ESIPP Project kicks-off: aiming at Autism support for families
The European University Cyprus participates as a partner in the three-year project Equity and Social Inclusion through Positive Parenting (ESIPP) which began on September 1st, 2015, and is being co-funded by the European Union under the Erasmus+ programme. The aim of ESIPP is to design and offer workshops to parents with children on autism in Croatia, Cyprus and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. The workshops will be based on data derived from the investigation of families’ needs.
Within the framework of the programme and based on results from its research, a family training model in the partner countries will be developed and implemented. Inter alia, this will include practical guidelines, activities, material for the enhancement and development of knowledge and skills necessary for the support of families and their children on the autism spectrum. The quality and effectiveness of the family training model will be evaluated through quantitative and qualitative research procedures.
The ESIPP project will deliver the first sets of training sessions in Skopje (FYR of Macedonia) on March 19-20 2016, in Limassol (Cyprus) on March 19 2016 and in Zagreb (Croatia) on April 9-10 2016. A minimum of 18 courses will be run through the lifetime of the project. You can find more information about the training sessions HERE.
The partner network of the Program includes universities, NGOs and parents’ associations. It is led by the University of Northampton (UK) and involves eight (8) other funded partners from Belgium (Autism Europe), Croatia (University of Zagreb – Faculty of Education and Rehabilitation Sciences, and Centar za Autizam), Cyprus (European University Cyprus, and the Autism Assessment Support Practice Centre), the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (Macedonian Scientific Society for Autism – MSSA), and the United Kingdom (Target Autism Training and Consultancy, and Autism Concern). The Department of Education Sciences, on behalf of the European University Cyprus, is contributing to the development and evaluation of the project, as well as leading the work-stream concerning the evaluation of the impact and sustainability of the programme.
Additional information about the ESIPP program and Cyprus’s participation in it may be requested from the coordinator of the team at the European University Cyprus, Dr. Eleni Theodorou, Assistant Professor of Social Foundations in Education, Department of Educational Sciences, email: [email protected].
You can also find more information on the newly launched project’s webpage at http://esipp.eu/ and the project’s first newsletter at https://t.co/VMIddQcbmM
Note: The European Commission support for this project and publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents which reflects the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.