"Sign languages are an important part of Europe’s multilingual diversity. An estimated 1 person in 1,000 uses a national sign language as their first language - i.e. about 500,000 people EU-wide. Others may use sign language as a second or third language, for example the family and friends of deaf and hearing-impaired people. Depending on the perception, deafness is considered as a disability or as an enrichment with an own culture. Unfortunately, different studies of partner organizations shows that there are still few people who know that there is one DEAF CULTURE which refers to a group of people who have common beliefs and practices, who have a set of knowledge, experiences, beliefs, specific language, customs and traditions that are transmitted through sign language. The vast majority of people continue to see deafness just as a deficiency. More, there are still few members of Deaf Community who are truly aware of their own cultural identity. To ensure the inclusion of deaf people in European society it's necessary raising the level of awareness for the entire society on this issue, on the hand, and awareness of their own cultural identity by deaf people and active involving in promoting it, on the other hand. The direct beneficiaries of the project were Deaf persons, students and adults, aged between 16 and 90 years, who also participated in the project activities and events. They are members of Deaf Community from different countries, who identify themselves as members of the Deaf Community with a distinct language and culture. Over 500 direct beneficiaries were involved in project activities in the realization of intellectual products, transnational and national learning activities, multiplication events etc. of which about 400, Deaf beneficiaries. The longer term benefits is increasing of the the chances of social inclusion for Deaf people by forming and developing the cultural identity for Deaf Community members and making the hearing community be aware of the existence of Deaf Community cultural identity. Our aim was not only to promote the culture of Deaf Community and the Sign Language but also to help the process of developing the Deaf Culture by encouraging its members to create and perform in specific artistic moments, to became active citizens in promoting their own culture, which was also successfully achieved by implementing the project. The project objectives where: - Promoting Deaf Community Culture in order to increase the public’s understanding and appreciation of Deaf Culture and Sign Language by creating and dissemination of a Virtual Cultural Center of the Deaf which contains different cultural products of the Deaf Community and informative multimedia educational materials about Deaf Culture. - Forming and developing the cultural identity for Deaf Community members by offering accessible information in Sign Language regarding own community culture and encouraging active involvement in creation of new products of entertainment and life long learning for deaf audiences like Sign Language Songs, Sign Language Comedy Shows, other relevant leisure and educational multimedia materials. The main results and impact envisaged are: - Educational and entertainment resources for Deaf people: Multimedia Open Educational Resources about Deaf Culture available in four versions (using partners countries Sign Languages) and videos with specific cultural manifestation of Deaf Community; - ""International Virtual Cultural Centre of the Deaf"" website that will include all our project results any many other resources in the topic, resources created by partner organizations but by other organizations, too. It will be a ""virtual cultural treasure"" about Deaf Culture where any interested person/organization will find open educational and entertainment resources, links to other sites, platforms etc. - Develop the cultural identity and active citizenship skills for Deaf Community members; - Developing the Deaf Community culture by encouraging its members to create and perform in specific artistic moments; - Developing a positive attitude, specific for an inclusive society, towards Deaf Community among the hearing people . These results were achieved by the project activities: local/national and transnational trainings, realization and distribution of intellectual outputs, dissemination activities, multiplier events, etc. Deaf people were involved in all project activities (including project management activities). Each organization engages Deaf people as employees, which results from the essence of the issue of Deaf Culture - where these people can provide the most information on this subject. In this way, we implement the principle of social inclusion of people with special needs. Ensuring equal access to services in IVCCD project required the provision of a sign language interpreter at every stage of project implementation."

