Collaboration with the University of the Balearic Islands

Since 1998 Cooperativa Jovent has been working permanently with the University of the Balearic Islands (UIB). 1998 was the year in which it signed a first agreement with the Fundació Universitat Empresa that was then consolidated with the signing of a Framework Agreement Collaboration (2002).

This Framework Agreement is basically based on three lines of work:

• Evaluation and research in the field of young people with a low educational level (with the Department of Applied Pedagogy and Educational Psychology).
• Student internships at the UIB (for now with the Department of Applied Pedagogy and Educational Psychology and with the Department of Psychology).
• Promotion and participation in conferences, studies, publications … in the field of the inclusion of people at risk of social exclusion, mainly of young people with low educational level.

Collaboration with the University contributes to Jovent’s innovation, continuous improvement, and the consolidation of good practices in order to provide quality education to young people with a low educational level.

All these actions mean a commitment of the entity for external evaluation as a tool for continuous improvement, for the approach between the university world and everyday reality, for a research that contributes to reflection, improvement and the dissemination of good practices in the field of social education… In short, the establishment and consolidation of a relational framework with an interrelation that provides a true exchange of “know-how”.

Among the most significant actions carried out since 1998 we can mention:

• Students of the UIB in practice: Every year, between two and four students pass through the Centre Jovent as interns. In this way, the university is closer to the workplace and the Centre Jovent offers its own experience gained over years of work.
• Design and elaboration of a database started in January 1999 that includes personal, family, academic and work information of users before, during and after their passage through the Centre Jovent. This database has allowed three complete evaluation reports (1999, 2001, 2004) of the evolution of the profiles of the students that have gone through the Centre Jovent. It has also been the basis for developing the new student management program that was created in 2015.
• Incorporation of telephone interviews at 6,12 and 24 months after completing the labor insertion as a constituent part of the integral insertion of young people.
• Study “Condition of Success and Breaks in the Participation of the Young Population in the Devices of Education of Second Chance: the Case of the CFO Jovent” on the personal situation, the influence of the project and its evaluation obtained through in-depth interviews (17 young people).
• Preparation of a protocol for the development of teaching material that favors self-training, especially aimed at students with vulnerability factors. This protocol was implemented as of the year 2001 and is the basic material on which the young people have worked at the Centre Jovent both in the content of training in workshops and in the contents of basic training. As of 2014 the protocol was the basis for the development of the new interactive materials.
• Participation in numbers work tables, conferences, studies and publications. Some have been led by Cooperativa Jovent, in others we have simply participated as guests.