• IMU Project Team Conducted First Pilot Training Program to the trainees from İşkur Kadıköy Branch, İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality, and Şehit Recep Büyük School for Special Education and Work Application Center. Our trainers who are experts in areas like People With Disabilities, Special Education, Employment of PwDs, and Work and Organizational Psychology lectured in the courses. The training program lasted 3 days, and after each course the trainees evaluated the modules instructed. The distribution of the participants were as follows:İŞKUR Kadıköy (10 Supported Employment Specialists), İMM Department for PwDs (3 Supported Employment Specialists), Şehit Recep Büyük School for Special Education (11 Special Education Specialists ), an officer from the PwDs department of IMU. The trainers were: Assistant Professor Dr. Emine Ayyıldız, Associate Professor Dr. Selma Arıkan, Psychologist MA. Beliz Canlı Korkut, Assistant Professor Dr. Özcan Erkan Akgün, Associate Professor Dr. Yeşim Güleç Aslan, and Assistant Professor Dr. Fidan Özbey. The training program consisted all the 6 modules developed during project as a part of Intellectual Output 4. These modules are:
  • •Barriers and limitations cause by the disability
    •How to support key competencies enhancement of your client
    •The concept of the supported employment
    •Practical tools for SE specialists
    •Assistive technologies for clients with disabilities
    •Career counseling guidelines

We met with Nafiye Öztuğ Director of Kartal Şehit Recep Büyük Special Education School. We first met her in Samsun during 27th National Special Education Congress. She visited us at İMU after the congress and we talked about possible collaborations (27 November 2017)

We participated to 27th National Special Education Congress that took place between 8-10 November 2017 in Samsun and organized by 19 Mayıs Üniversitesi.

Our presentations were accepted by the scientific committee.We will presented our studies related with PwDs and  Project outputs completed until now.

On 2 November 2017, two members of IMU Project Team from IMU Psychology department (Associate Professor Selma ARIKAN and Research Assistant Beliz Canlı) participated to a seminar on "Accessibility of Information Technology for PwDs" which was organized by IMU's Engineering and Natural Scıences Faculty. Project members met Halis Kuralay, who is the assistant director of  the Ministery of Family and Social Policies in İstanbul, to describe the Tools for SE project. They briefly explained the project aims and intellectual outputs to Halis Kuralay and promised for further meetings.

On 30 September 2017 IMU's project team member Assistant Professor Emine Ayyıldız participated to Beyazay Association's Coordination Meeting that took place in Iserlohn Germany.  She introduced the project and explained it's aims to other members of the Beyazay Association. This Association has a mission to ease PwD's lives by improving the opportunities and facilities in social, educational, cultural and employment areas for PwDs. The delegates of other branches like Germany, Switzerland, Netherlands, France and Greece also participated to this meeting.   They were all informed about the Tools4SE project.

On 23 October 2017 two members of IMU project team attended to the meeting organized by Down Türkiye -Down Sendromu Derneği that took place in İstanbul Hilton Bomonti Hotel. Down Türkiye is a substantially well experienced organization on the topic of Supported Employment and training Job Coaches. Associate Professor Dr. Selma Arıkan and Associate Professor Dr. Yeşim Güleç Aslan attended their meeting which was conducted to share the results of the project "Bağımsızım Çünkü Çalışıyorum 1".

This project was about Supported Employment and had many successful results including the employment of young people with down syndromes in the competitive work environment. Moreover the organization is really successful in training job coaches. Our team members met the coordinator of the project Selver Yulsever (manager & psychologist) and Fulya Ekmen (Vice Chairman of Down Türkiye) for possible collaborations. The Tools4SE project was briefly explained to Selver Yulsever and Fulya Ekmen and we decided to have further communications and collaborations for the topic of Supported Employment.

IMU project team including Associate Professor Selma Arıkan, Assistant Professor Emine Ayyıldız and Research Assistant Beliz Canlı visited İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality's Department for Health and Directorate of Disabled People (İSEM) on 28 September 2017. They had a meeting with Yeliz Yıldız Kökenek (the Director) and Halil Karacan (chief ressponsible of employment of PwDs, the municipality has a department consulting PwDs to place them in the competent labour market) .The project was briefly presented to them and they agreed on further collaborations for the employment of PwDs and the exploitation of the project outputs. "

On 21 September 2017, two of the members of IMU project team including Associate Professor Selma Arıkan and Research Assistant Beliz Canlı had made a visit to İŞKUR (Turkish Employment Agency) Kadıköy Branch. They had a meeting with the branch manager Aziz Doğan and gave a briefing about the project, its aims and the training modules prepared recently. They agreed to make a collaboration for the project and the employment of People With Disabilites.

We will participate 27th National Special Education Congress that will take place between 8-10 November 2017 in Samsun and organized by 19 Mayıs Üniversitesi.

Our presentations were accepted by the scientific committee.We will present our studies related with PwDs and  Project outputs completed until now. 

Fourth International Partner Meeting and First Blended Mobility of Higher Education Students took place between  11-15th of September 2017 in Maribor, Slovenia. Host partner URI-SOCA organized a very good mobiliy activity for tha partners including presentations of vocational rehabilitation specialists presentations and work-site visits. It was a great opportunity for ever participant to understand the Supoorted Emplotment practices in Slovenia.

