Harmonisation of inclusive practices towards disable people within European skills competitions. Erasmus Project

Project Title

Harmonisation of inclusive practices towards disable people within European skills competitions.

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 2018

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Inclusion – equity; Access for disadvantaged; Gender equality / equal opportunities

Project Summary

Employability of people with disability is still precarious in Europe. This is a fact and there has been no major movement since the beginning of our project.

Conversely, the global pandemic seems to worsen the situation.

People with disabilities are considered as vulnerable people by public authorities and they are the first affected by unemployment. Cap Emploi, public French association in charge to support unemployed persons with disabilities to find a job “has been impacted by the health crisis”. Results from the annual report by CHEOPS, Cap Emploi headend has been released and it reveals -9% for new job placement and -11% for job retention. (www.handicap.fr)

We did precise in the project summary that skills contests for people with disabilities at national and European levels is showcasing people with disabilities skills and highlights their professional talent with a view to employement.
Many events has been cancelled which was an abrupt stop to reach this goal despite the fact that some innovative virtual actions have emerged.

Our objectives through this project:
– harmonize skills contests in Europe to promote inclusion
– to permit, thanks to competition, professional emancipation
– create a strong European network to develop skills competition as an innovative tool toward employment of people with disabilities
– to change people’s perceptions of handicapped persons.

In conjunction with project partners, which are at the same time training centers, skills competition specialized centers or companies from the adapted sector, our project ws supposed to be built as follows:

1/ Overview of the situation, state by state, in term of inclusion and skills contest thanks to regular discussions with other coordinators.
2/ organization of concrete skills competition (thanks to what has been discussed at stage 1) in partners countries with the participation of more than 100 participants/learners with disabilities coming from those 5 countries.
3/ After the end of the project, (1/2 months), drafting a reference guide to serve for people with disabilities for a better inclusion into skills contest.

Number of participants original plan: 226 participants.

With the health situation, unfortunately, the project did go in that matter:

1/ Session 1 in England (November 2018) : trial session with less contestants than expected. We shared a lot regarding inclusion and skills contest with other coordinators, skills experts, aids, people specialized into the field of disabilities…
2/ Session 2 in Scotland ( May 2019) : session in a wonderful college with a big expertise in organizing skills competition of a really high level.
3/ Session 3 (France) May 2021: virtual session
4/ Session 4 (Finland) June 2021: virtual session
5/ Session 5 (Germany) June2021: virtual session

Total number of participants: 123
Participants with special needs: 61
Accompanying people: 62

Despite the pandemic situation, our partners remain really involved. We worked all together to find innovative solution for the success of this project.
Of course the timetable has been impacted and the format of our project changed as well.

However, our target audience did not change even if the representation was slightly different than expected with a higher participation of people suffering from a mental disability.

Following the initial plan, partners countries did a great work to welcome real or virtual skills competition keeping in mind the final objective : harmonize our practices of inclusion into skills contest.

Host partners have proposed between to 2 to 5 skills at each session. Craft skills have been selected in priority (cleaning services, cooking, horticulture, landscape gardening…).

Then, we can conclude that the approach to disability concerning skills contest or in the general life remains totally singular.

Thus, this Erasmus+ project and particularly physical session were helping us to realize that skills contest can bring major benefits for people with disabilities inclusion.
There is a famous saying/adage that says that “travels shapes youth” and it is a step towards autonomy of people with disabilities. Challenge, test his abilities and skills, travelling abroad, cultural enrichment are some of the benefits of this project toward a successful professional life.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 90756 Eur

Project Coordinator

ABILYMPICS FRANCE & Country: FR

Project Partners

• Natspec
• Skills Finland
• ADAPEI de la Gironde
• CITY OF GLASGOW COLLEGE
• WorldSkills Germany e.V.