Context and background:Statistics show that people with disabilities are more exposed than others to unemployment and social exclusion and labour market inclusion has a positive impact on social inclusion. In particular, young people with disabilities (YPWD), 17 to 29 y.o., are at high risk of becoming NEET. In order to support their job placement, the role of Job Coaches has become key, professionals who have the task of accompanying the client in job search and in the subsequent reintegration path.The direct experience of the Jump to Job! partners and the study of previous projects on the same topic show, however, that there is still a lot of room for improvement in Job Coaches intervention with YPWD. Another fundamental person that has proven to be more and more important in supporting job integration is the Peer Mentor, who with her/him experiential contribution can relate to the YPWD in a privileged manner. Their contribution is still undervalued and taken into little consideration.Jump to Job Objectives:Consequently, with the aim of facilitating the job placement of the YPWD, the project aims to achieve the following results:1)YPWD are more self-confident and have more active approach to the job search;2)Job Coaches and YPWD have a stronger, more fruitful relationship, supporting real job inclusion;3)Companies are able to adapt their environment and work process to create a sustainable job for YPWD;4)Job Coaches’ training is more effective and takes into account clients’ input and insight and is co-produced by YPWD;Activities:●A need analysis on Peer Mentors and Job Coaching for people with disability in the countries of the project partners is released;●A first training course will be delivered to 16 people (12 Job Coaches and 4 Peer Mentors);●A first pilot will be implemented at national level (4 countries) to test the effectiveness of the first training content;●A feedback analysis on the first training is released;●A second training course will be delivered to 16 people (12 Job Coaches and 4 Peer Mentors);●A second pilot will be implemented at national level (4 nations) to test the effectiveness of the second training;●A feedback analysis on the second training is released;●A training module for Job Coaches and peers is be delivered - Peer Mentor and Job Coach for young people with disabilities Curriculum.Number and profile of participants:Jump to Job! plans to train 12 Job Coaches and 4 Peer Mentors in their training path; subsequently, during the field tests, the project expects to involve at least 8 other Job Coaches for each participating service provider partner and to use the training contents with at least 25 YPWD for each service provider partner. In total, the project therefore plans to involve at least 32 between Job Coaches and Peer Mentors at least 100 YPWD.Methodology:Training programmes will be given following the principles of the FROG methodology, and will develop around 4 thematic nuclei (Vision, Identity, Communication, Impact) which will provide participants with innovative tools and skills in order to allow them to improve their intervention skills with the YPWD, in line with the objectives of the project. Participants will also be trained in how to successfully support companies in their employment of YPWD.Furthermore, the project includes 2 training and 2 field tests to allow real and incisive feedback on the final formulation of the training module.Research, training, testing and feedback will therefore be interrelated and enclosed in a virtuous circle.Results, impacts and long term benefit:Peer Mentor and Job Coach for young people with disabilities Curriculum and training content will be available online on the project website in 5 languages (English, Dutch, Greek, Spanish, Slovenian) and uploaded on an e-learning platform. Dissemination events of the project results will be held in Greece, Spain, Belgium and Slovenia. In this way the curriculum will be known at European level and could be used by professionals internationally, leading to a real improvement in the job placement and social inclusion of the YPWD.

There is a complex, changing and competitive socio-economic environment in Norway and Spain. In some EU countries the youth unemployment rate is reaching dramatic levels, and a lot of young people is not in education, not in employment or training (NEET). Nevertheless, the new generations of young women and men need to play a crucial role in meeting the many socio-economic, cultural and technological challenges and opportunities that we are facing in the European Union. This project aims to foster an international entrepreneurial mindset among European youth. Promoting the professional integration of young men and women, as well as promoting individual fulfillment, social cohesion and active citizenship.The project will develop an innovative model to support young people in the transition from education and training, or from unemployment or inactivity, to the labor market. The project will, through an innovative Leadership-training program for youth, combined with a new developed and innovative Business & Social entrepreneurship training, foster the proactivity among young people, especially focused on social entrepreneurship. This partnership is composed by a Norwegian partner, lyk-z & døtre, and a Spanish partner, Centro Integrado Público de Formación Profesional Misericordia. Two organisations with a long experience working with youth at risk of exclusion. Partners from a complete different social and economic context that could represent the diversity inside Europe. This partnership believes in the learning by doing methodology, and consequently involves the youth throughout the project. The project fosters the real implication of the young people in their society. By using the project as a platform to raise their awareness about Europe’s potential through sharing perspectives and ideas with young people from other European countries.The project has an innovative and comprehensive training methodology and structure, covering theory and practice in the project timeframe. In the first phase, the partnership will implement a verified, unique and fact-checked Leadership program for young people. Through this training, the participants become familiar with their inherent qualities and values and transmit this insight to action. They become leaders in their own lives. This is complemented with a specific training in Business & Social Entrepreneurship collaboratively developed by both partners, to enhance the entrepreneurship mindset and skills of the participants.In the second phase the project will, through a virtual platform and an international workshop, promote the interaction between countries and inclusion between youths. This partnership will create a possibility for unemployed youths to raise awareness and create solutions for the social challenges they face. In this workshop social entrepreneurship initiatives will be produced, made by youths for youths.In the third phase, the project will act as a facilitator platform. The partners will use their local networks to connect these young entrepreneurs and their social entrepreneurship initiatives with potential investors, start-up incubators and key stakeholders in order to bring the initiatives to fruition.The project aims to have real exchange between all the stakeholders involved, partners and participants, fostering a successful knowledge exchange.The project’s impact at an overall level will be the real promotion of the entrepreneurial mindset among European youth, reflected through the creation of Social Entrepreneurship initiatives. In this process, the project will enhance the professional integration of young men and women, their individual fulfillment enhancing them to make the best of their potential. This project complements and is clearly in line with the Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan of the European Commission.

