<< Background >>During implementation of one of our national projects addressed to seniors (Senior in Action), we had the opportunity to establish contact with a fairly large group of seniors. During the talks with them, it turned out that in Poland there is quite a big problem with professionalism among people who care for seniors, both privately and in nursing homes. By professionalism, we understand soft skills, not specific hard skills. Seniors often emphasized that caregivers lack the appropriate approach, commitment, empathy, and the ability to communicate with an older person.We have consulted this topic with partners with whom we implement other projects. It turned out that the situation is also similar in many other countries.Many EU countries are aging and the process is progressing fairly quickly. This process goes hand in hand with the weakening of family ties, which unfortunately results in the younger generations being reluctant to take care of seniors.The demand for paid care for the elderly will therefore increase in importance in the coming years. Along with this demand, the requirements for people working as carers of seniors will also increase. Today's generations of seniors pay more and more attention to the way they are cared for and to the soft skills possessed by caregivers.We want our project to meet these issues.On the one hand, we want to make all interested parties aware of the importance of having appropriate soft skills for people who care for seniors. In our publication, we want to emphasize the importance of having appropriate soft skills on the professionalism of caregivers. On the other hand, we want to enable the caregivers and the people who train them to develop these competences, which are undoubtedly the most important in the carer's work.One of our results will also be a knowledge base containing basic information on the formal requirements and working conditions of senior caregivers in different countries. The database will be a response to another noticed problem - the lack of sufficient information for people who would like to work as a carer for seniors abroad. Our database will make it easier for them to obtain the information they need to choose the country in which these people would like to work.We hope that our project will contribute to the improvement of the situation on the market of care services for seniors<< Objectives >>The main goal of the project is to increase the knowledge and skills necessary to perform the profession of caregiver for seniors, as well as to increase the interest of young people in this profession, by developing a number of training and information materials targeted at young people in various EU countries.Detailed objectives:•Providing young people who want to work as a caregiver for seniors or who work in this profession with tools enabling them to improve skills useful at work as a carer for seniors•increasing the efficiency and attractiveness of educating caregivers of seniors by indicating good practices in the field of non-standard methods of education and training of carers of seniors•increasing the awareness of young people about the education path and formal requirements regarding work for a caregiver of seniors in various EU countries<< Implementation >>All our activities will be focused on the preparation of planned results. Of course, at the same time, we will carry out all activities related to project management, ensuring the appropriate quality of project activities and the developed results, as well as disseminating information about our work and materials that we will develop.Activities that we plan as part of the preparation of individual results:O1 –Publication. At the beginning of activities aimed at developing this result, the partners will jointly decide on the exact division of responsibilities - i.e. which expert will be responsible for the preparation of specific content. Each of the partners will appoint an expert who will be responsible for the work on a selected part of the publication (as well as for conducting research aimed at preparing the content), evaluating the content prepared by other experts, and translating the finished publication into their native language. At a later date, each partner will also be responsible for disseminating the publication to their respective target groups in their country.O 2 – online courses. The first step will be for the partners to develop a list of questions that will be included in the tests measuring the level of skills before and after the completion of the prepared courses. The package leader will, of course, supervise the work of the experts, however, it is important that all experts actively participate in the preparation of the tests. The lead expert will prepare the final version of the questions and a description of the results and feedback for the people who will use the tests.In the next step, the package leader will present the other experts with the template for the webinar scenario and the sample text for the course. Of course, other experts will also be actively involved in this stage.The partners will also divide the materials to be prepared. Each of the experts will develop the selected part, and the lead expert will be responsible for ensuring that the final shape of the materials is uniform and consistent.In the last step, each of the partners will organize a short testing of selected elements of materials (those prepared by their experts) among a selected group of 10 people. Based on this testing, the final version of the materials will be developed, which each partner will translate into their own language.O3 – Database. At the beginning of the activities leading to the development of materials under O2, the partners share the responsibilities so that each of them will be responsible for analyzing the situation in several countries and preparing some of the materials. After the first version of the materials has been developed, each of the partners will organize a short testing - send a link to the test version of the materials to friendly institutions and experts for evaluation of the prepared content. It is important that people outside the project team can make an independent assessment of the suitability, reliability, attractiveness and understandability of the materials that will be widely available.