In 2015, more than one million people – refugees, displaced persons and other migrants – have made their way to Europe, a number that continues to increase. Civil society organisations and movements have efficiently organised urgent measures or supplied basic needs for the migrants. Within the civil society, adult education providers have an important role in offering a wide range of courses, from language learning to information about services and systems to intercultural exchanges.
This year, EAEA prioritized the issue of Adult Education and Refugees and awarded three projects with the EAEA Grundtvig Award for excellence in adult education.
The winner of the best international project, St. Andrew’s Refugee Services (StARS) in Egypt offers adult and children education, psychosocial services and legal assistance for refugees. With its wide range of language, technical and professional development courses, the project aims at not only developing a set of skills among refugees and migrants, but also to create a network of learners and employers.
The winner of the best European project, TLC Pack from VHS Cham in Germany, focuses on developing occupational specific, language resources to support migrants already working – or aspiring to work – in the care giving sector. It recognizes the necessity to develop intercultural competences among migrant caregivers and offers a number of activities to achieve this aim. The TLC Pack offers a practical response to an existing problem: while the number of migrant caregivers across Europe is growing, many of them lack the necessary language and intercultural competences.
The winner of the best national project comes from the Integration and Development Center for Information and Research (IDCIR) in Ukraine. The project “From Destruction to Creation. Ways of Reconciliation in the Ukrainian Society” aimed at promoting of culture of open dialogue among target groups, mainly internally displaced persons from occupied Crimea and armed conflict territories of Donbass and Luhansk. In the second stage of the project, local communities were invited to organize diverse cultural activities to help deconstruct stereotypes and build mutual respect. It is an example of engaging local community in civic initiatives.
The winners were announced on Tuesday evening, 28 June 2016 in Brussels, by the EAEA President Per Paludan Hansen.
Background
The first EAEA Grundtvig Award in Adult Education was launched in 2003 by EAEA in order to recognise and celebrate excellence in adult education. It highlights project results that produce new ideas, new partnerships, new methodologies and a new understanding how we can work in adult learning. The Award is given to an organisation or to participants who present the best product of a transnational project in adult learning. Please find more information on the EAEA Grundtvig Award on EAEA website.
Contact information
Gina Ebner EAEA Secretary-General, +32 02 234 37 60, gina.ebner@eaea.org
Helka Repo EAEA Communications Officer, +358 40 511 24 75, eaea-info@eaea.org
StARS: Michael Houghton, mhoughton@stars-egypt.org
TLC Pack: Aleksandra Sikorska, asikorska@vhs-cham.de
IDCIR: Yuliya Golodnikova, integrationcenter97@gmail.com
Text: Helka RepoPhotos: Helka Repo