University offices are not cold places only wrapped in data matrices and fixed on abstract ideas that are difficult to land on, but rather are environments of creative effervescence that actively reflect on the social challenges that surround us in order to find solutions. At least, that is how we from the Padre Ossó Faculty consider the research, about which we consider that one responsibility –the most important one– consists in trying to ensure that the knowledge generated reaches society.
At the Padre Ossó College, we have spent years reflecting on the possibility that our knowledge as researchers achieves an impact on the social challenges we are going through. With this determination, we come to two challenges that seem inescapable to us in Asturias: the importance of child welfare systems being in constant development; and the fact that Asturias has an aging population, analyzing whether our society reflects on the rapid demographic change we are facing. In addition, Asturias is characterized by the fact that most of its extension is rural, while the largest number of population is concentrated in the central area of the autonomous community. All these elements in communion led us to design lines of research focused on these two vital moments, based on which we founded the Inypema University Clinic (childhood and the elderly).
Connect academic knowledge with society
A university clinic represents a key tool for connecting academic knowledge with society, since it allows a work environment that intertwines research and intervention with solvency. The Inypema University Clinic brings together three teams: one specialized in childhood intervention, another specialized in the elderly, and a research team. With this structure, we have deployed projects in recent years that combine research and intervention. The most recent of these is the Inypema Living Lab Social Innovation Project, a project in collaboration with the Ministry of Social Rights of the Principality of Asturias, which is promoted by the European Funds of the Recovery and Resilience Mechanism (MRR).
The spirit of this project is to experiment in different ways how to approach intervention on early childhood care needs, especially in rural contexts; and on the logic of development of active aging in the Asturian rural elderly population.
The professional team is the one that travels to homes
Regarding the framework of early childhood care, we test a formula in which the table is turned: we do not expect children and families to approach the professional, but rather the professional team to go to the homes. We do it with an itinerant logic, facilitating not only the reconciliation of families, but also trying to make the intervention friendly to these minors, taking place in their own daily environment. These ideas open the door to a new intervention paradigm that is highly significant for the quality of family life. In addition to the face-to-face part, this intervention relies on technological resources to gain efficiency. Our intention is to generate very fluid communication channels with families and, with this, catalyze family empowerment regarding the intervention processes of minors. The family will be able to establish follow-ups with the professionals through the Internet, receive guidelines and gain autonomy, while observing that the minors experience progress in their well-being.
Necessarily, the vocation of the knowledge generated in a university is that it be shared to achieve the greatest possible reach. Therefore, the project seeks to articulate an interaction between professionals and researchers through an Early Care Hub. A space in which to share innovative ideas and good practices, building a shared development.
The second axis of this project, a pioneer in Asturias, involves promoting active aging and favoring processes of socialization between people. Social Education has taught us that a very good way of learning and developing takes place through our peers and the experience of working with older people has also shown the significance of knowledge and skills acquired throughout a lifetime. This is the philosophy on which this project axis is based, which consists of generating a relational framework between older people, promoting active ageing.
Mentors accompanying the elderly
The professionals from the university clinic will accompany a group of elderly people, which we call mentors, so that they themselves can promote active aging among their peers from different rural areas of Asturias. This process is also linked to technological resources, while facing aspects as crucial as the digital divide.
The project that we present experiments with new models, tries to adapt them to the Asturian reality, discusses with the key problems of its population and, in all of this, shows the ingredients of an innovation process. The vital trajectories of Asturias have been transformed in the last 30 years and it is difficult to predict what we will find in another 30. There is no doubt that the effort to find new recipes to deal with the present and anticipate the future is what that will allow us, as a society, to be versatile in finding the channel that provides quality of life. With a humble approximation, we believe that this must always be our job.