Access Angels. Guardian Angels of Accessible Travellers in Rural Areas

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Access Angels, a project funded by the EU ERASMUS+ programme involving 4 member States, aims to train youth volunteers to act as assistants to visitors with access requirements in rural areas in Europe.

Access Angels logoAccess Angels aims to train youth volunteers to act as assistants to visitors with access requirements in rural areas in Europe.

Access Angels teams up Vocational and Educational Training (VET) with sustainable tourism principles to serve visitors who make up the accessible tourism market. The project will develop a package of personal assistance services (PAS) offered by youth volunteers, similar to those services offered to disabled tourists in major cities but adapted to the needs of visitors with disabilities who want to experience rural tourism. This proposition should attract tourists with access requirements to rural areas and may also alleviate the obstacles of the difficult living conditions found in many rural areas.

The Access Angels project aims to meet the following objectives:

  • contribute to employability, economic growth and social cohesion through VET
  • offer to adults and young people the prospect of career opportunities through VET
  • promote inclusion of disadvantaged groups in the labour market
  • ensure the sustainability and excellence of vocational education and training.
  • use VET in support of sustainable development and in delivering social education to youth
  • provide rural tourism with a competitive advantage to attract the accessible travel market
  • contribute to rural economies
  • increase awareness of the needs of people with disabilities in rural areas
  • foster active citizenship and volunteering among the youth.

VET organisations, accessible travelers, rural youth and sustainable tourism authorities are the beneficiaries of this project. They are all represented in the project partnership. The project will utilise ENAT’s network to involve travellers with disabilities and other specific access requirements in the baseline research and testing activities. Nine events will be held in the partner countries, Poland, Czech Republic, Spain and Belgium attended by members of all target groups and stakeholders.

The project will carry out research to determine what services to include in the PAS package for rural areas. A second survey among the rural authorities will investigate their capacity to manage the service, with a view to regional authorities carrying out this role at the end of the project period. The data gathered from the first survey will be help to define the service, while the results of the second survey will be used to create an Operations Manual for the AA service.

A training curriculum and the corresponding pedagogical material will be developed. Trainers from each partner country will learn how to manage and support the AA service and how to train and coach the recruited volunteers to become Access Angels.

Coordinator

  • SYNTEA SPOLKA AKCYJNA, Poland

Partners

  • Institut pro trénink pohostinnosti, Czech Republic
  • Association for Development of Mountain Municipalities in the Republic of Bulgaria, Bulgaria
  • DEKAPLUS BUSINESS SERVICES LTD, Cyprus
  • DIKTYO THEMATIKON KENTON TROODOUS (DITHEKET) LTD, Cyprus
  • SOLUCIONES TECNO-PROFESIONALES CONSULTING, Spain
  • EUROPEAN NETWORK FOR ACCESSIBLE TOURISM ASBL, Belgium
  • Youth Europe Service, Italy
  • Institut za napredno upravljanje komunikacij, Miklavz na Dravskem polju, Slovenia
  • FUNDACION UNIVERSITARIA SAN ANTONIO, Spain

Contact

SYNTEA SA, Wojciechowska 9a, 20-704 Lublin, POLAND.

Email Project Manager: iwona.pietrzak@syntea.pl

Website: http://accessangelsproject.eu/index.html  (No longer active)

Publications: Download the project publications in PDF format from the right-hand panel. 

See also:  Access Angels Half-Day Final Conference, Brussels, 21 September 2018.  
 


ERASMUS Plus logoThe Access Angels project is funded by the European Union's ERASMUS+ Programme Key Action 2 - Cooperation for Innovation and the Exchange of Good Practices Strategic Partnerships for vocational education and training. The project Grant Agreement is registered under the code 2016-1-PL01-KA202-026504 (“the Action”) at Fundacja Rozwoju Systemu Edukacji (FRSE) Polish National Agency.

Disclaimer: This publication reflects the views only of the authors, and the Education, Audio-visual and Culture Executive Agency and the European Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained herein.