<< Results >>As part of the project activities, it is planned to develop 3 main intellectual outputs:•O1 – publication/report containing 3 main chapters. 1st one containing information about what soft skills a caregiver of seniors should have and why they are so important. 2nd chapter containing a specific list of soft skills that are most desirable in senior caregivers. 3rd chapter containing a set of good practices in the use of non-standard tools for the development of soft skills among people participating in courses preparing for the profession of caregiver for seniors. •O2 A set of training materials supporting the development of soft skills of people who want to work or work as carers of the elderly. The materials will consist of a series of thematic webinars on individual competences, as well as tests to check the knowledge of people participating in webinars (in the form of pre-tests and post-tests, both to be done by individual people, and to be carried out by training institution)•O3 - materials containing information on the path of education of carers of elderly people in various EU countries, as well as a list of formal requirements in individual EU countries that should be met by people who want to work as carers of the elderly peopleApart from the quantifiable results, we hope that the project will also contribute to:•Change attitudes both training institutions offering training for seniors’ caregivers as well as seniors’ caregivers themselves about importance of having high level of soft skills while working with seniors•increasing professionalism in the performance of professional duties by caregivers of seniors thanks to the possibility of improving their soft skills•increasing the professional mobility of caregivers of seniors by gaining access to information on the formal requirements and working conditions of a caregiver of seniors in various EU countries•increasing the standards of care for seniors thanks to the greater soft skills of the caregivers•making the training offer for carers of seniors more attractive was preceded by adding elements shaping soft competences

Inclusive university – a set of tools dedicated to HEI for better respond to disabled student’s needs project will be implemented by international consortium of partners – HEI and NGO in the period between 01.09.2019 – 30.09.2021.the process of social cognition helps to select, interpret, remember and use information in order to make judgment and decisions on social world (Aronso, Wilson, Akert 1997). Such activity bases on simplification. Very often it deforms the image as it enables to create wrong opinions on other people, categorizing them and even creates stereotypes and prejudices. According to researches on stereotypical approach to disabled people, disabled person is: weak, withdrawn, frightened, failure-liable, unsuccessful, help and support needed rather than being treated like a partner. Due to the fact those stereotypes emphasize wrong, inadequate specifics of disabled people, they influence interpersonal reactions and social contacts. Our project’s main aim is to break this approach and build the image of disabled person as an equal member of university society. Our proposition is to launch “Inclusive university” project, which main aim is to contribute to improve the situation and functioning of students with disabilities at University. Taking into consideration year-by-year increasing number of disabled students at European Universities, we would like to develop a set of tools dedicated to HEI for better respond to special needs of disabled students.Goals of the project are to:-Equip didactics, academic teachers with the knowledge on how to organize and coordinate education processes for students with special needs and disabilities, with the use of modern technologies-Support academics on how to diagnose and develop educational programmes responding to needs of disabled students-Tailor education strategies and methods to different types of disabilities: blindness, deafness, mental disorders, autism, socially awkward, other difficulties-Raise awareness of university community (didactics, administratives and students) on the presence of disabled students at the university-Increase the quality of studying and feeling of self-confidence of students with disabilities-Increase the quality of teaching by developing new approaches in teaching programmes including the concept of universal designDuring implementation of our project 3 main intellectual outputs will be developed:Output 1 – Publication dedicated to academics on how to teach disabled students with different disabilities.Output 2 – Training programme – raising awareness of university staff (didactic and administrative) and students on the presence of disabled students at the universityOutput 3 – Training course for students - universal designThe consortium consist of HEI from Poland, Slovenia and Cyprus and NGO from Poland. All partners are experienced in the field of international cooperation on innovative products. Impact of the project (in short):-Academics will have opportunity to learn how to incorporate new methods to their work and increase its quality and have opportunity to learn how to make their everyday classes more interesting and understandable for disabled students-Administrative staff will have opportunity to learn how to professionally deal with students with disabilities and raise their awareness about needs of students with disabilities-Students will be equipped with knowledge and competences enabling them to be more open and helpful in cooperating with their peers that have special needs. The project and its outputs will contribute to increase the openness and feeling of solidarity.-Universities will be more open, inclusive and friendly places for students with disabilties

