Science and Universities

The competition for this extension has been structured in three lots that include a total of eight public high schools. The first lot, won by the Asociación Educativa Integral del Raval, includes the two schools in the neighbourhood that have participated in the programme since its inception, Institut Milà i Fontanals and Institut Miquel Taradell, as well as Institut Consell de Cent, located in the lower part of Poble Sec, but with students living in the Raval. The second batch brings together the schools and neighbourhoods that were included in the first extension of the programme in the 2019-20 academic year: Institut Barri Besòs and Institut Bernat Metge, both in the Sant Martí district, and Institut Pablo Picasso, in Nou Barris. Finally, the third lot incorporates two more centres in Nou Barris, Institut Barcelona Congrés and Institut Flos i Calcat. These two lots have been won by AFEV.

For the selection of new Prometeus schools, the Barcelona Education Consortium provides data related to the needs of secondary school students for support in the transition to post-compulsory education, which makes it possible to evaluate the priority schools for action. Among the secondary schools with the greatest needs in this regard, the Prometeus programme chooses those that are also within the framework of the Pla de Barris (Neighbourhood Plan).

Prometeus Youth

Prometeus is aimed above all at young people who want to go on to higher education, but who have no family or sociocultural references in this regard, and therefore consider university to be beyond their reach.

According to Bernat Jiménez de Cisneros Puig, a technician at Barcelona City Council’s Department of Science and Universities and municipal coordinator of the Prometeus programme, “a low rate of access to university for students in public secondary schools is often not related to a lack of skills or the will to continue studying, but rather to aspects such as the lack of points of reference for the university, but with aspects such as the lack of references or the lack of prestige of higher education in their family or friends’ environment, the need to contribute financially to the family’s upkeep once they have finished secondary school, in addition to the frequent perception that university is expensive and difficult, or the lack of knowledge of the existing public scholarships”.

Faced with this situation, the programme strengthens the educational imaginary of young people, as well as the image of public high schools as centres of educational success, particularly as a stepping stone to university. Thus, with appropriate support and knowledge of existing public aid, these people can access and successfully complete their studies. Today, thanks to Prometeus, more than 150 young people from five secondary schools are pursuing higher education. In fact, last November saw the graduation of the first class of 15 students from the programme, most of whom have already found a job related to what they studied.

With the new extension of the programme to more neighbourhoods and high schools, it is expected that by the beginning of the 2022-23 school year, between 10 and 15 more students per high school will be added to the Prometeus community, i.e. around 100 people. Thus, between 2016 and 2023, the programme will have accompanied around 250 young people who, without the information and motivation activities and the support during the transition and in the course of higher education provided by the programme, would probably not have gone on to higher education.

Since its inception, Prometeus will have involved an investment of approximately €900,000. This growth has also meant moving from the initial part-time technician to a full-time team of seven people. Likewise, in order to advance in its mission, Prometeus has also been coordinating with Barcelona Activa and Serveis Socials, as well as with different organisations and initiatives in each neighbourhood. And, above all, the programme has the strong involvement of the city’s four public universities (UB, UAB, UPC and UPF), which has been intensified and systematised as the programme has grown. In this sense, apart from offering grants, salaries and other resources of their own, the universities have assigned referents and specialised units to the programme which, in coordination with the managing bodies, jointly ensure the monitoring and tutoring of Prometeus students while they are at university.

From project to programme

Prometeus was launched in the 2016-17 academic year as a Raval community project promoted by two organisations, the Raval Comprehensive Educational Association and El Raval newspaper, as well as the management of the Milà i Fontanals secondary school and the Miquel Taradell secondary school. These agents noted that, despite the ability of the students of these high schools to access university and successfully pursue higher education, the rate of access to university studies was lower than that of other neighbourhoods or high schools.

Faced with this contradiction, the organisations sought the complicity of the Ciutat Vella District, the Barcelona Education Consortium and the Barcelona Municipal Institute of Education, as well as the four public universities, which have also been involved since the 2016-2017 academic year. The first activities to motivate high school students to go to university and to accompany the first promotions of young Prometeus students were carried out with the direct involvement of key people from each entity or organisation involved in the project. In this sense, in 2018 a step forward was taken with the hiring, through Pla de Barris, of a part-time person in charge of centralising and articulating the regular tasks in relation to the secondary schools and the accompaniment of the young Prometheus students.

In the 2019-20 academic year, once the project was consolidated in the Raval, Prometeus made the leap to other neighbourhoods with the incorporation of the Barri Besòs, Bernat Metge and Pablo Picasso secondary schools, respectively in the neighbourhoods of Besòs and Maresme, La Verneda and La Paz, and Torre Baró, Ciutat Meridiana and Vallbona. In order to facilitate the gradual grounding in these new territories, emphasis was placed on linking the programme with the teaching staff of the new secondary schools, and then progressively extending it to other agents in the neighbourhood. Both the processes of expansion of the programme and the effects of the pandemic on the young Prometheans and their families, among other challenges, have contributed to turning what began as a project into a programme, in that it articulates and combines a whole range of actions and services in very diverse fields so that the young people of the Prometheus high schools can continue studying and develop their talent under equal conditions.

Today, the success of the programme throughout its six years of existence generates interest and the will to extend the Prometeus model to secondary schools located in areas not covered by the Pla de Barris, in this case through the corresponding district, as well as in other municipalities, which are currently in the process of implementing the programme in their territory. The team of people who manage Prometeus in Barcelona accompanies these extension processes through meetings and by sharing a guide for the extension that includes the principles, methodology and functioning of the programme.