The recent lockdown due to the COVID pandemic has highlighted our reliance on virtual means for staying in touch, continue learning and also working. Critically, it has also thrown into sharp definition the issues of digital exclusion and the lack of digital readiness for educators. This has been a specially challenging situation for the population who lack basic digital skills like the people with mental health challenges, cognitive disorders or/and especial learning needs, and thus, for the professionals targeting them.Distance learning massively activated during this Covid-19 crisis revealed the limited autonomy of people with disabilities, in particular with intellectual, learning and /or psychiatric disabilities, in the use of available technologies. This situation increased the inequality in the access to the training proposals and the marginalization and isolation of those groups, with heavy repercussions on their well-being and in their possibility of playing an active role in society, because also their distance to the labour market is getting increased.Statistics show that people with disabilities are more exposed than others to unemployment and social exclusion. It is proben that labour market inclusion has a positive impact on social inclusion and that by including people with disabilities, companies, individuals and society at large all win. The role of Job Coaches has become key to support the job inclusion of this vulnerable groups. Job coaches have the task of accompanying the client in job search and in the subsequent reintegration path. But during the recent lockdown educators, VET mentors and job coaches working with people with disabilities have found a lot of challenges to continue delivering career advise and job coaching to their target group due to three main issues:1. A lack of digital competences for mentoring and job coaching on-line.2. Scarcity of digital job coaching tools and methods.3. The digital gap in the access to on line services by people with disabilities.WORK@BLE project tackles these three challenges faced by people with disabilities and the VET mentors/job coaches working with this group to enable then and the professionals to recieve and deliver the job coaching services respectively, by these means: 1. Training job coachers in the use of digital job coaching tools.2. Developing an innovative digital coaching toolkit and a friendly platform tailored to the needs of the target group. (IO1)3. Developing an educative digital e-Scape Room for assessing job skills (IO2)The two outputs are tailored to the digital needs of the target groups. Professionals could undergo their job coaching on line to people with learning difficulties and limited digital skills. The latest will not only improve their employability but also will train their digital skills by using the platform and the e-Scape Room. WORK@BLE exchanges good practices and identifies innovative job coaching tools in order to digitalize them, trains jobcoaches and VET mentors working in the field of people with disabilities, and also creates a friendly job coaching platform and a digital Scape Room to assess job skills. Everything accessible for the final target group and thus enabling the coachers delivering e-coaching. In few words, WORK@BLE breaks down digital barriers and promotes the access to labour market and to autonomous active living to disadvantaged groups.

<< Background >>All partners are actively working in providing training and mentoring within prisons and want to expand these services with innovative training approaches, to including the implementation of a proven method FROG leadership and life-mastery program to empower inmates and ex-inmates and support inclusion and active participation in the community. The project meets the needs of inmates and ex-inmates for a successful integration to everyday life and work, both by providing them with proven coaching (FROG) methodology for self-realization and empowerment as well as follow up peer support and network as well as access to information on available support in their country on the FREEDOM platform. The FROG result from the training in Norway shows that 75% of the participants manage to get back to work or education or employment. The FROG training/coaching method is built in the understanding of psychophysiology, especially the theories of the neuro-physiologist and researcher Benjamin Libet about unconsciously decision-making and the free will. Also, the methodology is based on principles and theories from cognitive training, leadership, positive psychology, communication tools from film and from co-active coaching.Partners will create online platforms and network of peers that will provide encouragement and support to inmates and ex-inmates as well as creating personal longtime relations between peer that can further strengthen the support and follow up for the inmates after their incarceration as an addition to the services/support already offered within partners countries. Creation of the FREEDOM platform is in line with both national and EU policies and the Bologna Process, which mandates that learning should be open to everyone regardless of social exclusion factors such as incarceration. People with lived experience in incarceration can serve as a valuable guide to prisoners, particularly to those with needs that were not identified when they were in jail. Criminologists have recognized long ago the importance of peer training in the current prisoner’s reform. The literature on peer mentor-ship programs in the criminal justice system has shown major benefits, such as increased physical and mental health and belonging. Imprisonment and release can alleviate feelings of tension and despair, and therefore finding emotional companions is one of the functions that peer mentoring serves. Peer training is another activity that can take place inside the prison's closed environment. The partnership believes that the FREEDOM project is responding the need of the target group for personal empowerment and support to re-engage into community, education or employment. to these identified needs to use ICT for education, mentoring and training that will enhance inmates community participation enabling them to learn from peers and prepare for a successful integration not only to society but more importantly to their families and friends. There is not only personal benefit to be gained by the project but also huge economic benefit for the community including high social cost of crimes and community cost involved in incarceration of offenders.