The Social Innovation Chair of the UdL evaluates the Vincles project in Erill la Vall

Last Thursday, March 27, the team from the Social Innovation Chair of the University of Lleida (UdL) began the evaluation of the Vincles Alt Pirineu-Aran project in Eril la Vall, taking advantage of one of the activities promoted within the framework of the project: the monthly traditional cooking workshop. The Vincles project, coordinated by the iSocial Foundation, aims to detect and intervene early against unwanted loneliness in people over 65 years old, and is active in several municipalities in the Alt Pirineu and Aran territory, including the municipality of Eril de Vall.

Vincles combines the use of technology with community activation, which, through activities such as this cooking workshop, seeks to create community and socialization spaces to improve the quality of life of older people. From a technological standpoint, the project uses Big Data technology to identify and classify the risk of loneliness in individuals, allowing for more precise and effective community intervention.

The University of Lleida is one of the project’s partners, and the involvement of its Social Innovation Chair is key to ensuring the measurability and reproducibility of the results achieved in the implementation of Vincles. During the evaluation carried out in Eril de Vall, the research team, which is currently in the first phase of qualitative analysis, organized several focus groups with the workshop participants to gather information on how the project has impacted their perception and experience of loneliness. This methodology has allowed them to collect data on the participants’ satisfaction with the actions and initiatives developed within the project framework.

The evaluation process will continue in the current weeks with new visits to other areas of the project, such as Cerdanya, Val d’Aran and Alt Urgell, to continue expanding the collection of data and analyzing the effectiveness of the interventions. The Vincles project, in which the Regional Councils and Municipalities of the Alt Pirineu-Aran also participate, in addition to the entities ABD, Alba Jussà and Integra Pirineus, is supported by the Diputació de Lleida, the Fundació La Caixa and the Generalitat de Catalunya through the Next Generation funds.