The career aspirations of young Deaf people do not differ from hearing youngsters. However, the obstacles that they need to overcome so that to achieve their professional goals are much bigger. Nowadays, we can observe many activities directed to young Deaf people, aimed at helping them to overcome language barriers. Unfortunately, most of these activities are focused on rehabilitation of Deaf young people (helping them to improve hearing abilities), teaching them the language of the country in which they live, or teaching hearing people sign language. All of these activities are very helpful. But the Deaf young people, that we (and as it turned out – our partners as well) discussed with, have mentioned one thing that lead us to preparation of this project. They pointed out that communication barrier results in lack of information about how this “real” world of hearing working people looks like and how the real co-existing of hearing and Deaf people goes on daily basis. Most of us is afraid when we have to go to new school or job. Thoughts as “will I fit there?” “will I understand what I have to do?, “will they accept me?”, “will I manage to fulfil my duties?” – are much more concerning in the case of Deaf person. The second thing that we were told is that Deaf young people want to enter “hearing” labour market, so they want to get to know its rules. They want to receive information about how to enter and function on this labour market – information adjusted to their needs but still based on information which their hearing colleagues receive while starting professional life. Our project and prepared results are directed to young Deaf people, and to career advisors who work or would wish to work with Deaf young people. We would also like our project to have influence on the people from the environment of young Deaf people and show them that it is worth to support Deaf person in his/her professional aspirations. The main objective of our project was to change attitudes of young Deaf people, help them to believe that they can have influence on their professional development and are able to overcome obstacles in order to function in every professional environment they choose to be part of. We also plan to: •Increase job-opportunities for young Deaf job-candidates in the regular job market. •Encourage young Deaf people to do their best to start independent work-life in regular job market. •Give young Deaf people tools helping them enter the labour market. •Help young Deaf people to overcome obstacles in effective professional development and entering the labour market We planed to do it by: 1.development of a set of tools helping and guiding young Deaf people in the process of entering the labour market (translated into their languages); 2.giving young Deaf people information about how to define what skills and competences they already have, and about how and where they can improve them; 3.giving young Deaf people information about which skills and competences are mostly required at the labour market; 4.showing them how the reality of working with hearing people looks like; 5.encouraging career counsellors to reach Deaf young people and help them to enter labour market effectively (by give them tools and instructions about how to work with Deaf)

<< Background >>The motivation for the development of this project were meetings between the employees of our Career Office and our students from various fields. During these meetings, young people often admitted that they did not have any specific career plans. They were often students with good academic record, involved in the life of the university and acting as volunteers in various organizations. The biggest problem for them was that they came from small towns where there was no broader career prospect. An animator of the local environment seems to be an ideal profession for such people. This is how the idea of preparing a project was born, which would introduce young people to the profession of animator, which is currently not very popular in our country. Wanting to prepare materials for the project, we used the help of foreign partners and, after consultations, we decided to prepare a project aimed not only at young people in Poland.Needs that our project responds to:•young people involved in the life of their communities. Thanks to the materials developed as part of the project, people will gain knowledge about how they can transform their current activity into a profession, bringing not only satisfaction but also income. Thanks to practical information on the animator's work, they will receive tips on what exactly they can do to work even better. In addition, the project will satisfy their need to improve their competences and skills, it will indicate in which areas they should still train.•young people looking for their career path. There are a lot of young people rooted in the virtual world who, despite their high skills, do not really know what to do with their professional future. It is possible that the materials developed in the framework of the project (especially the O3 brochure) will help them decide what they would like to do in life and how to go about using their skills in a practical, useful and effective way.•organizations and institutions working with and for the benefit of local communities. Thanks to the project, they will gain knowledge about who the animator of the local environment is and how his work can support their activities.•Local communities from different regions. There are a lot of societies that would like to develop, but do not really know how to go about it. Thanks to the materials developed as part of the project, they will know that they can find people who will work for the development of these communities.