‘Digital Inclusion for Older People’ Project was implemented to help the elderly to adapt to the rapid digital transformation that is changing our world, and to ensure sustainable improvement through strengthening intergenerational communication.

 

65+ Elderly Rights Association Board Member Dr Gülüstü Salur asserts that digital inclusion, which the association has prioritised since its establishment, has evolved from a necessity to an urgency with the pandemic. Salur points out that support towards and the growth of work on aging is “a very important goal for a healthy, productive and active life for all generations.”

 

The “Digital Inclusion for Older People” Project was implemented in 2021 to meet the digital needs of the elderly under the coordination of the 65+ Elderly Rights Association, in collaboration with 50 Plus Hellas, the most active and experienced association in the field of the elderly in Greece. Dr Gülüstü Salur said that the digital world covers a wide spectrum from daily shopping to health and banking services, from public services to cultural and educational activities. According to Salur, learning the language of the digital world by the elderly strengthens their participation in social and cultural life and accelerates their transformation.

 

The main activities of the project, implemented in the Sixth Phase of the Civil Society Dialogue Programme for 15 months, included the preparation of training programmes for digital information literacy, training young volunteers to provide digital inclusion trainings, development of elder-friendly applications and games. The sustainable, reproducible, and transferable content of the educational materials, which also have Greek and English versions, was developed with the support of the project partner 50 Plus Hellas.

 

Digital friends: Role of municipalities and universities in the project

Municipalities and universities were among the greatest supporters of the “Digital Inclusion for Older People” Project. The participants of the project included Bağcılar, Bayrampaşa, Beşiktaş̧, Şişli and Zeytinburnu Municipalities, Bezmialem Vakıf University, Istanbul Technical University Computer and Information Engineering Faculty and Boğaziçi University Computer Engineering Department.

 

“Digital Inclusion for Older People: Call for Joint Action on the Role of Municipalities” event, organised in April 2022 with the cooperation of the 65+ Elderly Rights Association and the Marmara Municipalities Union, featured discussions on the roles that the municipalities could take within the scope of the project. The municipalities that took an active role in the project also shared their own experiences in the event.

 

Trainings were delivered to young/peer volunteers called ‘Digital Friends’, with the support of municipalities and universities, on topics of aging, adult learning methods, monitoring and evaluation, and technological learning. These trainings provided theoretic and practical information to the elderly in the use of smartphones, tablets, computers, and applications.

 

Şişli Municipality Gerontological Services Officer Tuğçe Tıngır spoke about their inclusion in the project, “Actually, the digital inequalities experienced by the elderly have always existed. But it has become more visible with the pandemic. We were involved in the ‘Digital Inclusion’ Project to encourage the participation of the elderly in social life and to increase their quality of life.”

 

İkbal Karamık, one of the participants of the project’s “Digital Friends Meeting”, organised by Şişli Municipality in June 2022, expressed her satisfaction with the event: “I am one of the first applicants to this project. Here we learned almost everything we did not know about technology, especially about smartphones. I would like to thank those who brought this project to life.”