning and response.

In order to assess how effective is the e-learning platform in improving firefighters’ competences, the e-learning platform will be tested with firefighters and individuals with disabilities from four EU countries. The firefighters will first complete the online training and afterwards, they will put in practice what they have learnt by carrying out some simulations and drills with individuals with disabilities. Using the results from the testing, the partners will define the necessary improvements to ensure that the e-learning platform delivers the target learning outcomes.

The project will be implemented by a transnational and transectoral partnership involving organisations from the school sector, VET providers, adult education providers, Higher Education Institutions and four fire and rescue services employing professional firefighters and providing continuous training to them.

Beyond the partners, the e-learning platform have the potential to be exploited by a wide range of organisations and individuals because it will be published as an OER (Open Educational Resource) under the Creative Commons license “Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0)”. Thus allowing anyone to freely use all the content as well as to modify it and build upon.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 254228 Eur

Project Coordinator

FREDERIKSBORG BRAND OG REDNING & Country: DK

Project Partners

• Slovensko združenje za požarno varstvo
• TURUN AMMATTIKORKEAKOULU OY
• Gasilsko resevalna sluzba Kranj
• Southwest Emergency Services
• Kasperskolen
• Fundacion Marcelino Champagnat
• AYUNTAMIENTO DE ALCALA DE GUADAIRA