The role of intergenerational learning in creating age-friendly universities and communities

At the Faculty of Social Work, we ran an educational programme titled “Life Stories in the Embrace of Memories” as part of the Faculty of Active Wisdom in the 2023/24 academic year. Participants in the programme explored people’s lives, learned about different methods and techniques for recording and analysing interviews and, on this basis, learned how to create people’s life stories. They acquired communication skills, both verbal and non-verbal, and learned about the usefulness of life stories in everyday life and in today’s changing society. The learning was intergenerational, as the participants were both retired women and students of social work. The interge­nerational learning that took place gave rise to new experiences and the exchange of opinions on the topics discussed. The results of the training show that intergenerati­onal learning enables the exchange of expertise between students of different ages, promotes the personal and professional development of young social work students and students in the second half of life and, above all, helps to overcome age discri­mination and find new ways of intergenerational coexistence.