The UOC's solidarity area was set up in 2001, which coincided with the International Year for a Culture of Peace as declared by UNESCO. Initially, it was called the Campus for Peace and its goal was to place information and communication technologies (ICTs) at the service of cooperation, solidarity, literacy, sustainability, humanitarian aid and peace. Over the past four years, the project has become established and cooperation and voluntary work have become transversal activities throughout the University. The area that promotes these types of actions is now known as UOC Cooperation.
We are the university for NGOs, the charitable initiative of the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Open University of Catalonia, UOC). We run training, research and awareness-raising programmes for social and humanitarian ends using e-learning methodology to improve people’s living conditions.
The UOC’s Campus for Peace was created with a view to contributing to peace, providing solidarity to less favoured people and societies, for development cooperation, humanitarian aid and sustainability, founded on ethical principles based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Earth Charter. Essentially, the objective consists of helping provide people with knowledge to make them independent, able to solve their own problems, defend their basic rights without violence and co-exist peacefully. We work in alliance with other universities, NGOs, governmental humanitarian organisations, foundations and all kinds of private and public organisations with similar objectives and ethical principles that have mass distribution networks and the capacity to act with the end users of the aid.
Training, research and awareness-raising We at the Campus for Peace are a team of multidisciplinary professionals from the UOC, a pioneering, benchmark e-learning institution founded in 1994. We are the university for NGOs, using information technologies for research and education in the field of humanitarian work. The Campus for Peace promotes state-regulated training and skills provision in: development cooperation through the Virtual School of Cooperation, environmental education through the EcoUniversity and peace studies through the University Network for Peace and Conflict Resolution. It organises get-togethers for experts to establish common strategic and tactical plans in fields such as those mentioned above, to establish operating networks and publish of innovative content in the fields of Human Rights, Conflict Resolution and the processes of Peace, Environmental Sustainability and International Cooperation. University education is usually governed by education laws during the early years of education and by the market in terms of postgraduate education. At the Campus for Peace, we are governed by humanitarian criteria and ideals. We are, therefore, the Humanitarian University, the university for NGOs, the University for Peace. The training that we offer reaches over three thousand students and over two hundred lecturers and we offer hundreds of subjects in all fields of knowledge. Social and humanitarian application We believe in and transfer knowledge with a social and humanitarian application with a university, virtual and universally accessible perspective. At our campus, we offer flexible academic administrative programmes and trainer training courses, continuous educational assessment, expert volunteers from around the world and specific teaching materials. We collaborate with organisations such as the Red Cross, Engineers without Borders, Amnesty International, Gaia Education, UNITAR, PNUD, the World Organisation of the Scout Movement, numerous universities throughout the world, town and city councils and citizens’ associations. Virtual Campus Through the Virtual Campus we promote humanitarian action: we facilitate distance education for the defence of human rights; we foster access to useful resources to develop literacy, education and access to healthcare; we offer funding possibilities for cooperation projects in the field of development and we put people around the world in touch with one another who have a joint desire to participate in conflict resolution processes.
We understand that introducing information and communication technologies can have a positive impact and help non-government organisations carry out their work in cooperation and solidarity. Therefore, we propose providing NGOs and civil society associations with the necessary tools for working in a network and on the Internet.
The Campus for Peace works in the following fields of activity:
Human rights
Conflict resolution
Peace processes
Environmental sustainability
International cooperation
We are currently working in a number of areas:
EcoUniversity, the aim of which is to integrate all areas of knowledge involved in the improvement and well-being of individuals, with respect for people and the environment.
Virtual School of Cooperation, where the main objective is to run a whole range of cooperation training programmes for development. The training programmes are in web format and run via free software, which help improve social, human, economic and environmental skills among populations at risk from poverty, conflicts or marginalisation.
UNESCO-UOC-F C Barcelona Foundation Chair, which will run training programmes for conflict resolution through sport.
Campus for Peace in Africa, facilitating the transfer of technology and training programmes with African organisations.
Peace studies through the Peace and Conflict Resolution University Network.
We manage the NGO Campus and try to solve any problems that arise, but its success basically relies on the NGOs that participate in it.
As far as participating NGOs are concerned, a total of four organisations have set up courses on the Campus for online training courses open to people interested in the areas of knowledge offered. Out of a total of 23, 16 have set up an intranet as a work tool and 17 have participated in one of the training courses offered by the NGO Campus.
A total of 1096 people have taken part in the virtual training courses that have to date been run on the NGO Campus. Of these, 491 were NGO employees and 605 took part in courses run by NGOs within the framework of the Campus.
In order to carry out this project, the following are essential:
Having virtual training experts within the University
Setting up a virtual learning environment
Setting a plan into motion for attracting designers of educational material and teachers to act in a supporting role to the University's virtual training experts.
The above will not be possible unless the university community contributes to the project with its capacities and goodwill.
As far as NGOs and other participating associations are concerned, the main recommendation that can be made to others who wish to undertake this experience is that they avoid a supplier-customer relationship with institutions at all costs. The role should be that of a specialist, so that NGOs and associations may be provided with the tools and technology that allow them to organise courses and establish the criteria needed to work with the intranet tool as independently as possible.
guninetwork.org | Ph: +34 93 401 70 08 | Fx: +34 93 401 08 55 | C. Jordi Girona, 31. Edifici TG(S1). E-08755 Barcelona
