ART and SOCIAL CHANGE builds on Palermo: Uno sguardo a fuoco’s main findings as – funded by the National Health Plan 2010 – Action 12.4-b) - social rehabilitation through innovative training and therapeutic practices for people with substance misuse. A group of artists led this initiative where they explored the impact of photo-interactive activity with 26 people in a drug and alcohol treatment service formally known as SERT (Italian Public Health Service dealing with substance misuse).Participants attended a one-year informal training course during which they gained an a working knowledge of photography and its potential uses for artistic, vocational & professional purposes. The overall objective of “Palermo, a focused look” (whose scientific monitoring was done by the Department of Pathological Addictions - Research Unit - University of Palermo), was to develop an innovative approach to instigate a process of change in beneficiaries through empowerment.Project evaluation outcomes were encouraging and demonstrated a significant success rate of 88.5% where participants reported a stronger personal identity, enhanced motivation, greater awareness of emotions & how to better express themselves, increased levels of self-esteem and confidence. In addition, participation in the project also led to an increase in vocational skills related social reintegration and future educational & employment opportunities and enhanced skills in photography. Using the research and work previously done by ASP-Palermo on the project: Palermo - uno sguardo a fuoco as a starting point, ART and SOCIAL CHANGE proposes to work towards a culture shift in health organisations working within the substance misuse and recovery sector. ART and SOCIAL CHANGE involves the implementation of several innovations which differ markedly from the previous approach used by ASP-Palermo. This proposal involves a Pan-European dimension with experts on the topic coming from 5 EU countries who will share their experiences and provide their own, invaluable contributions to deliver the project outputs. ART and SOCIAL CHANGE is a cross field project with the main focus being on health care staff training, but also linking this with the innovative use of art and media as healing tool. The project hopes to expand the use of more varied forms of art and media (from just the original use of photography), to induce social-change. An important aim of the project will be to develop suitable and relevant CPD and training materials based on international research and empirical testing. This will be done using an interdisciplinary and collaborative team. This will be composed of three different elements from the partner countries i.e. artists, health professionals and people in long-term recovery working together. It will also involve the unique use of peer-to peer learning and training. This will be done through the following and innovative method: - The initial phase will be to establish an interdisciplinary collaborative team (artists, health professionals and people in long-term recovery). The teams will be selected from the piloting countries: LT, UK, FR and IT. These piloting countries will be referred to as the Peer Learning Group (PLG);- The PLG will then undertake visits to each piloting country to undertake learning, teaching and training activities (LTT) and observe current ideas and practice. Each partner involved in the piloting will also prepare a national report of the state of the art. This will be further collated by the Lithuanian partner (VIKO) to produce an international comparison report. - On the basis of the research and the results of the LLT, the (DE) VET provider will coordinate all the partner countries with the purpose of devising and delivering a CPD training framework and training materials; - The CPD framework and training materials will be piloted, tested and cascaded in three phases. The first phase will be undertaken directly by the piloting countries IT, FR, LT and the UK, who will test and evaluate the framework and training materials amongst themselves. In the second phase, using the results of the evaluation and any subsequent amendments, the framework and training materials will be tested with actual service users in each pilot country; this will also be further evaluated. The third phase will then involve peer-to-peer training, where health workers will train co-health workers using the final version of the framework and training materials.- Alongside this, partners will have to prepare documentary evidence of the training and the process using video format. This will be coordinated by La Maison de l’image (FR).- A set of written guidelines for decision makers). These guidelines will be developed to inform decision makers with regards to the main findings of our transnational cooperation in order to integrate the “ART and SOCIAL CHANGE” training in the CPD programmes. This will be coordinated by Mano-guru (LT).