This year marked the tenth anniversary of the annual UPF Solidària Fair, which celebrated the occasion with a record-setting edition: 33 organizations, seven more than last year, came together for an in-person event on 19 October, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., in the courtyard of the Jaume I building on the Ciutadella campus. Members of the university community were thus able to learn first-hand about third-sector organizations with ties to the university specializing in a wide range of issues: from poverty, human rights, solidarity, children and the elderly to social mentoring, ethical banking, soup kitchens, and international work camps, amongst others.

For Ester Oliveras, vice-rector for Social Commitment and Sustainability at UPF, “The fair is the main event for UPF Solidària, a platform launched 15 years ago, which this year brought together more than 30 social organizations that Pompeu Fabra University partners with. The event allows them to forge new connections with each other, whilst also providing students and other members of the university community with an opportunity to get to know them, building a network between the organizations and visitors.’

Across the ten editions (the first was held in 2013), participation in the face-to-face fair has ranged from 24 organizations (2016) to 33 (2022). In cumulative terms, a total of 90 organizations have participated. In 2020, the event had to be held online, due to the pandemic. For the 2021 edition, UPF Solidària decided to offer a mixed face-to-face and online format, an initiative it maintained this year: over the course of four days, the virtual fair was attended by some 50 organizations, which received more than 1,200 visitors.

Some of the organizations to attend the 2022 edition in the Jaume I courtyard have taken part in every edition of the fair (e.g. the Fundación Privada de Ared and Oikocredit Catalunya) or all but one (Amnesty International UPF, AFEV, Fundació Educació Solidària and Fundació Servei Solidari), whilst six organizations were visiting the campus for the first time (Ponts per la Pau, Fundación Soñar Despierto, Empieza por Educar, Espai d’Inclusió i Formació Casc Antic, Aigua per al Sahel and Càritas Diocesana Sant Feliu de Llobregat).

Grants for social engagement and sustainable development projects and service-learning initiatives

The participating organizations in the tenth edition of the fair included 12 of the 21 organizations selected in the 2022 UPF Solidària call for proposals for social engagement and sustainable development projects, which have received grants ranging from €1,500 to €4,900.

Oliveras considers these grants, which can be requested by members of the administrative and services staff (PAS), teaching and research staff (PDI), students, retired PAS and PDI and alumni, together with a social entity,, to be one of the pillars of UPF Solidària: ‘Over the course of the call’s 16 editions, nearly €700,000 in funding has been awarded, enabled by donations from the university community, the Social Council and the budget of the UPF,. The money has been used to carry out a total of 173 projects.’

According to the vice-rector, ‘As a public institution, the university has a duty to give back to society for everything it receives from the public sector. In this regard, this year we are promoting the service-learning initiative, which UPF rolled out years ago with the aim of linking teaching with providing a social service at a non-profit organization.’

To this end, the tenth edition of the UPF Solidària Fair included the round-table discussion ‘The impact of the service-learning (SL) methodology’, which sought to explain how the university uses SL (which aims to provide students with meaningful learning experiences that allow them to put the knowledge they acquire into practice whilst meeting a need in the community) and its impact on society from a variety of perspectives presented by teaching staff, students and organizations.