The four campuses of Universidade Católica Portuguesa will be participating in FLY, the European volunteer and service-learning program. Either by sending students on volunteering missions abroad, or by hosting foreign volunteers for volunteering experiences in Portugal. A real exchange of volunteers.
Around 40 foreign volunteers will be integrated into national missions: the Homem project (support for people with addictive and dependent behaviors), the Juntos pelos Sorrisos project (summer camp with institutionalized young people, meal service and support for the homeless and migrants), the Bridges to Inclusion project (support for pregnant women in vulnerable situations and people at risk of social exclusion) and the Just a Change project (rehabilitation of houses). The volunteers are Spanish, Italian and Slovak. From the four campuses of the Portuguese Catholic University, there will be around 11 students going on different volunteer missions in Spain, Italy, Morocco and Brazil.
"This year it was possible to involve all 4 campuses of Católica in the project, which is a great satisfaction given the University's unified dimension and because it represents the joint and articulated work of 4 geographies so that their students can take advantage of these opportunities," says Carmo Themudo, coordinator of the Integral Development of the Person Unit at the Catholic University in Porto.
"International volunteering is a very complete volunteering experience because, in addition to all the skills that any volunteer acquires and puts into practice, it also allows students to experience different cultures, traditions and ways of life, broadening their horizons and promoting mutual understanding between people from different backgrounds," he adds.
The FLY program, which reinforces the commitment of the participating universities to sustainable development, aims - above all - to make university communities aware of the problems of migration, refugees and people at risk of social exclusion and to highlight projects that care for people and the community. Coordinated by the Spanish Universities of Comillas (Madrid), the University of Deusto (Bilbao) and ESADE (Barcelona), FLY 2024 brings together, in addition to the Portuguese Catholic University, the Universities of Loyola (Andalusia, Spain), LUMSA (Rome, Italy) and Mateja Bela (Banská Bystrica, Slovakia) and IQS (Barcelona, Spain).
