Xavier Úcar Martínez

Professor of Social Pedagogy at the Systematic and Social Pedagogy Department, Autonomous University of Barcelona. President of the Spanish and Latin American Society of Social Pedagogy (SIPS) (2013-2019). President of the Coordinating Committee for Socio-Cultural Animation of Catalonia (CASC_CAT) (2010-2014). Co-Director of the Collection of Action and Socio-educative Community at Graó Publishing (2006). He has been a visiting professor at several universities in Europe and America (Boston University and University of Michigan, USA ; Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil; Università degli Studi di Firenze, Italy; Universidade Tras -os- Montes e Alto Douro, Portugal). He is an expert on Social Pedagogy and on design and evaluation of cultural Animation and Community Development programs. He has written 10 books and over 90 papers, among book chapters and journal articles. He is currently developing a national research project on participatory evaluation in community empowerment processes, and an European project on volunteering and employment.