Author Archives: Pataki Veronika

Study tour in Pécs on our Hidden City project

Our Polish and Czech partners visited us for a three-day study tour in Pécs. In the framework of our project “Walk in our shoes”, supported by the International Visegrad Fund, we presented our Hidden City Tor-Tour to our project partners as a best practice.

On a beautiful sunny morning of the meeting, Gergő Berkes the leader of the Hidden City Tor-Tour, and his support partner Zoltán Borsodi gave a walk through the city centre, from a barrier-free perspective. And that afternoon, in our BeFogadó community space we discussed the experiences so far, listened to the Polish and Czech project reports and planned future tasks. Even a tasting of Pécs wines and an accessible visit to Cella Septichora fitted into our programme. 🙂

The study tour was the first step to visiting each other. The People First Association had previously provided an online training to Fundacija Sowelo and EYCB members on how they could create similar sensitizing city-walks. Now they have been further helped by seeing us lead a Hidden City Tor-Tour live. Fortunately, we have enthusiastic partners who not only enjoyed the walk, but also gave us very useful opinions and suggestions for improvement!

In the current phase of the project, partners have developed their individual methodologies to organise their own Hidden City Walks.
We are looking forward to the next study tours in Poznan/Poland in June, and Vrchlabi/Czech Republic in August, to see what the Polish and Czech versions of the Hidden City look like!

Thank you for being here and we’re so glad you enjoyed our city!

 

News from Poland

“We are still working on improving our city-walk. Monika has joined the
project team! We are very excited to start this collaboration.

Monika is active in supporting people with disabilities and has a lot of
experience in guiding groups. Participating in our project will allow
her to strengthen her competences.

We are actively preparing for the Pécs visit. Together we are
familiarising ourselves with materials and analysing best practices in
order to be able to participate sufficiently in the visit.

We can’t wait :)”

The organisation of the 8. Barrier-free Tourism Day has started

This is the 8th year that we and our partners have organised a national, inclusive festival where everyone can have fun together disabled and able-bodied, and where participants can try experiences that they would otherwise not have, or only very rarely. What are they? For example, driving a car as a blind person, riding a motorbike in a wheelchair, or even dragon boating…

The organization of this year’s festival started today, with a pleasant, friendly, barrier-free excursion. Thanks to this, not only the festival’s organising committee and some of its volunteers, but also the stakeholders who took part in the excursion were invited to support our work with their valuable ideas and contributions. It was great to work together and organise this year’s Barrier-free Tourism Day festival!

This year’s date is 7. September, which is not new for many regular participants. In order to be able to plan ahead, we hold the event on the first Saturday of September each year.

We are looking forward to welcoming everyone from all over the country and even from abroad, as in the past years!
Follow this year’s festival on the People First Association Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/PeopleFirstHun/), or on the Barrier-free Tourism Day Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/turizmus.akadalymentes)

 

About the database in our first ever podcast

There is a great online newspaper, Mecseki Müzli, which summarises the most important news of our region every week. And its podcasts cover interesting local or even more far-reaching topics. Veronika Pataki, the president of the association, and Hilda Kerekes, a member of the board, were happy to attend such a good-mood podcast discussion.

The main topic was our Barrier-free Pécs Database as our aim is to be identified with our association. But we also discussed the accessibility of the Mecseki Müzli. 🙂

Listen to us, we want to know how you liked it!
And follow, use, share the Barrier-free Pécs Database, because it’s GOOD FOR EVERYONE!

Click here for the podcast:
https://www.mecsekimuzli.com/people-first-egyesulet-pataki-veronika-kerekes-hilda-akadalymentes-pecs/

Fly from Pécs/or to Pécs barrier-free

Barrier-free tourism will be a key issue in the near future, that much is already certain. More and more elderly people are travelling, more and more people with disabilities are travelling – hopefully as independently as possible.

There has been an airport in Pécs for a long time, but until now it has not been possible to fly from our city for holidays or business, or only for a short time. Now, however, the opportunity has been opened up and there is a huge interest in both holidays and flights to Munich, which also offers business and family visit opportunities.

