Description

Nowadays autism affects 3.3 million people in the European Union – about 1 person out of 150 is diagnosed with this handicap in Europe. Although specific efforts have been made by the autism plans with regards to diagnose, specialized education and access toordinary life, the teenager phase leading towards independent life, a particularly critical phase, is very inadequately covered and funded.

Facing these observations, the challenge is to better know the European frames, the will and needs of concerned stakeholders andto be able to offer existing innovative tools and methods to professionals (education, social) to accompany the transition towards mainstream and independent life. Professionals need to access networks and existing practices in terms of training and intervention processes. The TRAIL project will address these professionals in order to help them to better accompany the transition phase, teenagers being indirect beneficiaries.

General objective:
To contribute to the identification and the implementation of best practices for professionals and of intervention frameworks that would allow the support of the adolescence phase and their access to ordinary life. Final objective will be to enable completion and/or recommendations of national or European plans for autism.

Operational objectives
-To identify the existing good practices, looking particularly into what has been set up in the States and in Canada with regards to means such as “toolbox” but also practices or initiatives existing in Europe – if possible during the duration of the project also study the transfer criteria and possibilities
-To transfer 2 innovative methods and tools already spotted : Interactive theatre and scriptwriting (Sweden – TP TEATERN) to personalize accompaniment and also to set up collaborative solutions between different stakeholders and teenagers themselves, Mobile units (APAJH38 – Lyon) intervening directly during the independant life as a tailor-made support and also adapt the HIPE 4 days-course (TOI Leonardo 2012) which will be completed with the specificities of transition phase
-To set up professional communities and to enrich them via tools such as social WEB in order to sustain collaboration between different stakeholders who rarely work together (researchers, professionals, institutions, decision-makers and financers)
-To define the criteria and indicators that would allow the anticipation of the teenagers’ accompaniment to ordinary life
-To study the intervention or support possibilities (and in which form) of the institutional actors or financers to make deployment of innovative actions possible, within the partnership countries.