This summer 47 UAB students will be volunteering in prisons

10/07/2025

During this 2024/25 academic year, 78 volunteers participated in the programme. In July, 47 more students signed up for the specific summer volunteering campaign, reaching a total of 125 people.

Volunteers from the FAS Justice Programme carry out different types of activities in prisons: academic and socio-professional, physical-sports, leisure and personal development, and cultural and artistic activities. This experience allows them to get closer to the reality of the prison world, raising awareness and breaking the myths associated with inmates and favouring social reintegration processes.

Some of the activities carried out are: handicrafts; basketball; volleyball; Catalan classes; workshops on women's health; academic support; Spanish classes; radio; musical theatre; literature workshop, etc. And according to the satisfaction surveys of participants, all activities are rated very positively.

New aspects of this academic year

This year the pilot project for accompanying young people during their leave from the Juvenile Penitentiary Centre in La Roca del Vallès has been consolidated, becoming a stable axis of the Justice Programme. A total of 15 young people were accompanied by a team made up of 25 volunteers. The 23 volunteers taking part in the academic year 24/25 followed the objective of sharing healthy leisure alternatives and making a network of resources and services available to these young people.

Also, participation in the CFA Brians 1 and in the Women’s UIC of Brians 1 has been initiated. During the summer campaign, activities are proposed for the CP Joves and also for the CP Women, taking new steps to expand the programme, and for the next course, a proposal for collaboration with the Open Centre 2 of Barcelona has been made.

In addition, a collaboration was set up with the FAS Health Volunteering Programme and the CP 4 Camins, with occasional participation in the LGTBIQ+ group, a collaboration with the magazine and radio of the CP with topics of sexual and emotional health, and two thematic summer stands were organised: one for Sant Jordi and another in the framework of “Support DON’T Punish”. In addition, the volunteers participated in the Fairs of Entities in Brians 1 and in the CP Joves.

Finally, to incorporate qualitative indicators that allow a more homogeneous assessment between centres and activities, an intern of the bachelor’s degree in Criminology reviewed its evaluation system, making a proposal for an evaluation questionnaire to unify the assessments of the different actions carried out in all the penitentiary centres.