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School Years: Families
Tula Baxter
Honorary Chairman
LOOK London
and
T.E.A.M. (European Network for Parent Support Groups and Families with VI Children)
25 Newlands Avenue
Thames Ditton
Surrey KT7 0HD
UK
Fax/phone: +44 (0) 20 8224 0735
E-mail: tulaabaxter@hotmail.com
Background
Sometime towards the end of 1999, Herman Gresnigt, the European Chairman of ICEVI, invited me to lead a workshop on parents for the European Conference in Kracow in July 2000. It seemed a good idea so I accepted. As I was also presenting a paper, at the same conference, titled T.E.A.M. Together Everyone Achieves More, I decided to use the same theme as that of my presentation.
I concluded my presentation with the statement: We are all here today because we want to make a difference. Professionals, Educators, Funders, Government and Voluntary Agencies and, last but not least, Parents and VI children themselves. So let's start working together as a T.E.A.M. because: Together Everyone Achieves More.
The T.E.A.M. workshop
The focus of the workshop was to form a European Network of parent support groups. The value of setting up a European Network of Parent Support Groups and, perhaps, laying the foundations of such a network, was discussed in depth.
After many contributions and much discussion it was decided that there was (and is) a need to “join the efforts” of parents in different countries through the establishment of parent support groups in countries without such networks. The T.E.A.M. idea (Together Everyone Achieves More) could be applied to co-operation across Europe.
The workshop proved to be a great success and confirmed that "Ordinary Parents Can Achieve Extra-Ordinary Things" - with a little help from professionals of course!
We decided to call the European Network ‘T.E.A.M’, to carry through the theme of the workshop but also because we believed that “Together Europe will Achieve More”.
The T.E.A.M. logo was the first fruit of working together in Europe - electronically. The logo was first designed in Russia and emailed to the UK - London. It was then emailed to our Information Officer in the Netherlands for comments before being emailed back to the UK for final touching up - which was done in Cambridge.
The results are on the screen behind me (describe it).........T.E.A.M.
Together Everyone Achieves More /Together Europe Achieves More
PROJECTS
Many projects began to develop some very small and some quite substantial. These included:
Providing contacts for penfriends.
Liaising with European countries to locate particular publications and /or educational videos.
Hosting parents and professionals during T.E.A.M. meetings and /or other Seminars.
Providing contact names in Particular countries as requested
Identifying individuals to be contact persons and T.E.A.M. vice-presidents for their country.
T.E.A.M.-VIEWS European School project.
T.E.A.M. project "In Touch with Families"
T.E.A.M.-VIEWS European School.
The European School is a new initiative for Europe - the vision of a parent who, with the help and participation of other parents and professionals, put down the foundation of a new European charity. VIEWS has achieved a great deal already and its founder is here today, giving details of the current pilot scheme for this project .
VIEWS stands for "Visually Impaired's Educational World Support" and is a new non-profit, European organisation, based in Belgium. The founder members are three European parent support organisations, APAM in Belgium, FNAPEDV in France and LOOK London in the UK. VIEWS has been set up to provide educational support for blind and visually impaired students who have completed their studies at high school. The first project of VIEWS is the European School and it is hoped that it will be similar to Overbrook School, which formerly operated in Philadelphia, USA.
Beatrice Renard - the parent whose idea this project was and who is now the project manager - and Séverine Renard, VIEWS' Co-ordinator - who studied at Overbrook - are both here in this building today and they can give you more details of the pilot scheme of this school and future plans.
T.E.A.M. project "In Touch with Families"
“In Touch with Families”, is one of T.E.A.M.’s two major projects. Preparations for this project started almost immediately after the European ICEVI Conference in Krakow. It was undertaken by two Parent Organisations, the first based in the Russian Federation - Moscow Parents of the VI - and the second based in the UK - LOOK London. With funding from the British Government - Department for International Development Fund (DfID), Partnerships in the Non-Profit Sector Projects (PNPS) - “In Touch with Families” addresses the needs of Multi-Disabled Visually Impaired children in Russia as well as establishing parent support networks there.
The project made available, through interactive Workshops in Moscow, the methods and experience of leading British professionals in this area, with a view to encouraging improved problem solving within it in Russia. At the same time the project also aimed to stimulate within Russia the establish-ment by parents of more local groups, for mutual support and promotion of children’s rights.
The UK and Russian project leaders visited Ufa and Volgograd specifically to help set up local groups there. There followed activities aimed at ensuring the sharing in the local regions of the experiences received by workshop participants, who came from all over the Russian Federation.
The Workshops in Moscow
system of education for MDVI children
The LOOK London experience: the organisation of parents’ support groups: mutual support, co-operation between parents and professionals, the multi-agency, multi-disciplinary approach to supporting MDVI children.- the outcome was an awareness of the possible benefits of parents/professional support groups and knowledge of how to set up and run such groups. As a direct result of this workshop, local parent support groups were set up in three regions
The development of MDVI children and their communications; the effects of Autism and Visual Impairment; approaches to helping the children learn through play. The outcome was greater understanding of what parents and staff can do with a child so that daily experiences are fun, make sense and are educational. A video has been produced based on this workshop.
The development of key skills in daily living for MDVI children, such as self- care, feeding, dressing, mobility and communication. The outcome was a greater awareness of what skills a child will need to grow to independence – and of some of the techniques for helping children to learn those skills.
The factors in the visual, tactile, social and auditory environment of MDVI children that are needed for learning to take place.. The outcome : awareness of how the child’s surroundings can be designed to be most helpful, including the social or communicating environment.
A very successful seminar, with many fathers attending and participating fully in discussions and debates.
CONCLUSION
A very successful project with numerous benefits to MDVI children and their parents Why? Because we all worked together as a T.E.A.M. Going back to my opening statement, every agency mentioned below actually played a part:
Professionals: A number of UK Professionals were approached for advice support and ideas. They all responded to requests and gave us the benefit of their experiences, many without charging fees.
Educators: A number of UK Educators participated some giving their time free, others being released from their place of work at much reduced rates. For instance, The Royal Blind School in Edinburgh provided two Educators without any charge at all.
Government Agencies: The British Government - Department for International Development Fund (DfID), Partnerships in the Non-Profit Sector Projects (PNPS) - provided the grant for this project.
Voluntary Agencies:
Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) in the UK gave us invaluable advice right from when we were preparing the application. This was done by phone, emails and face-to-face meetings with appropriate staff.
Moscow Blind Union provided accommodation for professionals and a venue for a seminar.
The Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB) in the UK provided, free of charge, a selection of information sheets and booklets for parents for the packs of participating groups.
LOOK London provided resource materials especially prepared for the groups, as well as publications on subscription (Tac-packs, Tactile books, relevant magazines and catalogues.
Last but not least, "Ordinary Parents" from different countries worked together with professionals and the large number of agencies named above. They worked together as a T.E.A.M. to make this project a great success.
So
"Ordinary Parents" Can Achieve Extra-Ordinary Things
- but only if we all work together as a T.E.A.M.!
Thank you very much for your attention.
Tula A Baxter
June 2002 ICEVI-Holland 2002 Conference copy final.doc
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