30 March 2012

In honour of the 2012 European Year of Active Ageing and Solidarity between Generations, the next Eurodiaconia Award will focus on projects and services that contribute to promoting active ageing, in residential care and in the community. The Award aims to raise awareness of diaconal work, facilitate mutual learning among members of Eurodiaconia and highlight an issue in Eurodiaconia's area of work.

The European Year 2012 seeks to promote active ageing in three areas: employment, participation in society and independent living. As Eurodiaconia’s members’ work focuses on the last two areas the Award aims to profile work in relation to the participation in society and independent living of older people. The ultimate aim should be to promote their social inclusion, essentially to improve their quality of life.

Fostering solidarity between older and younger people contributes to the social inclusion of older people as well as social cohesion in general. As promoting solidarity between generations is designed to be mainstreamed in all the actions of the Year, projects/services that have an intergenerational element are especially welcomed.

More information on the Award, including how entries are evaluated, can be found in the Award Description and Entry Procedure here. The application form can be found here and entries are accepted until the 15^th of July.

In 2007 Eurodiaconia began an annual award programme to recognise best practice in diaconal social work. Its purpose is to raise awareness of diaconia and communicate the unique identity of diaconia to European decision makers, build connections between diaconal organisations throughout Europe and encourage diaconal best practice sharing across borders.