Read about the accessibility of Pécs-Pogány Airport and our cooperation in its development in our Barrier-free Pécs Database!
Pécs-Pogány Airport – People First

Az Universal Air repülője látható a kifutópályán. Hosszú, vékony, kecses repülőgép, két hatalmas motorturbinával az oldalán.

Az Universal Air repülője látható a kifutópályán. Hosszú, vékony, kecses repülőgép, két hatalmas motorturbinával az oldalán.

New international project launched

We are involved in a project with a special theme and a very topical subject, in an unusually large international partnership.
It is increasingly important that people with disabilities are able to access financial services and banking products without barriers, and that they have a thorough knowledge of this sector, of security and of the difficulties that may arise.

This is the subject of our latest international project, CODE – theCcessibility Of financial services for persons withDisabilitiEs.
This is another big step towards social inclusion.

We will be working with Italian, Spanish, Belgian, Greek, French partners, experts and of course people with disabilities themselves.
Read more about this exciting new project on our website under the Projects menu here: https://peoplefirst.hu/en/blog-post/code-erasmus-international-project/?fbclid=IwAR2VbW1r1sqQkeO-sCYL5equrCJjQrVAvU6DCzSFEzrd07KHLE8rEiLWDbA_aem_AZyrIauUVDWkCMRAfaPUmSg6iCN92Lfl0WJah6NtPHCjhKa9Lm6tK3LZ9QXSr2A8yA4qj0hHwpdowJWaEtRZn__W

CODE Erasmus+ international project

Project title:
CODE – aCcessibility Of financial services for persons withDisabilitiEs
Foster social and financial inclusion through strategic partnership. Promoting joint initiatives among stakeholders based on the exchange of good practices and skills.

Project duration:
01.12.2023. – 30.11.2026.

Partner organisations:
Chambre de Commerce Italienne de Nice (COO) – ITALY
FondazioneIstitutodei Sordi di Torino ONLUS – ITALY
Fondazione Luigi Clerici  – ITALY
Cooperation Bancaire Pour L’europe – BELGIUM
Atlantis Engineering S.A. – GREECE
Association De Patronage De L’institut Regional Des Jeunes Sourds Et Des Jeunes Aveugles De Marseille – FRANCE
Fundacio Privada Trinijove – SPAIN
People First Közhasznú Egyesület Pécs – HUNGARY

Financial inclusion is a challenge facing most EU countries. It was therefore essential to establish a broad transnational cooperation involving 8 relevant organisations from 5 different countries. In this way we are trying to enable this socio-economic challenge to be overcome.

Project summary:
The project aims to provide persons with disabilities with guidance to better access financial services and documents, and to adjust the financial services and products currently available to their needs.
Target groups of the project:
– persons with disabilities: the project aims to facilitate their understanding of the financial and banking sector through financial literacy training on the types of products and services available to them. The target group will be able to access the training materials through a web platform and related application.
– reaching the target group is also helped by the involvement of disability support networks and vocational training centers. These networks can benefit from the professional materials created and offer new services and support tools. At the same time, they can acquire new skills and knowledge in this field.
– vocational training trainers/instructors and service providers: they will have access to innovative training on access to financial services for people with disabilities. This will allow them to expand their course offerings in this direction.
Indirect target groups:
– financial institutions and banks, for whom the guidelines on the accessibility of financial services are useful information. This will enable them to design and implement more accessible services for all, while broadening their audience and reaching target groups that they have not yet reached. At the same time, managers and staff can acquire new skills through the project.
– SMEs (small and medium sized enterprises) and chambers of commerce, be able to develop good practices for integration in the workplace, learn about and apply good practices.
– political decision-makers who can further reflect on its social use by learning from the good practice training programme on financial inclusion for people with disabilities.

Involving target groups is a key element of the project, so stakeholders are involved in the national teams from the start as focus groups, brainstormers and testers.

