Providing services with the potential to support work and personal life integration for staff

Availability of structured supports inside the organization for child-care, family-members with special needs, elder family-members, etc. for UNIBO staff.

In collaboration with the Alma Mater Foundation and the Dal Monte Foundation, the University of Bologna organized a two weeks’ summer camp targeting UNIBO staff’s children aged 11-13 (a target group which is frequently overlooked by the available services targeting children and their families). The summer camp was held in June 2017 and 40 children per week were involved. This experimental action was made possible by the fruitful collaboration of different key actors from the Governance (namely,  Rector, the Vice Rector to Human Resources, the President of the Guarantee Committee for Equal Opportunities, Employee Wellbeing and Non-Discrimination at Work, the Rector’s Delegate to Gender Equality, the Rector’s Delegate to Guidance and relations with the school system) as well as by the valorisation of internal human resources that worked together with professionals in the field of Education. In fact, the Scientific committee was composed by a group of Professors from the Department of Education, the training activities in the SSH and STEM fields were carried out by UNIBO researchers/professors (who received a reimbursement for this activity), the pedagogical coordination and tutoring was held by two Educators (externals, selected by the Scientific Committee) and some students from the Department of Education Studies collaborated as interns.

Unibo co-financed the activity together with the Fondazione del Monte so that the fee for families could be affordable (120 euros per week).

The project has been very challenging because this kind of activity or service has never been realised before by the University of Bologna, and its implementation requested a strong networking between different Departments and areas of the organisation.

In the short term, about 80 families benefited of a high quality childcare service covering an overlooked target group (11-13 years old children and their parents). Children, in particular, had the possibility to attend workshops in different disciplinary fields. The experimentation of the action allowed UNIBO developing the required expertise to improve this action in the future. Due to the high number of requests and the satisfaction of participants the summer camp will be doubled in 2018.

The organizational effort put to organise the summer camp valuing UNIBO staff competences, knowledge and skills as well as the expertise and organizational knowledge achieved during the summer camp experience could allow the RPO to embed this intervention into its structures.

The action was evaluated through the following tools: questionnaires targeting children delivered before and after the action implementation; monitoring observation of the summer camp experience during the action implementation. The questionnaires provided information on participants’ expectations, motivations and their final satisfaction on the experience. The evaluation was carried out by an MA student from the Department of Education Studies who was supported by academic staff.

Utilising UNIBO human resources competences, skills and knowledge could enable UNIBO to make this action sustainable in the future.

Work and personal life integration

Availability of supports/resources

Alma Mater Studiorum – Universita Di Bologna (UNIBO)
Higher education institution

Researchers/professors and technical and administrative staff