ACPELIA Cyprus
ACPELIA Cyprus
Our organisation is volunteering organisation so we don't have any paid staff but we worked all volunteering, when we have approved projects in themes that we work on them then independentad contracts are done with the suitable youth workers, trainers and project managers so to be able to make all the activities from these contracts. We have more than 50 youth workers, learners and members of the group who are willing to work with our organisation and who are ready for being employed according to the needs of each plan. In the organisation we are working in a lot of themes according to the needs of the area and generally youth workers that are working for our organisation. For this project we are going to have the following team for implementation of all the activities of the program.
Nikolas Nikolaou (Project Manager)
Nikolas Nikolaou (president of NGO ACPELIA) plays a central or peripheral role in every project with his expert knowledge. Due to the fact that he is successful as a coach and organizer in his personal life as we can see from the small CV that follows he is going to have 2 evenings training of youth workers about his experience in coaching.
President of ACPELIA (Mr Nikolas Nikolaou, physics teacher in high school, BSC, MSc in Chemical Engineering National Technical University of Athens and MSc, BSc in the University of Cyprus at Physics department) has previous experience by taking part in many seminars and actions related to Environment, Non-Formal Education, Entrepreneurship and Discrimination. He organized and participated in more than 20 European programs which are doing with Non-Formal Education (KA105, KA205, KA229, Youth In Action) as well as several local environmental and Science projects with groups of young people, many of them can be found in his website: www.nikolas-nikolaou.net. Also, Nikolas is coordinating the biggest students and teacher annual Conference about Natural Sciences that is a yearly conference in Cyprus with the participation of more than 1000 students and more than 300 teachers. He manages to coach a team of the organising committee and to make them all do well for 10 years now that is taking place the Conference starting alone and now has a big team to coordinate.
Erma Georgiou (Management team, trainer)
Erma Georgiou, gained a BA in Theatre Studies from the University of Athens, and then graduated from the drama school of G. Armenis.She is also registered as a yoga and meditation teacher from Yoga Alliance Institute and has attended various seminars on theatrical techniques such as physical theatre, voice lessons e.t.c.But, she is always searching ways to empower people and finding therapy through arts and therefore she attended drama therapy lessons. She has worked with children of refugee background in Elix N.G.O at Athens and she attended to the workshop "Facilitate Teachers using the arts in working with groups'' from P.Y.E organization and she was impressed by the creativity of the process as well as the potential of arts to empower people.
At the moment,she is working as a school assistant empowering students with social and educational difficulties,she is also teaching drama lessons to kids and adults in the afternoons and empowering through drama activities people with mental health needs in the psychiatric ward of the Limassol hospital.She has a great passion in the development of individuals as well as groups, and this is the reason that she decided to collaborate and become a trainer at the NGO Acpelia. She worked as a trainer in more than 10 projects implemented by ACPELIA last 2 years.
Kyriacos Stouppas, Youthworker/Trainer
My name is Kyriacos Stouppas, I live in Cyprus and I am a Youthworker, Trainer of Non Formal Learning and a Project Manager.
I am actively involved in local and EU projects providing awareness, mentoring and educational activities. I am a a member and a volunteer in many local NGOs. Trough my work I support and promote values such as Democracy, Active citizenship, Life Long Learning, Social Inclusion, Volunteerism, Human rights, and Sustainable Development.
Dimitra Alexandrou, Youthworker
My name is Dimitra Alexandrou, I am 26 years old. I studied midwifery in the university of west Attica. I have been working as a midwife the last three years. I am excited to be part of the childbirth process and helping women experience labor in the way they wish. The studies included theoretical teaching, laboratory, clinical exercises and six months of internship.
Currently I am studying Human Resource Management (MSc) in the University of Cyprus, to further explore the field I am passionate about - everything that focuses on humans. As a part of my Masters degree in 2022 i certified in Structures, Job Design, Workforce Planning and Psychometric Measurement issued by Evalion - SHL Greece & Cyprus. In 2021 i was qualified as an Infant Massage Instructor by the International Association of Infant Massage (IAIM).
Eva Christodoulou, youthworker/trainer
My name is Eva and i live in Cyprus. My first degree is in Sociology and i have postgraduate studies in "Public Relations" and in "Creative Arts and Animation/Encouragement".
I am a Youth Worker, Facilitator and Trainer under the Erasmus+ projects. I also coordinate and create educational programs and workshops for children and adults based on non formal education and experiential learning. The tools I use are inspired from mindfulness techniques, personal development, holistic and ecocentric education, creative arts (drama, body movement, music, games etc), yoga philosophy and practice, psychology and many more. I am a certified Yoga teacher specialized in kids yoga and people with special needs and i have a background in public relationships, event planning, fundraising events, management and marketing.
Activism and volunteerism are my biggest passions in my life and what characterises me the most, is my sensitivity towards social welfare, environmental sustainability, animal justice and humanitarianism.