In addition to that all project partners conducted a meeting on the developments of the project outputs, dissemination and exploitation of the project and determined their action plan for forthcoming activities.

On 1 August 2017 IMU Project team visited İŞKUR (Türkiye İş Kurumu). We briefly described Tools4SE Project to İstanbul Branch Manager Yunus Yelmen and Assistant Manager Günay Bölükoğlu. 

At the begging of August IMU Project team visited İstanbul Engelliler Merkezi and gave information about Tools4SE. 

Associate Prof. Selma Arıkan contacted with Yasemin Ekşioğlu Ahad about the Project .She is working as a psychologist and counselling the PwDs and employers for job placement. She visited Selma Arıkan’s office at IMU and they had a meeting about the Project and possible colloborations. 

Associate Professor Selma ARIKAN attended the graduation ceremony of Türkan Sabancı Çok Engelliler ve Görme Engelliler Okulu/ Türkan Sabancı School of Special Education for Children with Multiple Disabilities & for visually impaired Children

Ast. Professor Emine Ayyıldız organized an activity for  children with multiple disabilities. The students of Türkan Sabancı School of Children with Multiple Disablities presented a music Show. After the show mothers of these children shared their experiences with us.  Than we made an appointment with Uğur Kalafat the Director of the school, and visited their school 3 times.(meeting, graduation ceremony and an iftar dinner in Ramadan) 

The event took place in 24th May 2017

Associate Professor Yeşim Güleç Aslan organized an Awareness Day on Autism in İstanbul Medeniyet Üniversitesi with two speakers specialized in Autism.

Sezgin Kartal the founder of Nova Special Education and Rehabilitation Center, he is a psycholgist specialized in the rehabilitation of children with developmental disabilities. We briefly summarized our Project Tools4SE to him. 

We also met Parin Yakupyan the founder of Algı Special Education and Rehabilitation Center. Her son has autism spectrum disorder. We told our Project to her.

The event took place on 5th May 2017

The Tools4SE project was presented within a round table organised by the Bulgarian Ministry of labour and social policy. The main topic of the event was the social entrepreneurship and MCA team has delivered thematic ppt emphasisng on the supported employment service as a tool for the promotion of employment.

The attendees were about 70 people – policy makers, experts from regional authorities, social entrepreneurs, people with disability and other experts. The event was held on18th  August 2017 In town of Haskovo, Bulgaria.

On 06th July 2017, MCA was co-organiser of the International conference entitled “Employment of People with disabilities – challenges and solutions”. The Supported employment was the major topic of the conference and guest speakers from Bulgaria, Turkey, Spain and Austria presented different models of SE implemented in the European countries.

The conference was held in Burgas, Bulgaria and was visited by more than 200 participants form 7 European countries. The conference was proceeded by press conference and the reports from the event were published in local newspapers, radio and television.

On 15^th May 2017 MCA team has presented the Tools4SE project within a workshop for professionals in VET centres. The event was held in Svishtov, Bulgaria and the participants were representatives of VET centres, professionals working in the labour branches of the national employment agency, university professors and representatives of NGOs. The particip0ants also discussed the opportunities for further use of the project outcomes.

The Tools4SE project was presented during a training seminar on career counseling of people with disabilities, co-organised by University of Ruse and MCA. The event was held on 13th May 2017 in Ruse, Bulgaria and aimed at announcement of the newly developed tools for SE Specialists VET training programme for SE providers. During the event it was agreed that MCA team will prepare a paper for the scientific conference organised by University of Ruse at the end of October 2017.

The team of MCA was invited to give a presentation on the benefits of the supported employment within a Round table held on 6th April 2017, Sofia. The event was organised by “My dream job” e-platform which main idea is to bring together job seekers with disabilities and employers who are willing to hire them. The platform is newly established one and it is the first of its kind in Bulgaria.

Among the services offered by My Dream Job will also be online career counseling, support for job interview preparation and others. The participants came to the conclusion that the supported employment can be also added to the services portfolio offered by the platform.

Marie Curie Association promoted the Tools4SE project during the VI International Fair of social enterprises within the social economy held between 29th March and 1 Apr 2017 in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. During the 4-days event more than 6000 visitors had the chance to visit the MCA’s stand and to be familiar with the concept of the project.

Among the visitors were people with disabilities, employers of disabled people, social entrepreneurs, psychologists and other specialists who consult people with disabilities and non-disabled employees, as well as policy makers and representatives of social enterprises’ umbrella organisations. 

On the 5^th of January 2017 Marie Curie Association has presented the project during a workshop entitled “SE – new chance for employment of PwDs”. The workshop was held in Plovdiv, Bulgaria and the participants were representatives of the public administration working in the field of social affairs and employment.

Project Team participated 7th Job Fair organized by Pendik Municipality on 17th November 2016 in Istanbul, Turkey. There were 16 companies represented by HR teams to meet with potential employees. More than 500 employees registered and visited the stands of the companies.

Project Team found a chance to talk with representatives of the companies and gave project general information and piloting process details to register online learning system and follow the training activities.