An EMRBI EU Project in progress – an Internet portal for the aging population for them to be better and continuously integrated into current cultural, social, political, technological or economic life events.
Feeling Younger by Getting Older – An EMRBI EU Project in progress
On the sunny Saturday morning of 7 September 2013, under the auspices of a Grundtvig LLP project funded by IDEP Cyprus, several team members of the “Feeling Younger by Getting Older” (FYGO) have organized an innovative ICT training for elderly citizens. The project’s final mission is to develop an Internet portal for the aging population for them to be better and continuously integrated into current cultural, social, political, technological or economic life events. Creating a nexus and mutual skill and knowledge transfer between the elderly and their young counterparts is a further key aim of the project. The training was initiated by Euro Med Business research Institute (EMRBI) and the project team included: Prof. Demetris Vrontis, president EMRBI and Dean at the University of Nicosia, Prof. Hans Ruediger Kaufmann, vice-president EMRBI and faculty of the University of Nicosia, Dr. Simona Mihai Yiannaki from European University Cyprus,; EMRBI’s coordinator of the project, Ms. Yioula Papakyriakou, former Rotary Club president and Ms. Georgia Sakka from Youth Board Cyprus.
For the first time, an organized group of 15 elderly citizens were trained by a group of 16 very young volunteers from Youth Board Cyprus, led by Ms. Georgia Sakka, who are very much experienced in web browsing and internet application. The friendly and relaxed environment was created by the informal one-to-one coaching, “like a personal coach” as one ‘learner’ mentioned, and the evaluation interview showed an interesting conclusion: the elderly felt much more integrated in the society, felt more relaxed less frustrated and more capable when using internet as they thought they would before the seminar they realized that what the youngster do nowadays with the social media and social networks is pretty much “what we used to do when speaking over the phone years ago”.
The inter-generational co-operation resulted in that both groups were very enthusiastic about this opportunity and were looking forward to the next training session, to which we hope to invite also many other elderly interested in deciphering the internet mystery. They felt they can now do more things by themselves, from looking online for their better health, entertainment, social networking, reading news when they happen, buying online or booking their holidays and some for ongoing professional activities. The training space was sponsored by the University of Nicosia.
For more information about FYGO visit our FB page: Fygo-Feeling-Younger-by-Getting-Older and our project website: www.feeling-younger.eu