People living in closed detention and care facilities face significant challenges keeping pace with society’s rapid digitalisation. These vulnerable groups – including prisoners, ex-offenders and migrants – need access to secure digital learning environments to improve key competences for successful reintegration into the work and communities. Despite this pressing need, many countries still face difficulties in implementing effective blended learning approaches within these controlled (and secured) settings, creating barriers that further exacerbate the digital divide.
Most detention and care centres struggle with a lack of digital tools, a high workload in education- and IT- departments and high staff turnover are challenges faced by the majority of (closed) detention and care centres. People who live in such environments have very limited access to customised internet and in the case of prisons, often little interaction with the outside world. While good initiatives exist, there are obstacles to implementation at a systemic level.
DigiFusE: Creating a comprehensive approach
The DigiFusE project supports a more systematic approach to the introduction of digital technologies in closed detention and care centres and aims to create comprehensive guidelines to be used by practitioners in Europe.
The project is divided into different phases. Field research teams in five European countries conduct interviews with relevant stakeholders and practitioners, while the European partners, such as EAEA, focus on analysing existing literature on the topic. The research phase concentrates on the needs and challenges of the education environments in (closed) detention and care centres, analysing their strategic, organisational, informational, and technical aspects. As a result, a (new) comparative and comprehensive learning and teaching method will be designed for such settings.
This method will be tested and piloted in the five partner countries working directly with the staff, practitioners, and beneficiaries to adapt the guidelines based on field feedback and insights. Once the guidelines are refined, the partnership will launch a dissemination campaign to promote the results with closed detention and care institutions in other countries around Europe. This will help to ensure the sustainability and transferability of the method to other realities and target groups; as well as encourage decision-makers to rethink the education policies for controlled learning environments.
DigiFusE in short
DigiFusE supports closed detention and care institutions for vulnerable people, by creating practical and transferable educational guidelines. The guidelines combine the knowledge of the needs and challenges of these settings with existing best practices. By testing and piloting a new method in five countries and disseminating it among local, national, and European stakeholders, DigiFusE will improve education environments of (closed) detention and care institutions for vulnerable people.
For further information on the project, its methodology and partners, please visit the DigiFusE website, and read the first project newsletter.
For contacts: maria.ribeiro@eaea.org.
Text: Ivan Tsapiuk, Maria Gonçalves Ribeiro