The 5th transnational project meeting of the project “ECOPRIS – Ecological Economics in Prison Work Administration” took place in Timisoara, Romania, on the 16th and 17th November 2016. All the partner organizations involved have attended the event, which was hosted by Timisoara Penitentiary.
The working agenda for this meeting consisted in making a briefing on project objectives and implementation status, working on projects outputs 2 (assessment tool) and 3 (training program and curricula). Regarding the latter, the project partners have agreed on a curriculum structure that amounts to 90 hours of e-learning, another 90 hours of face-to-face training classes and 210 hours of on the job training. As a result, training will be focused on the subjects of Marketing, Prison Work Development, Ecology, Management, Entrepreneurship, Communication and Information and Communication Technologies. Moreover, further topics were stated and discussed such as the conjoint course manual and guide, and the progress and financial reporting.
ECOPRIS project promoter is BSAFE Lab of Beira Interior University (Portugal) and the remainder partners, besides IPS Innovative Prison Systems (also from Portugal) are CPIP Center for Promoting Lifelong Learning (Romania), the West University of Timisoara (Romania), the General Directorate of Prisons and Detention Houses (Turkey), and EuroPris – European Organisation of Prison and Correctional Services (Netherlands and Belgium).
ECOPRIS promotes open and flexible learning, virtual mobility and other innovative learning methods, fostering the development of entrepreneurial skills and improvement of the capacities of organizations in the areas of inclusion of inmates. This project gathers, in its consortia, prison administrations from different countries, universities, training organizations and private companies, aiming to develop a work-based training courses addressing prison work initiatives and management skills.