The Summer University of the Rincón de Ademuz (UVRA) is a joint initiative of the Chair for Citizen Participation and Valencian Landscapes of the Universitat de València and of the Vice-Principal for Territorial Projection and Participation which starts with the purpose of making the Valencian interior regions more dynamic through a training, cultural, playful, new and intriguing offer.

According to Emilio Iranzo, the co-director of the Chair, the purpose of UVRA is ‘to provide the citizens of the Rincón de Ademuz and the adjacent regions with useful and attractive knowledges and tools which will be used to encourage healthy habits, the environmental and landscape awareness and to visualise the future opportunities of the rural areas’. The UVRA programme includes training conferences, talks, workshops and round tables as well as concerts, performances, guided tours and night excursions. ‘We would like to achieve the greatest participation since we think that the proposal has social, training and playful ingredients of current interest’, has explained Emilio Iranzo.

All the training sessions of UVRA will take place at the IES Ademuz with the purpose of encouraging the participation of students who ‘need new expectations, both academic and professional’ as the director of the educational centre, Isabel Grande Luque, has said. The Summer University of Ademuz comes at a time when it is necessary the promotion of collective learning processes which are able of generating innovative attitudes which limit the depopulation by encouraging the singularities of the rural areas.

The mayor of Ademuz, Ángel Andrés, who is aware of this problem, has shown gratitude for the increasing commitment of institutions towards the rural world: ‘the worst depopulation is the depopulation of hope. Therefore, we should find methods to make the village a promising place for our children to undertake and find job and to ensure the generational renewal of the familiar companies’.

The president of the Mancomunidad del Rincón de Ademuz, Domingo Antón Lázaro, has spoken about the importance of going for a development model which is respectful and sustainable and he thinks that the UVRA ‘will publicise the region and generate interest among the entrepreneurs who want to live in this region, with calm and harmony with nature and without the stress that the life in the city entails’.

UVRA is included within the activities of the Chair for Citizen Participation and Valencian Landscapes that academic platform resulting from the collaboration between the Valencian Department for Housing, Public Works and Structuring of the Territory and the Universitat de València. The objective of the Chair is not only the reflection and research but also the dissemination and transfer of knowledge about the democratisation of the landscape and territorial values.

The vice-principal for Territorial Projection and Participation has explained that UVRA represents the beginning of an academic project with three objectives: to bring the public university closer to the Rincón de Ademuz region through training, research and transfer of knowledge; to study interesting topics for the local population, in this case, to address issues that help to identify the keys for the economic, social and territory development; and to ‘to stablish relations with the Valencian society in the territory with the participation of everybody’, as the vice-principal has said. Until now, the Universitat de València celebrated four similar seasonal universities in the Valencian territory: the Summer University of Gandia, the Winter University of Ontinyent, the Autumn University of Enguera and the Spring University of Alzira.

The whole programme can be checked at: http://www.uv.es/unitatsuport/documentos/Dipticos/Jornadas/UVRA%202017.pdf