Accessibility and inclusion are part of our Distance Learning Unit (UED/IPL) acting model. UED/IPL aims at developing learning accessible to all, and has been developing work in this specific area. For this reason and because the inclusion is also a concern to us, IPL has accepted the challenge of the eu4all project. The technology and human resources existing in the IPL made possible the implementation of some project components that may improve practices in higher education and lifelong learning in the IPL.
The mission of the EU4ALL project is to provide educational and training institutions with innovative technology for providing e-services that are accessible to all their students and professionals, including the elderly and those with disabilities. Improving access to lifelong learning is the motivation behind the development of a framework of educational services. This framework helps in the deployment of personalized learning, which can be used to increase the accessibility of e-learning and the availability of support services for people with disabilities.
Project description
The Lifelong Learning paradigm recognizes that, in a knowledge-based economy, education and work are integrated throughout people’s lives. All citizens need ongoing access to learning to enable them to work. Technology is playing an increasing role in mediating this learning. However, if this technology is inappropriate and introduced with insufficient support, disabled people will face even further exclusion from the interlinked worlds of education and work. To address this, EU4ALL sets forward the concept of Accessible Lifelong Learning (ALL) uniting 3 key strategies:
- That the technology that mediates lifelong learning does so accommodating the diversity of ways people interact with technology and the content and services it delivers.
- That this technology is used to bring support services to disabled learners.
- Providing support services and technical infrastructure that enable teaching, technical and administrative staff of educational institutions to offer their teaching and services in a way that is accessible to disabled learners
The aim of EU4ALL is to improve the efficiency and efficacy of implementing these strategies by developing an open service architecture for ALL. To achieve a wide impact the approach taken is not to develop a single EU4ALL system but a standard-based framework that facilitates the integration of the approach with a wide range of eLearning systems.
More specifically the goals of EU4ALL are to:
- Design an open service-oriented architecture for ALL.
- Develop the software infrastructure for ALL services (including content, support and access services).
- Validate the results in large-scale higher education settings.
Learn more about this project by visiting http://eu4all-project.atosresearch.eu/