<< Objectives >>The project´s goal is to create a support program for inmates and ex-inmates in and after incarceration in prisons through proven FROG leadership and life-mastery training and peer mentoring. The project will help teach and implement methods to break the vicious cycle of criminality and multiple prison stays. The main objective of the Road to freedom project is to help convicts break the chain of addiction and criminality and prepare for the future after their sentence is over. The first step will be to train trainers or FROG coaches that will then implement the pilot training in partners countries. An overall methodology, situation analysis and evaluation descriptors and process will be designed for the project (R1) as well as documentation of project process and results as well as peer-interviews or short-documentaries. This again will be published on the FREEDOM platform that will also be designed as a peer network and training platform, both for communication among FROG coaches and their communication with participants in the pilot training. The end result of the project that will be sustained after project finalization is a network of trained trainers, peers and professionals, and peers that have undertaken the FROG training and enjoyed peer support that will encourage them to volunteer and contribute to the peer network and peer support in the future. By engaging stakeholders from start to finish the partnership is confidant that project results will not only be of good quality but also become sustainable after project finalization, making FROG leadership and life mastery method and peer mentoring an incremental part of rehabilitation processes within the prison system in Europe. The project also aims at influencing prison policies and practice in partner countries and Europe as well as public discourse through the production and distribution of FREEDOM videos and short documentary (R2) and through the multiplier events in partners countries related to presentation of project results or transnational and online final conference as well as through their dissemination efforts.<< Implementation >>The FREEDOM project will implement 4 project results, 6 multiplier events including transnational online final conference, various dissemination activities including 3 newsletters and countless PR initiatives, 3 transnational partnersmeetings. Project results include Methodology, evaluation process and situation analysis (R1), video-success stories and documentary (R2), FROG curriculum, training of trainers and pilot training (R3) FREEDOM information and training platform and peer network (R4), all project results will be accessible on the FREEDOM platform during and at least 24 months after project finalization.<< Results >>Following project results will be developed and finalized within the project duration:R1: Methodology, situation analysis and evaluation. This result will included desk top research on existing policies, practices and support to the target group in partners countries/regions as well as other related topics like addiction, in-prison education opportunities, vocational rehabilitation, this result will build upon surveys, interviews with professionals/practitioners like social workers and researchers within the field, focus groups or interviews with inmates and ex-inmates. This output will also demonstrate the overall methodology of the project, define descriptors for its success and include overall evaluation scheme for project results that will then be compiled in a comparative report and foresight conducted in cooperation with reference groups and the partnership in the end of the project. This project result will be lead by CESIE.R2: FREEDOM best practices and documentaries. Building upon life-story approach and short documentaries on ex-inmates that have managed to turn their life around. This also includes input from professionals andresearchers in the development of 2-3 short documentaries for each participating country introducing role-models and 1 short documentary including overall presentation of project results based upon documentations of training of trainers, pilot training and input from partners, associated partners, experts and interviewed peers. Quasar production will manage this result that will provide overview of project implementation that can be used for both dissemination and training purposes. R3 FROG leadership and life-mastery training of trainers and pilot training and mentoring of these trainers in partner countries. This result will include; guidelines, material and support processes developed into a curriculum and open educational resources in English and then partners languages. This project result is based on best practice from Lyk-Z in Norway that will lead all training activities. R4: FREEDOM Platform that will be both information and training platform as well as communication platform for peer mentoring and support. Central content will be in English while country spesific information will be in partner languages, except for Norwegian as Lyk-Z role will to transfer best practice. The development of the platform will include need and technical requirement analysis, set up of a website/platform etc. Athens lifelong learning center will lead this project result.All material produced by the Road to Freedom project will be Open Educational Resources that can be accessed online either via phone or a computer. This main objective being in line with Erasmus+ priorities or: The inclusion of inmates and ex-inmates into society by empowering them to engage in education, communication and empowerment on the labor market, Creating up-skilling pathways, improving accessibility and increasing take-up of adult education.The Road to Freedom project objective is to train and empower convicts and to provide them with professional and peer support to fully engage and participate in the community. The Prison and Probation Administration of Iceland (PPA) is the leading organisation in Iceland relevant for this project and therefore a crucial associated partner to the project as well as partner counters prisoner administrations. All project results will be accessible on the FREEDOM training platform during and at least 24 months after project finalization. Prisoner administrations in all partner countries will benefit extremely from this project as well as other EU countries. The partnership is confident that all project results can be sustained after project finalization and that our documentation and analysis of current policies and support will ad value to existing support and perhaps change the approaches currently used in inmate rehabilitation.