Customer: Commission of the European Communities, DG Education and Culture

Duration: December 2002 – December 2005

One of the fastest growing sectors in modern economy is that of services. This sector is creating thousands of jobs Europe-wide annually. A significant part of these jobs are related to service support operations, such as after sales support, public relations and most important of all, helpdesk services. Currently, the employment of PSN (People with Special Needs) in the service sector is far below the average, due to a number of associate difficulties, such as how to reach the office, office adaptations needed, lack of the skills required, low level of computer knowledge, etc.
TELL-IT intends to develop a multimedia, flexible and continuing training program for on-the-job training for people with mobility and/or visual impairment in order to be employed in the service provision sector and, more specifically, in helpdesk operations. In addition, a teleworking module will be developed, together with a relevant training program, in order to help PSN with more severe disabilities to work from their home. Finally, the project develops life-long training schemes for its users, taking into account the constant evaluation of help-desk services and support technologies.
The developed services will be tested and optimised in Pilots in three EU countries, namely in the helpdesk of a mobile telephone company in Spain, a computer knowledge certification company in Greece, and a disabled training centre in Ireland; all of which belong to relevant pan- European networks. However, the Consortium draws experience from two more European countries with developing Partners, namely Belgium and the UK, thus establishing a truly pan-European knowledge repository on the subject.
Thus, the project will result in the significant and continuing improvement of vocational skills of PSN in relation to Help Desk functions, their acquaintance with new, ICT tools operation knowledge and ability to work with the public and support public services. The latter is further promoted by the Pilot extension of the highly recognised ECDL computer knowledge accreditation and licensing schemes to the relevant knowledge of PSN for helpdesk tasks.

Role of TREDIT:
– Development of the multimedia software that will be used for the training of the disabled persons