THIRD TRANSNATIONAL MEETING WITHIN THE ESIPP PROJECT

Abstract

In the period from 15 to 16 of June 2016 at the Faculty of Philosophy, the 3rd transnational meeting of organizations including ESIPP-project (Equity and Social Inclusion trough Positive Parenting) was held. The meeting was hosted by Macedonian Scientific Society for Autism.
On June 15, attendees were welcomed by Prof. Dr. Lena Damovska, Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and Prof. Dr. Vladimir Trajkovski. Then, representatives from the University of Northampton David Preece with Paul Bramble, who was present via Skype talked about the activities and the state of project management, and David Preece explained the project report.
Dr. Jasmina Stosic from Faculty for Education and Rehabilitation from Zagreb the state of delivery workstream.
Parents from R. Hrvatska and R. Macedonia showed satisfaction from participating in the training. Loizos Simenou from the European University of Cyprus spoke about the realized and future activities related to sustainability of the project.
Cristina Fernandez from Autism Europe presented dissemination plan and its ongoing implementation, visits to the project website and social networks.
Prof. Dr. Vladimir Trajkovski MSSA informed the results of anonymous questionnaire about the quality of implementation of the second transnational meeting held in January in Cyprus. For the participation of parents and parent groups Julia Hardcastle of Autism Concern presented the current situation.
On June 16, the positive personal experiences from the cooperation between organizations involving the project were stated for better understanding cultural characteristics of different countries, spreading new friendships and improved skills for project work. Also, there were specified dates for future transnational meetings and it was talked about preparations for the next XI European Congress for Autism "Happy, healthy, empowered," which will be held in September 2016 in Edinburgh. ESIPP project will participate in a poster presentation, titled "Developing parent education in autism in South East Europe."
The team, responsible for implementation and evaluation of training for parents of children with autism, evaluated past trainings from R. Croatia and Macedonia and presented future topics for the next training from Ron Fortuna and Angela Capper from Target Autism.
In addition to working activities, the guests had possibility to visit Archaeological museum at Faculty of Philosophy, to meet the city of Skopje with all its beauties and land marks.
On June 17, 2016 in POU "Dr Zlatan Sremac" Skopje, 17 parents of children with autism from different parts of the Republic Macedonia had the opportunity to participate in two workshops, "Issues related to problems in eating and sleep patterns in children with autism," held by Ron Fortuna and Angela Capper from the organization "Target Autism" and "Puberty and adolescence in autism" held by Dr David Preece from the University of Northampton. Also, parents had the opportunity to talk with Julia Hardcastle, parent of two children with autism from the parent organization "Autism Concern" from Northampton.