Inclusion in Pissouri village
2022-1-CY02-ESC30-SOL-000051953
Inclusion in Pissouri Village
- a wonderful village with wonderfull people.
Just to mention the most important to all is that in recent years, great importance has been given to the tourist development of the area and especially the Pissouri beach, which has a special beauty and which in recent years has been awarded the Blue Flag of Europe. The Columbia Hotel is built in the beach area as well as many other tourist accommodations, restaurants, and tourist shops. Pissouri can be described as one of the most remarkable tourist areas of Cyprus because it combines mountain and sea.
Due to this development, we started the last 20 years to have a lot of people from other countries stay in Pissouri since they want to work, or they want to have a better life in Pissouri. Last 2 years a lot of immigrants and a lot of minorities or refugees have been coming to the Pissouri area to live here and to have a better life. We noticed that most of the time these people are always discriminated against and they are not part of the real life in Pissouri, but they are alone with their friends and other immigrants and they don't have in their company people from the area.
Through this action we want to involve young people and children belonging to vulnerable families (single parents, poor families, any health problems, who have been bullied due to a different situation they are experiencing, due to low self-esteem, other people with reduced opportunities) who have low self-esteem with young people who are cut off from the social environment of our Community (foreigners, refugees, ethnic minorities and generally people who came for a better life in Pissouri and the situation did not help them to get involved enough in our Community) in mixed groups to work together and to develop through their own involvement their self-esteem but also their self-improvement in many skills that they will acquire during the 12-month program of activities that we will develop. The involvement of the participants in these different groups of people with reduced opportunities of these different groups with the diversity that characterizes each and their involvement in actions within the community of Pissouri, will help them develop skills and engage in the commons of our community. something that will help in their integration into the Social set. So the most basic goal of our actions is to integrate people with reduced opportunities in our Community to integrate and develop social skills and self-esteem through the development of many other educational skills from the actions that will be developed.
The idea came from the whole team led by Polyxeni Nikolaou who is a young graduate of the Gymnastics Academy, a volunteer youth worker in ACPELIA organisation and an ardent supporter of non-formal education. Polyxeni, after raising her concerns to the group of volunteers and the president of the ACPELIA Association, decided on the specific program that will be developed by our team throughout the program.
In addition, through the project, the residents of the community of Pissouri as well as the surrounding communities will be made aware of issues:
- Solidarity and mutual assistance between residents
- Voluntary offer to vulnerable groups
- Interaction of the new generation with the older generations
- Interaction with people of other nationalities and origins
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Acceptance of diversity.
If you are interesting to be part of our groups to get involved please apply to the link: https://forms.gle/ExV9YYqpJkUcmFBr9
MORE THAN A VILLAGE - INCLUSIVE VILLAGE
Our friendly volunteers will make you feel at home. Come and have your chance to be invlonved in an inclusive society.
Designing the program
In designing the program, our primary goal was to cultivate a new habit in the recipients of our activities. We realized that to achieve this we needed to focus: In the transmission of knowledge, in cultivating skills and in experiencing something new. So, we set both qualitative and quantitative goals that will benefit the community and at the same time keep us alert. We focused on two quality goals, which represent the change we want to see both in the people who will participate in our activities and in the community:
-The awareness of the public on issues of integration of people who have a difference
-The awareness of mainly the young but also the rest of the inhabitants of the community and the surrounding communities in matters of solidarity to vulnerable groups and the older generations through the activities that will be done with voluntary work.
To achieve our quality goals, we set specific and achievable quantitative goals:
- Achieving our activities according to the program that we quote below, and we have it in the Annexes in the form of Table and description.
- The involvement of at least 15 young people from the Community of Pissouri and the surrounding Communities in the process of activities (3 groups of 5 people according to their age).
- The awareness of at least 200 citizens on issues of integration and inclusion of people with different backgrounds from the community of Pissouri and the surrounding communities with the actions that we will implement.
Main Aim
As can be seen through the twelve-month ( https://inclusioninpissouri.webnode.page/timetable/ ) program we have drawn up for the duration of our project, one of the most basic goals is to involve young people who are in some way isolated from the Community. We struggle to involve them with our natives, something that can happen through their own actions, involvement that will make them feel welcome in our community environment. We want through their involvement with non-formal education activities as we mention to get to know our community, to get involved with the community and to become more active citizens in our village. We live in different societies and since the world as it is bringing different people to live together, we must have an acceptance of the diversity of each person and through this acceptance we must be able to accept each person and include him in our own small society.
Target groups (Diverse Groups)
Our main target group is people with fewer opportunities in the community of Pissouri and surrounding communities. These individuals will be selected with the assistance and guidance of the Community authorities, the Pissouri Social Welfare Association and other organized groups concerned with the well-being of needy individuals and families. Vulnerable people can be people who have financial, social, educational, mobility or other difficulties as well as foreigners (refugees, economic migrants, or other migrants). The coronavirus pandemic has aggravated the situation of vulnerable people and has put people in a difficult position who may not have previously been included in the vulnerable groups. For example, many people have lost their income, or it has decreased. In addition, many young people have been forced to return to their paternal homes to reduce their expenses, resulting in low self-esteem and, as a result, being socially vulnerable.
A secondary target group is the public of the community of Pissouri and the surrounding communities. Through the activities of our program, we aim to inform and sensitize at least 200 citizens regarding our different actions and their involvement in some of our actions that have to do with external activities.
Our team is also a direct target of our program. Through the implementation of the program, we will come across the difficulties and problems faced by those who start their own project. Although we have studied our program a lot, we have contacted the local authority, the Social Welfare Association of Pissouri and some businessmen and artists of the Community, as in any new beginning there may be minor problems. Through the implementation of the program, we will acquire new and improve our existing skills, such as teamwork, bargaining power, taking initiatives and other skills.
Benefits to our community
Our community will benefit much more from our actions because through the involvement of these young people in the activities they will be able to see their own culture and learn their own ideals and may eventually see that we are all human beings, regardless of nationality, peculiarity or even diversity of each of us. We believe that through our actions the individuals of our community will meet all these different individuals of the groups and there will be a smooth acceptance and integration of these individuals with other residents of the Community as they will now act as a group and belong to the volunteer groups of the ACPELIA association.