Universitat Pompeu Fabra
Founded in 1990, Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) is a public university based in Barcelona that is highly competitive in research and aims to transform education to respond to future challenges. In a context of major global challenges, UPF has undertaken an imperative commitment as a university institution: to help find solutions for the main challenges facing humanity and the planet, which are set out in the Planetary Wellbeing initiative.
The Department of Experimental and Health Sciences(DCEXS) was founded in 1998. The great challenge of the DCEXS has been to successfully develop a project where research and teaching are firmly integrated. Together with the UPF’sFaculty of Health and Life Sciences, the DCEXS is responsible for four undergraduate degrees: Human Biology, Medicine, Biomedical Engineering and Bioinformatics. The Department also runs Master’s degrees in the fields of biomedicine, pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, clinical laboratory sciences, and public health, and PhD Programme in Biomedicine recognised by independent agencies. The DCEXS is strategically located within the Barcelona’sBiomedical Research Park (PRBB), a large scientific infrastructure that gathers together several public research centres and is physically connected to Barcelona’s Hospital del Mar, thus being one of the largest hubs of biomedical research in southern Europe.
The UPF team in this project is formed by members of the Health Sciences Educational Research Group (GRECS) from the DCEXS. The GRECS research field is focused on the improvement of teaching and learning processes in health sciences education. They work on the development of active learning models, such as problem-based and project-based learning, flipped classroom or clinical simulation. They have a long experience in the promotion of transversal skills and in the design of competence-based assessment models and instruments, such as portfolio and mentoring programmes. They have developed several projects on learning approaches to develop critical thinking and creativity in higher education. The members of GRECS have educational responsibilities in the degrees of human biology and medicine and in the master degree of pre-service teachers training. Thus, most of the teaching innovation projects are implemented and evaluated in those studies.
UPF coordinates the project and, therefore, the leading partner and the direct interlocutor with SEPIE.
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS:
Mar Carrió Llach, principal investigator of ITSHEC, is a doctor in biology, professor and researcher in the Department of Experimental and Health Sciences of the Pompeu Fabra University (DCEXS-UPF), specialist in science education. She is the head of GRECS. She is the coordinator of the pre-service teacher training Master’s Degree of Pompeu Fabra University and Open University of Catalonia and also of the Teaching Mentorship Programme in DCEXS-UPF. Her current research is focus on problem-based, inquiry-based learning methods and the promotion of scientific creativity. She has been highly involved in the design of the programme for the promotion of transversal competences in the Faculty of Health and Life Sciences at the UPF, based on a mentoring programme and a portfolio. She has also a long experience in university teacher training. She published more than 50 research articles and book chapters and she recently co-edited the Research Topic on Neuroeducation at Frontiers in Educational Psychology. She has received 4 national educational innovation awards.
Nathália Rosa, project manager of ITSHEC, is a doctor in communication and a Public Health researcher specialized in Health Promotion and Community Health, and its interface with Communication, with 10 years of experience in qualitative research projects. She is the Methodological Coordinator and responsible for the Communication Area of the Observatory of Public Policies in Health and Health Education in Brazil, a national network composed of 15 public universities from all over the country, with more than 70 professionals involved including professors, researchers, undergraduate and graduate students. She has received the PhD Extraordinary Award at the UAB (2019) for her PhD thesis “eHealth and Participaction: analysis of communication and health field in Brazil”.