Project outputs:
The innovation of the CODE project is that it promotes the application of the universal design model and social inclusion to the financial, banking, insurance and business environment. CODE is a pilot project that aims to enhance financial literacy among people with disabilities.
It will foster inclusion of the target group in the financial system and access to financial products/instruments by the collection and sharing of best practises of inclusion at EU level (IO1) and the creation of an interactive map for users i.e. a platform and an app that everyone can use (IO2). The project will finally create a new training course composed of modules and guidelines to be used by trainers and people with disabilities to deal with banking institutions (IO3).

The main task of People First Association as a Hungarian partner in the project is:
As in all international projects, our main task is to promote the principle of “Nothing about us without us”. In addition, our main tasks are the design and development of the CODE inclusive platform in the framework of the training course and digital tools, in cooperation with the Greek partner. And in the framework of the piloting of the course, the final fine-tuning of the materials developed with the help of our association members.

👉Follow us on Facebook too: CODE project

 

 

The communication Platform is ready to launch

The first version of the common Platform, which presents the project, the International Visegrad Fund and international best practices has been prepared. It also acts as a discussion forum for partners. The Polish and Czech teams will add their ideas to the website developed by the Hungarian partner, and then the joint work on the Platform can start. We plan to make it public and open to all interested parties after the project closes.

The Polish team is almost complete with its own sensitising city walk, but the Czech team has also been formed and is developing contacts with the city government.

We will meet in Pécs in May to present the Hidden City Tor-Tour as a best practice of the Hungarian People First Association. We also agreed on the details of this in the March online meeting.

 

The Pécs City Civic Framework is open again

It is a great pleasure when NGOs in Pécs ask the city government for something and it is implemented within a short time. This happened last year, when several civil society organisations at the Civil Forum asked for city funding to be made available through tenders. The reason for this is that many NGOs work for the people of Pécs, for those in need, often carrying out activities that the state or the municipality cannot or cannot adequately provide. A number of exemplary initiatives have been/are being implemented in Pécs by NGOs.

Last year’s Pécs City Civic Framework will continue this year, with a little more money available for applicants. It is a great achievement that – also at the request of Pécs civic activists – the call for applications was launched at the beginning of the year. The application method has also been improved, with the House of Civic Communities playing a major role as coordinator.

Listen to the PécsTV news report about this, in which, to our great delight, People First is featured prominently. Thank you PécsTV!

Barrier-free Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day can also be barrier-free.
We can help you plan by recommending pleasant barrier-free places in or around Pécs. You can also use our Barrier-free Pécs Database, which you can access by clicking the right button on every page of our website.

💘🍜Click here if you think Valentine’s Day is also a great opportunity to enjoy a delicious meal together in a restaurant, without any barriers: https://peoplefirst.hu/en/search-result/?directory_type=barrier-free-pecs&in_cat=27&q=

💘☕🍰Click here for a coffee on a soft pink cloud with a cookie: https://peoplefirst.hu/en/search-result/?directory_type=barrier-free-pecs&in_cat=28&q=

💘🌿It’s so much fun to talk during a walk or a hike, click here if you’re planning to do so on 14 February: https://peoplefirst.hu/en/search-result/?directory_type=barrier-free-pecs&in_cat=37&q=

💘🎭But a movie, theatre or other experience is also a real experience for two. Here are some barrier-free ideas:https://peoplefirst.hu/en/search-result/?directory_type=barrier-free-pecs&in_cat=36&q=

💘🎁You know what? Even shopping together isn’t a bad Valentine’s Day activity. Here are some ideas: https://peoplefirst.hu/en/search-result/?directory_type=barrier-free-pecs&in_cat=29&q=

Let us know how your Valetin day went! Or if you spent this holiday in another accessible location, we’d love to hear about that too, we have a place for it in our database.

By the way, did you know that Valentine is not only the patron saint of lovers, but also of people with mental illness and epilepsy?
In fact, even in ancient Rome, it was a day of fertility celebrations and a prophecy of matchmaking.
So let’s celebrate, have a great Valentine’s Day!