accessible and quality training for students with disabilities

1. Feeling for Full Life
Daniela Manova
Lecturer in Medical College
“Yordanka Filaretova”
Medical University
Sofia
manova_dany@abv.bg

2. If a person cannot work what he/she loves, they must
learn to love what they work. (a Japanese proverb)
In their childhood, people don’t usually choose to work
with people with disabilities. It just happens and then a
different value system is built.
I started working with children with cerebral palsy in
1990.
Since 1995 I have been teaching masseurs with visual
impairment.

3. AIM OF THIS PRESENTATION
• To present the academic and professional training of masseurs
with visual impairments which is the only one in Bulgaria
• To present the results of the joint work with Marie Curie
Association within Q4S project

4. TRAINING OF MASSEOURS WITH VISUAL
IMPAIRMENTS IN MEDICAL COLLEGE “YORDANKA
FILARETOVA” – SOFIA, BULGARIA
Employment is a key to social integration and is one
of the most important ways of combating social
exclusion of people with disabilities and promoting
of their independent life and dignity. Therefore one
of the educational goals set for “Masseur with Visual
Impairment” major is acquiring of knowledge and
skills through which they are socially integrated,
their independence is encouraged and their dignity is
preserved.

5. THIS IS US

6. HISTORY
• This major has been established through initiative of the
Ministry of Health, Ministry of Labour and Social Policy and
Union of the Blind in Bulgaria
• Training started in 1976 and during the first few years students
without visual impairments were also trained
• Since 1997 the training course continues for three years and
students over 71% disability (loss of working capacity) are
accepted

7. EDUCATION
• Tertiary – “Professional Bachelor” degree
• Form – full time training
• Duration of study – 3 years
• Curriculum – 3350 hours

8. METHODS OF EDUCATION
• Audio tapes
• Lectures and exercises that are visualized through models and enlarged
schemes. When using multimedia and educational videos they are
accompanied by a detailed description
• Demonstrations done simultaneously by both trainer’s and student’s hands
• Thematic discussions
• Workshops
• Self-preparation
• For educational workshops – working with patients

9. TRAINING EXERCISE

10. EXERCISE IN MASSAGE

11. EXERCISE IN MASSAGE

12. KINESITHERAPY EXERCISE

13. PROFESSIONAL COMPETENCES
• To work in massage rooms in rehabilitation hospitals and medical centers
• Sports teams
• Hydropathic offices
• Heat treatment rooms
• Hotels and SPA Hotels – SPA and Wellness
• Fitness clubs

14. JOINT WORK WITH MARIE CURIE ASSOCIATION WITHIN
Q4S PROJECT
• March, 2011 – first meeting
• Results – through the survey made about accessibility and
quality of the training environment we got a real assessment
for the actual students’ attitude towards the training, teachers,
ways of teaching, and organization of the teaching process.

15. JOINT WORK WITH MARIE CURIE ASSOCIATION WITHIN
Q4S PROJECT
• The study of the students’ needs through specialized for
people with disabilities website exceeded its goals
• On the basis of the conclusions made, students, trainers and
the college have an acquisition – speaking blood pressure
measuring apparatus, tape recorders and purchasing of a
computer with specialized software for people with disabilities
is forthcoming

16. Website presentation www.q4s.eu – March, 2011
• It provoked excitement and curiosity
• It was held in hearty working environment
• Students were extremely concentrated
• They demonstrated different ways for using of computer – through
large sized font or a magnifier. There were students who did not
have computer skills and it was difficult for them to follow the
meaning of the text
• Many discussions, questions, comments, recommendations – active
involvement

17. Website presentation www.q4s.eu – March, 2011

18. Website presentation www.q4s.eu – March, 2011

19. Website presentation www.q4s.eu – March, 2011

20. POSITIVE ASPECT
• Rich and varied information material
• Thematically structured and understandable
• Interesting and of great benefit for the students
• Interesting and of great benefit for the trainers especially the part
related to skills
• There are links to different ministries and organizations

21. THE MOST INTERESTING
• Case studies
 They provoked different associations and willingness to tell their own
stories

22. THE MOST INTERESTING
• Self-review profiler
 Connecting individual characteristics of students with a skill
immediately distinguished several groups. Those who could
not use a computer were interested in section “ICT Skills”
 “Group work” was also interesting especially in combination
with visual impairments
 The links in this section were visited and there were
recommendations for updating the information and including
of judo for visually impaired. Other sports, such as goal-ball,
chess, and even shooting were also mentioned.

23. THE MOST INTERESTING
• Useful Information
 The links there are really useful and additionally extend the
information
• Disability and Skill Guides
 The option for printing is convenient and can be used at any
time by parents and relatives

24. RECOMMENDATIONS
• Information for professional realization to be added
• To add links with labour offices and employers
• Workplaces of people with visual impairments to be popularized – for
example specialized rehabilitation hospitals or other places as well as the
different professions in which traditionally or not visually impaired people
are trained
• To create forum

25. RECOMMENDATIONS
• To extend the age scope for which the website is intended
 Information there is useful even for those who are going to
make choice for professional realization
 Parents can help themselves and their child when they are
informed in time for any difficulties and the respective
enabling strategies
• To promote the site in medical institutions and by the social
workers

26. SUMMARY
• Students’ opinion for the website and its information was
different from the experts’ one
 Students searched and found information related to their
difficulties
 Experts found terminological inconsistencies

27. SUMMARY
• According to students, who are the real users of the website, it
is:
 accessible
 abundant in information
 necessary
 provoking
 lacking in information about professions

28. CONCLUSIONS
• Contacts and meetings with MCA in one year made the
students to rethink their attitude towards learning and to
become more responsible
• Students’ participation in the three meetings is outside their
curriculum and is expression for their active behaviour
• At the beginning for us, the trainers, it was a real challenge to
convince them to participate and to be active

29. CONCLUSIONS
• Participation in this project improved the trust between
teachers/trainers and students and even if this is the only thing
we have done, it is too much for these people, who mostly
expect to be unnoticed.
• When a person realizes their strengths and their real situation
then he/she finds strength to live with all that he/she has and to
go ahead.

30. THANK YOU!
• For ethic and sympathetic attitude of MCA’s team
• That the team has a person with visual impairments who does
her work with a smile and this is a hope that it is possible for a
person with disability to realize successfully
• For the opportunity for a student in “Masseur” major to
participate in National Advisory Group meeting and he was
given a chance to express his competent opinion about the
software and the accessibility of the website.

31. THANK YOU!
I WISH YOU SUCCESS
AND
LET ALL THAT YOU HAVE SOWN TO
SPROUT