Main International Events

 

2018

• 11^th January 2018 in Brussels (Belgium). Start of the ERASMUS + TopHouse Project.
• 18^th to 19^th January 2018 in Girona (Catalonia). Start of the ERASMUS + I-Decide Project.
• 22^nd January 2018 in Montauban (France). Meeting with UDAF to agree on the presentation & consolidation of the partnership for a new Erasmus+ Project initially called AC_COMPAGNONS.
• 21^st to 23^rd February 2018 in Vienna (Austria). Zero-Project Conference 2018 on Innovative Practice and Policies for Persons with Disabilities.
• 30^th March 2018 in Paris (France). Meeting at the UDAF/UNAF headquarters. Presentation, at the French national level, of the Fundación Tutelar de les Comarques Gironines and its action regarding the adaptation of the UNCRPD and the parallel study on Social Return On Investment (Campus Arnau d’Escala).
• 14^th to 15^th May 2018 in Geneva (Switzerland). Seminar on the reduction of involuntary interventions in mental health services at United Nations.
• 4^th to 6^th October 2018 in Barcelona (Catalonia). EASPD Conference in Barcelona “”Technology and digitalization in the social care sector: the impact on education, employment and independent living”. FTCG co-organizes in close coordination with Plataforma Educativa, CONACEE, Fundació Ramón Noguera and SOM Fundació.
• 25^th to 27^th October 2018 in Seoul (South Korea). V World Congress on Adult Guardianship.

2017

• 14^th to 16^th June 2017 in Belfast (Ireland) Participation in the 1^st World Congress of Work with Support & Supported Employment, presenting, along with Plataforma Educativa and Fundació Ramón Noguera the paper “Sheltered Employment; Threats and Challenges in Changing Socio-Economic Environment “.
• July 4^th, 2017. Meeting at the UDAF of the Department of Aude, Carcassonne and other Guardianship institutions of the Occitan Region.
• 5^th to 6^th October 2017 in Barcelona (Catalonia). Integrated Day and Inclusive Societies. B-Debate. With Guttmann Institute. Cosmocaixa.
• 9^th October 2017 in Girona (Catalonia). Social circle organized by the Foundation with some of our supported persons with Mr. Facundo Chávez, Human Rights Watch and Disability Advisor at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.
• 12^th and 13^th October 2017 in Tallin (Estonia). Conference “Dignity + Independent living = DI”. European Social Fundation.
• 26^th to 27^th October 2017 – Podgorica (Montenegro). Participation in the EASPD Conference while also co-presenting alongside with Jordi Cid from (IAS)“Deinstitutionalization: the Girona Experience”
• 5^th December 2017. UDAF from Occitan Region meeting in FTCG headquarters.
• 18^th to 20^th December 2017. Conférence scientifique et citoyenne. Confcap 2017. Paris. We co-present two case studies, together with UDAF Toulouse and Tane et Garonne, in order to share the different approaches in SDM.

 

A bit of history: The beginnings

International participation increases in activity since May 2014 when participating actively in the III World Congress on Adult Guardianship “Promising practice to ensure Excellence in Guardianship Around the World” organized by the International Guardianship Network in the city of Arlington, Virginia ( USA), where we presented the paper “Too much is restricting; too little is abandoning: seeking a correct guardianship intervention “, in collaboration with Campus Arnau d’Escala Foundation (an ethical observatory applied to social intervention), focusing on the ethical challenges arising from the change that the Convention entails in matters of guardianship.

Since then, we have attended and participated as speakers in congresses and international conferences and events, joining the European platform EASPD, an association representing about 15,000 European organizations. The participation of the Foundation in projects in collaboration with EASPD is extensive and focused on finding strategies to apply the Convention of the Rights of the People with Disabilities (UNCRPD), axis of the international debate in matter of disability, with great implications that affect both European and national legal frameworks, professional practice and the social conception of disability at a global scale. EASPD recognized, in 2015, the work of the Foundation identifying it as one of the five good practices of community-based support services for independent life.

The Foundation has been part of the advisory board of the IV World Congress on Adult Guardianship, organized by the International Guardianship Network (Erkner, Berlin, September 2016), announcing the Catalan model of Institutions for the protection of the person as well as the steps our organisation has undertaken in adapting to the new paradigm in the light of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities through the presentation of a poster and a video co-produced with PWD’s that attests in first person the personal experiences of people whom we support in relation to the way the support is provided and has helped changing their lives, from situations of social exclusion and long institutionalization to a community context where they develop their lives independently.

Aside from participating in the World Congress on Adult Guardianship, we highlight participation in the following events:

• March 2016, in Strasbourg (France). Round table at the European Court of Human Rights on Access to Justice for people with disabilities, in collaboration with EASPD and the AJuPID project.
• March 2016, in Sofia (Bulgaria), participation in the final phase of the AJuPiD project (Access to Justice for people with disabilities), which has analyzed the legal systems and best practices in terms of legal capacity and access to Justice of people with disabilities in five countries.
• March 2016, Brussels (Belgium) Participation in the Political Conference on disability and organization of governing bodies.
• April 2016 – Moldova Participation in the “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” project development workshop and participation in the annual Conference organized by EASPD.
• September 2012, September 2014: UDAF-FTCG Conference Series, Occitan region.
• September 2016 in Budapest (Hungary) Participation in the “New Dimensions on Social Protection Towards Community Based Living” Technical Conference.
• September 2016. Participation in the pilot project “Increasing our understanding of how we can improve the health of people living in vulnerable and isolated situations across Europe,” launched by the European Commission, VulnerAble
• October 2016 – Brussels (Belgium) Participation in the “Entelis” Seminar “Technology for unlocking human potential: roadmaps for closing the digital divide for people with disabilities”
• October 2016 – Brussels (Belgium) Participation in the conference of the EASPD “20 Years on the Road”