On International Day of Persons with Disabilities 2021, UNESCO called for coordinated actions by private and public stakeholders in the Caribbean Small Island Developing States, SIDS, to remove barriers so persons with disabilities can fully enjoy their human rights and fundamental freedoms. A prerequisite for this is the advancing of legislation to protect these citizens from discrimination and exclusion and to ensure their meaningful participation in society on an equal basis with others.
The Centre for Disability Studies at The University of the West Indies (UWICDS) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, UNESCO, in the Caribbean have jointly prepared the Training Manual for Understanding Persons with Disabilities and their Meaningful Inclusion.
This manual is aimed at equipping policy makers, media professionals, youth with disabilities, youth-led organizations, and the wider society, with a clear understanding of how to meaningfully engage persons with disabilities, in line with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
This manual is also designed to be used as a basis for trainings that aim to raise awareness how to meaningfully engage persons with disabilities in the Caribbean.
This training manual contains four main axes:
- What is disability and who constitutes persons with disabilities?
- Understanding the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Declaration of Pétion Ville;
- How to communicate with persons with disabilities?
- What is advocacy in the context of persons with disabilities