<< Objectives >>The main goal of the project is to increase the knowledge and skills necessary to perform the profession of an animator of the local environment, as well as to increase the interest of young people in this profession, by developing a number of training and information materials targeted at young people in various EU countries.Detailed objectives:•Equipping young people who want to work as an animator of the local environment with tools enabling them to acquire knowledge and skills useful in working in this profession•increasing young people's awareness of the possibility of working as an animator of the local environment and the specificity of working in this profession•increased interest of young people in various EU countries in the profession of an animator of the local environment<< Implementation >>The activities within the project can be divided into two groups.The first of them are activities related to project management, ensuring the appropriate quality of project activities and the developed results, as well as activities related to disseminating information about the project, its assumptions, planned results, and finally disseminating the developed results.The second group of activities will be activities focused on the preparation of materials planned under the project. Here, the activities will depend on what we plan to achieve as part of a given result.O1 - Publication. In their activities, the partners will focus on preparing the content for individual chapters of the publication. At the beginning, the exact scope of the content that will be included in the publication will be determined, then the structure of individual chapters and the graphic design - thanks to this, the whole will be uniform. After that, each of the experts will prepare their part of the publication, and then the chief expert will put it together.O2 - online courses. Each of the partners will be actively involved in the development of both test questions (pre-tests and post-tests) as well as content for individual courses and webinar scenarios. After the content is prepared, the tests will be developed in an interactive form and the webinars will be recorded. The whole thing will then be assembled into courses. The next step will be to test the courses - in which experts from all partner organizations will be involved. After testing, the final version of the courses will be developed and posted on the project website.O3 will be prepared in the form of a brochure that will be prepared by all experts from the partner organizations. The first step will be to determine the exact content of the brochure and the layout of the individual chapters - so that the whole is consistent. When each of the partners has prepared their part of the brochure, the main expert will put it together, which will be consulted with young people - to check if it is understandable, attractive and useful for them. The final version will be posted on the project website.<< Results >>The results that we will develop as part of the project activities will serve this purpose.O1 – publication containing main information about the profession of local environment animator, with its description, list of skills needed in this job, concrete instructions about organization of work, as well as list of good practices with usage of non-standard training tools.O2 - A collection of training materials supporting the development of soft skills of people who want to work or work as animators of the local environment. The materials will consist of a series of thematic webinars on individual competences, as well as tests to check the knowledge of people participating in webinars (in the form of pre-tests and post-tests, both to be done by individuals and to be carried out by the institution). training)O3 - a brochure addressed to young people, containing basic information about what an animator of the local environment does, what competences should they have, where to get them, and therefore it is worth becoming interested in working in this profession.Apart from the quantifiable results, we hope that the project will also contribute to:•Change attitudes young people, representatives of local communities, local NGOs about importance of work of local animator in development of local communities•increasing professionalism in the performance of professional duties by people already working as local environment animators thanks to the possibility of improving their soft skills•increasing the standards of work of so far working local environment animators.•contribute to development of at least few local communities thanks to professional development of local environment animator.

Western Balkan countries are on their way for integration to European Union. Besides the harmonization of law, improvement of institutional capabilities is another important agenda in this process. Considering this, establishment of EU model university-enterprise cooperation is crucial for WBC.The main objective of SUCCESS is to establish of university-enterprise cooperation by forming a partnership in the areas of education and knowledge transfer based on the market needs, as well as creating wide university-enterprise cooperation network in Western Balkan countries. These goals are aimed to be achieved through a steady collaboration among WBC universities and enterprises from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania and Montenegro, and EU universities from, Poland Spain, Serbia and Germany. Considering this, main activities foreseen within the project are as follows: Exploring the partnership models in EU and WBC, university – enterprise partnership, modernization of curricula by introducing practice-oriented teaching and learning, introducing internship programme in cooperation with business sector, reinforcing of existing structures and establishing start-up services. Successful implementation of those activities will lead to the increasing graduates employability. The results of the project are: university – business network established at each WBC, Regional network cooperation platform set-up and implemented, 4 common projects between partner universities and business sector created at each WBC HEIs, new updated courses/programmes implemented at WBC universities in cooperation with business sector, start-up services at WBC universities established and functional, academic staff trained in the practice-oriented teaching, internship programmes developed and introduced at 8 WBC universities. All of the activities and results of the project will be disseminated through the network established within the project.