The project aim was: - broadening the knowledge about the socio-occupational functioning of people with disabilities, - learning about the effective and proven method of professional activation of people with disabilities - supported employment, - updating skills and qualifications of supported employment specialists (SES) in partner countries, exchange of best practices between SES, - Expressing SES opinions on the functioning of the social-occupational activation system for people with disabilities in partner countries. As a byproduct, the project has brought advantage not only to the world of VET, but, by focusing on a fundamental occupation, to person with disabilities inserted or willing to be inserted in VET. The project benefited the following main target groups: 1. Existing SESs: the project allowed to recognize themselves as part of a specific profession. Our aim was to create a network of SESs at European level, to exchange best practices in supported employment stages and analize the training offer in each partner country. 2. People interested in becoming SES: to learn from mentors-SES, to measure distance between competence already possessed and competence needed to work as SES, and to develop action plans for their own training. The project also allowed to compare training offered by different training providers and to chose the most complete or the more suitable referring to the missing competencies 3. Training providers in general: how to choose the best SES when recruiting them 4. VET trainers interested in training of SES 5. Policy makers and stakeholders can use the competence profile as a relevant reference point for the concrete implementation of professional recognition path within a European perspective, 6. People with disabilities interested in supported employment services. The list of results is the following : • website/platform with detailed description of 5 steps of supported employment, best practices, training in that area, national recomendations, etc. ; • Compendium of Best Practices in SE process gathered in all partner countries in English and partner languages; • 4 face to face staff trainings in each partner countries on all 5 stages of SE addressed to SES and potential SES to observe work-based setting of SES in partner countries.

The beneficiaries of Being Deaf in an Inclusive Europe Project are deaf adult people. The success of their social and professional integration depends on education, on access to information and also on the ability to research on information. Unfortunately, the deaf people’s possibilities to inform themselves mainly depends on the speech language level and on a good knowledge of spoken and written verbal language because there are few informational and educational materials using Sign Language as main communication instrument. The project was implemented through a strategic partnership between 5 non- profit organisations from 5 European countries: Romania, Slovakia, Turkey, Poland and Germany. All partners provide services to Deaf people and have experience in working with Deaf people and in producing multimedia educational or informative materials using Sign Language. According to the statistics, in Romania there are, approximately 25 000 hearing impaired people, in Turkey, approximately 350 000, in Poland, approximately 50 000, in Slovakia 50 000 and in Germany approx. 100 000 deaf people. In total, in partner organisations' countries, there are approx. 575 000 deaf people. Over 150 000 from them are Sign language users. One of the major barriers to for Deaf people is the lack of recognition, acceptance and use of sign language in all areas of life as well as lack of respect for Deaf people’s cultural and linguistic identity. This leads to marginalization of Deaf people. By raising the level of awareness for the entire society on this issue this attitude can be changed and the Deaf Community can be recognized as linguistic community. That’s why one of the priorities of our project targeted reducing disparities in learning outcomes affecting Deaf Adult Learners.Bilingual education is a wide spread concept on European and also on global level, referring to children and young deaf people. The innovation of our project consists in transferring this concept in education throughout Life Long Learning of deaf adults. The access to bilingual education (using verbal communication and Sign Language at the same time) for deaf adults is quite limited on European level and almost absent on national level because of the small number of interprets and because of limited financial resources assigned to this domain.The main Project Objectives were: - development of social and professional abilities of integration for the adult deaf and hearing impaired persons by forming and informing them about the labour market, the opportunities that digital technology and it’s continuum upgrading offers them in terms of communication and social integration, Human Rights, social integration abilities, Deaf Community Culture;- facilitating the access to Open Educational Resources for Deaf people through the creation and development of a free e-Learning Platform containing video informative materials on various topics of interest for Deaf Community using Sign Language as primary means of communication. These objectives where achieved primarily through 5 Training Activities (Blended mobility of adult learners) including 80 mobilities for direct beneficiaries and by producing of 5 educational materials tailored to their special needs and e-Learning specific (available in five languages of partner countries). The main activities and tools which ensured internal and external communication and, also, dissemination, exploitation of project results and its impact, where the project website, a virtual Learning Platform to Deaf adult learners and 5 national multiplier events addressing in special to Deaf Community and including Press Conferences. The main results and impact envisaged where: - increasing the socio-professional integration skills of the beneficiaries; - informing deaf people about the opportunities that digital technology and it’s continuum upgrading offers them in terms of communication and social integration and developing the necessary skills and competences in order to use digital technology; - increasing the self-esteem and developing the cultural identity for European Deaf Community; - new educational strategies which can be duplicated in the beneficiaries’ institutions and other European similar institutions and new open educational resources adapted to deaf people special needs. A virtual Learning Platform was developed and, it is an important source for information and lifelong learning for Deaf Adults.