Minutes of the National Committee of the University Programs for Older Adults' Meeting

• Concepción Bru Ronda. University of Alicante
• Adoración Holgado Sánchez. Pontifical University of Salamanca
• Francisca Pérez Llamas. University of Murcia
• Mª Dolores Zahonero Virgili. Representative of IMSERSO
• Concepción Pando Navarro. University of Murcia (guest)
• Carmen Orte Socías. University of the Balearic Islands.
• Antonio Martínez Faura. University of Murcia (guest)
• Manuel Velázquez Clavijo. University of Sevilla.
• Josep Mª Sabaté i Bosch. University. Rovira i Virgili. Tarragona
• Bernabé Sarabia Heydrich State Secretary of Education and Universities
• José Arnay Puerta. University of La Laguna. Tenerife

José Manuel Mayan Santos. University of Santiago, was not able to attend for different reasons.

Guests attending

• Concepción Pando Navarro. University of Murcia
• Antonio Martínez Faura. University of Murcia
• Joseph Torrellas i Vendrell (Speaker at the 6th Meeting)
• María López Jurado (Speaker at the 6th Meeting)
• Mará Luz Nera Jiménez (Speaker at the 6th Meeting)

1) Information from the Director General of IMSERSO about the new guidelines of IMSERSO regarding the Programs for Older Adults.

Mª Ángeles Aguado, José Carlos Baura and Esther López Martín, members of the IMSERSO, were also present, together with the Director General Alberto Galerón. The Director General began explaining the changes in the structure of IMSERSO that were published on the 15th of March at the B. O. E. Together with the changes in its structure, IMSERSO will carry out a National Plan of Training in Social Services that will be published soon and will make it easier for the universities with which IMSERSO collaborates, to adapt to the new guidelines and goals. The following is a summary of those changes:

Those Programs with a clear social purpose in its content will have priority when deciding which ones to finance.

Those Programs with more general purposes (such as Science. Technology, etc.), must be financed by other State or Autonomous Administrations or Private Institutions (Ministry of Education, Autonomous Departments, Savings Banks, etc).

IMSERSO will try to keep the Programs with contents that will be common to all of them.

IMSERSO will promote and encourage the carrying out of training events such as Conferences, Scientific Meetings, etc, aimed at older adults.

IMSERSO plans to adapt the Programs to these new guidelines in 2003.

IMSERSO will try to cooperate with an even bigger number of Programs.

IMSERSO is negotiating with the U.N.E.D. to implement Programs for Older Adults in rural areas.

After the presentation of the Director General there were several interventions from members of the Committee talking about:

How difficult it is to specify what social contents means, given that one of the goals of the Programs is to improve the quality of life of the Older Adults and that goal can be achieved by different contents (health, science, technology, humanism,etc) and not exclusively by social contents.

The need to establish pluriannual plans of training that will allow a bigger stability in the Programs' financing.

If the application of the new guidelines of the IMSERSO is not made gradually, many Programs will be in serious financial problems.

The need for the IMSERSO and the National Committee to work together in order to create an Interdepartmental Committee that will establish the corresponding responsibilities of the State and Autonomous Administrations regarding the Programs for Older Adults.

Agreements:

a) The creation of an IMSERSO-National Committee's working group that will study in detail the characteristics and the process of implementation of the new guidelines.

b) That working group will carry on as long as the process lasts.

c) It is agreed for the IMSERSO and the National Committee to hold another meeting in Alicante on the 16th of April.

2) Debate about the draft and final preparation of the Presentation/Framework.

Given that the members appointed by the Committee had worked on different parts of the Model/Framework, as it had been agreed at the meeting in Murcia, there was a debate about each one of the corresponding sections:

1. Justification: José Arnay and Carmen Orte

2. Aims: Juan Antonio Lorenzo and Adoración Holgado.

3. Organizing Structure: José Manuel Mayan.

4. Contents of the teachings: Juan Antonio Lorenzo, Adoración Holgado, Lola Zahonero and Francisca Pérez.

5. Students at the University: Concepción Bru and Josep Mª Sabaté.

All of them were approved, except the Organizing Structure. The Committee considered that the aspects that it dealt with were an interesting contribution to the future but non-viable at the moment, given that its requirements where too much far away from the current situation of most of the running Programs. Therefore the proposal remained as follows:

Courses:3

Dates: from October to June

Total amount of credits offered: 40-45 (400-450 hours)

Type of subjects: Compulsory, Optional and Complementary Activities of University kind.

Schedule: Afternoons

Joining: Own infrastructure and management

Secondary academic level : The option of specialization for one year minimun.

Students' Associations: The Associations can play an important role in self-training activities.

Concha Bru will prepare a summary of the structure to present it in his speach about the Model/Framework at the 6th Meeting.

3) Analysis and debate about the National Association's draft.

Antonio Martínez Faura, from the University of Murcia, presented the different aspects of the draft that he had prepared. There was a debate about some of its formal aspects and it was approved to be discussed at the Organizers Meeting that will be held in Alicante.

The meeting ends at 18.30.

Signed by José Arnay Puerta

Secretary