Gavriela Loukaidou, youthworker
My name is Gavriela, from Nicosia Cyprus, but I like to think of myself as a global citizen. I don't believe that a job title defines us, but I do believe that we give meaning to whatever we decide to do. Even from a young age, I couldn't imagine myself doing just one thing for the rest of my life as I had many and different interests.
My main passions have to do with human rights, gender equality, diversity and inclusion of marginalised people and mental health awareness. I studied Business and Public Administration at the University of Cyprus, majoring in Management. I also have a diploma in Digital Marketing and Branding. As far as my professional career is concerned, I so far have worked in Marketing, both traditional and in the digital space, but I aspire to also get involved in other fields such as Human Resources and Strategic Project Management. During my studies I did an Erasmus student exchange in Germany, which is what firstly introduced me to youth mobility. Since 2022 I have been involved in numerous Erasmus+ projects, which I plan to keep up as it is something that fulfills me. .
Stella Komodromou, Youthworker/trainer
Stella Komodromou is an Environmental Scientist, volunteer in European projects through several organizations. She is an expert in non-formal activities, volunteer in the organisation, youth worker and trainer in several projects and themes of our organisation. As youth worker she took part in the following Erasmus Plus Programs: Give value to our land (Limassol, Cyprus, 2012), Biodiversity and Active Learning (Limassol, Cyprus, 2013), Climate Changes As Fast As Fashion (Cyprus 2014), Non-Formal Environmental Education (Cyprus, 2015), Connecting the Alps with EURopean habitats (Austria, 2016), SEMEP, South Eastern Environmental Mediterranean Program (Romania, 2017), Save Our Environment Save OurSelves (2018 - 2019), Another Way, Trainer of the program.
In the organisation we are working in a lot of themes according to the needs of the area and generally youth workers that are working for our organisation. Such themes are:
Culture and Interculture activities: Main Aim of the Organisation is to rescue, preservation and transmission of cultural heritage, sustainability of the environment and national traditions of Cyprus, as expressed through dancing, singing, music and customs of the Island. Cultural activities promote social inclusion, human rights and help in the limitation of the discrimination among the generations. To promote the above-mentioned important values, the association is organizing cultural, informative, educational, and interactive activities for youth with the new European Programs department of the association.
Digital Competences: We are working in a lot of projects with digitalization of them according to the needs of each project. You can see that in each project we have webpages, our webpage is organized, and all these are being done from our youth workers in different programs.
Social and Environmental Entrepreneurship activities: Social entrepreneurship is an approach by individuals, groups, start-up companies or entrepreneurs, in which they develop, fund and implement solutions to social, cultural, or environmental issues. We are working in a lot of programs providing skills to our youth workers in this area.
Inclusion: Through all the above activities we are trying always to include persons with fewer opportunities so to be able to always have activities for inclusion. We are trying always to include participants with fewer opportunities and health problem to our project.
Environmental Research and Science themes: The research in our Science Department has to do with scientific themes such as Environment, Energy, Circular Economy, Renewable Energy Sources. In the projects that we are doing this year with cooperation of other organizations with our members they are involved more than 70 youngsters. In these projects our first goals is to make the young people to learn how to learn.
Human and Women's Rights against Discrimination
Main Aim of the Organisation is to help a lot of people, youngsters and provide problems in discrimination in a lot of areas like sexual orientation, women's rights, human rights, social inclusion, racism, and a lot of other themes which our youngsters are facing. We are working in these themes with youth workers which they work as lawyers in Human Rights, and with our youth workers which are members who are personally involved with these themes.
Music, Theater, Drama and Arts: We have a registered as a yoga and meditation teacher from yoga Alliance Institute and has attended various seminar on theatrical techniques such as physical theatre, voice lessons e.t.c. We create groups in our organization with youngsters so to give them education about self-improvement with theater and drama Non formal activities.
Tourism programs according to our area: Tourism could play a crucial role in the development of European regions and reduce the negative effects of economic crisis. Services and output created for touristic purposes contribute to the local development by creating new jobs that can compensate the industrial or local downfall, safeguard and enhance the natural and cultural heritage in branches like the artistic one, the branch of local gastronomy or the defense of biodiversity. Last year and for the following 2 years our organisation is working in KA205 program which has to do with touristic paths for people with problems in vision and we are trying through this program to make some touristic path so to be explored with all the others emotions except from vision, so this paths to be understood also in a different way from people with vision problems also.
Sports: Since our local area is a Rural touristic Area in Cyprus we are organizing a lot of local and international events for tourism in rural tourism and thematic trips for youth members and youngsters so to learn more about rural areas and to provide inclusion through all persons through sport and other activities like seminars and trips. Sport for children today is essentially the game of an era where fields as playgrounds have disappeared and there is no longer time, opportunity or even safety for carefree play in the neighborhoods. That is why we must not forget that the main goal of sports needs to be primarily a pleasant activity, something that will more than visible in survival games, but also a valuable experience for young people.
Mental Health: Furthermore, our purpose is to come up against the factors which depreciate the way we understand ourselves. Moreover, implementation of project in Mental Health aims to discover our strengths and to understand that hidden within every weakness are our strengths, so sometimes we must look at them from a new perspective.