During two days, the meeting of the Southern European region took place at the headquarters of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa (UCP) in Porto.
The agenda included a meeting with the civil society organisations with which the UCP carries out its service-learning and community outreach activities, a seminar and a visit to one of the centres where students carry out community activities as part of their training.
The Seminar entitled: “Transforming the University through Service-Learning” brought together, at the UCP Carvalho Guerra Auditorium, representatives of the institutions that make up the Uniservitate Programme in the Southern Europe region: University of Deusto (Bilbao, Spain) as regional hub of the programme, St Mary’s University (London), Universitá Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (Milan and Rome), UCP authorities, students, professors, community partners and experts in the field.
Opening by Isabel Capeloa Gil, UCP
The opening ceremony was attended by Isabel Capeloa Gil, rector of the organising university, and then gave way to an agenda of conferences in which among others participated Nieves Tapia, director of CLAYSS and María Rosa Tapia, global coordinator of the Uniservitate Programme. Then, in the afternoon, teachers and students from UCP shared some SL experiences with the participation of Luisa Mota Ribeiro and Ana Oliveira from UCP. Finally, the day concluded with a group exchange on barriers and facilitators for the development of service-learning projects facilitated by Maria Rosa Tapia.
Nieves Tapia, CLAYSS
The second day’s activities included a lecture by Andrés Peregalli, from the Uniservitate Programme coordinating team. In turn, Almudena Eizaguirre and José Ramón Canedo, from the University of Deusto, presented “The process of institutionalisation of SL at the University of Deusto”.
María Rosa Tapia, Uniservitate
The end of the day found all colleagues and specialists participating in a round table in which they reflected on experiences of “Good Practices of SL through the 4 pillars: Reflection, Learning, Participation and Service”, with the participation of Marianne Rozario, (St Mary’s University), Maria José Correia (UCP), Domenico Simeone (Universitá Cattolica del Sacro Cuore), Candelaria Ferrara and Andrés Peregalli (Uniservitate Porgramme).
SL Round Table
The Seminar was a valuable opportunity to reflect together on service-learning as a catalyst for change in Universities, to strengthen ties, to exchange experiences, to debate, to rethink innovative ways of improving learning and actions with the community in a cooperative and supportive way, to share fraternally and above all to learn together.
To see the full program of activities click here
