EASPD Innovation Awards Winners Announced
The European Association of Service providers for Persons with Disabilities (EASPD) congratulates IASIS NGO, Milestones Trust, Platform of Families of Children with Disabilities, Centre de la Gabrielle MFPass, Zukunft trotz Handicap e.V. on winning EASPD’s 2024 Innovation Awards.
Each of these five practices were recognised for their efforts to develop inclusive and human-rights based mental health and psychosocial disability support services in line with the theme of EASPD's 2024 Spring Conference.
The winners of the fourth edition of the EASPD Innovation Awards received their awards at a ceremony hosted during the conference, which is taking place in Bratislava, Slovakia over the next two days.
The winners are, in no particular order, as follows:
IASIS NGO, ‘Caregiving Project’
The Caregiving project by IASIS NGO aims to provide pre-vocational training to beneficiaries undergoing treatment in mental health rehabilitation units. The training programme empowers individuals with mental health conditions to participate in weekly sessions, emphasising pre-vocational development as nursing assistants. Upon completing the training, participants receive support to enter the workforce either as nursing assistants in limited liability social cooperatives or take on the role of a peer-supporter within the mental health unit.
Milestones Trust, ‘The Move on Project’
The ‘Move on Project’ is a mental health-supported living Recovery Service that aims to provide an opportunity for individuals with enduring and complex mental health conditions to engage in a two-year programme of community-based rehabilitation, offering a person-centred approach to recovery, in collaboration with not only the persons supported, but also their families, advocates, and other healthcare professionals, to achieve the best possible outcomes.
Platform of Families of Children with Disabilities, ‘#ParentsToParents’
#ParentsToParents is a support network initiated and run by the Platform of Families of Children with Disabilities since 2019. Within this network, a team of trained peer counsellors, who are parents of children with disabilities, provide valuable peer-to-peer counselling based on their own experience to other parents and family members of children with disabilities. Since its initiation the programme has supported over 2200 families across Slovakia.
Centre de la Gabrielle MFPass, ‘GABLAB, Le living lab de la Gabrielle’
The ‘GABLAB’ the living lab method concept and transfers it to a dynamic real-life test environment that fosters co-creation and innovation among stakeholders in the disability sector.The practice includes the persons supported in the decision-making process and guarantees that all voices have the same power at the table to discuss and reflect on difficult questions and re-examine facts that are taken for granted to a seek for a common approach.
Zukunft trotz Handicap e.V., ‘Professional Development/Employment’
The ‘Professional Development/Employment’ programme provides professional training for young adults with intellectual disabilities in two distinct programmes: the “daycare training programme,” preparing them for careers in childcare, and the “gastronomy training programme,” equipping participants for roles in the hotel, catering, and housekeeping sectors. Comprising both practical and theoretical components, including a final examination, the programmes certify graduates for entry into these respective professional domains.
With these awards, EASPD aims to spotlight the excellent work of our members to ensure people with a disability benefit from innovative services.
EASPD hopes that these best practices can be a source of inspiration for other service providers as we work together towards the full implementation of the UN CRPD.
For more information on these practices, we invite you to consult the EASPD Innovation Awards 2024 Booklet.
Supporting Documents
For more information, please contact:
Miguel Buitrago
Learning & Development Officer
miguel.buitrago@easpd.eu
+32 2 238 39 31
Note to editors:
The European Association of Service providers for Persons with Disabilities is a non-profit European umbrella organisation, established in 1996, and currently representing over 20,000 social and health services for persons with disabilities. EASPD advocates effective and high-quality disability-related services in the field of education, employment and individualised support, in line with the UN CRPD principles, which could bring benefits not only to persons with disabilities, but to society as a whole.