Education

Due to the scale of our business and the fact that we are a public trust institution, we have obligations towards the society. We want our customers to understand not only the products and services which they use but also the reasons and the consequences of various financial decisions. We emphasize the need for financial education from early age. Being aware of the changes occurring in the society, the economy and the demographic structure we take care to include seniors not only in financial services but also in the economy in general.

The priority areas of the bank’s corporate social responsibility activities include:

Santander Universidades worldwide:

Santander Universidades in Poland:

Santander Universidades (SU) is a program launched in December 201 to support higher education, research and the idea of entrepreneurship, a global initiative bringing together close to 1 000 universities worldwide. The idea of the program is based on the assumption that the cooperation between the world of business and the world of academia will result directly in the development of new technologies and research programs and the transfer of know-how will have a positive impact on the economy.

Polish universities cooperating with SU operate scholarship programs and individual research programs in entrepreneurship and research development, in particular including new technologies, student and faculty staff mobility and the development of global networking and knowledge sharing.

At present, 59 universities from the largest academic centres in Poland are members of the program.

Detailed information about the Santander Universidades program and its priorities can be found in last year’s report.

On 21 and 22 May 2018, the 4th International Universia Rectors Meeting took place in Salamanca. The opening ceremony was attended by His Royal Highness Filip VI, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, President of Portugal and Ana Botin, executive chair of Banco Santander. The meeting was attended by more than 600 rectors and faculty staff, politicians and entrepreneurs. Poland was represented by a delegation of 14 rectors and representatives of our bank, including Gerry Byrn, Supervisory Board Chairman and Arkadiusz Przybył, Vice President of the Management Board of Santander Bank Polska.

In 2018, five persons from Poland (3 students and 2 administration staff members) took part in the global summer programs financed by Santander Universidades at the most prestigious  universities in the world, such as Georgetown University, Yale and the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA). The participants:

In 2019, just like a year earlier, students of the partner universities of Santander Universidades and experienced managers were invited to apply for the internship. The offer met with a huge interest – tens of thousands of applications from all over the world were received. Students from Poland presented very high level, therefore as many as 11 persons were invited to participate in the scholarships. Among the winners, there were students from the Warsaw School of Economics, the Poznań University of Technology, the Medical University in Gdańsk, Leon Koźmiński School of Business and the Economic University in Poznań and three experienced managers.

The participants will take part in action-packed summer courses aimed at upgrading competences in the international environment. The participants of Santander Scholarship international projects will be able to participate in one of the following programs:

In March 2019 a new version of the platform was made available to users. On the revamped and relaunched Finansiaki.pl website one can find a range of colourful, user-friendly teaching aids on the subject of personal finance management. You can sort the available materials depending on the user type (teacher, parent, child) and the age of the target audience. The content includes articles with advice for the parents and ready-to-use class scripts for teachers which can be displayed or printed out and used at school. Moreover, the teaching aids were prepared in conformance with the official curriculum of pre-school and primary school education.

The project of the Warsaw Banking Institute Bankers for the Financial Education of Youth (BAKCYL)  is an example of the social collaboration for the upgrading of young people’s financial knowledge. It draws on the engagement of bank employees who volunteer to act as trainers. Under the project, bank employees convey practical financial knowledge to teenagers in order to facilitate their conscious and successful start into adult life in a modern society and the Santander Foundation assists them in the execution of the project.

In 2018, the volunteers from our bank participating in the BAKCYL project trained 8,400 students. The best volunteers received special commendations. Out of the three awarded volunteers, two are  from Santander Bank Polska: Urszula Jakubska-Żuk and Dariusz Maciuba.

The project has been designed in partnership with the Federation of Polish Food Banks and is addressed to beneficiaries of Food Bank who are potentially at risk of social and economic exclusion. A few employees of the bank prepared workshop scenarios and a practical guide to saving money and repaying debt and delivered training for Food Bank educators. Using the developed materials, between January and April 2018, the local Food Bank educators delivered 78 workshops across Poland attended altogether by 1,370 persons.

Attractions offered in the Santander Station:

• First aid workshops organized as part of the How’s Your Driving project the goal of which is to promote road safety.
• Fans of new technologies will find in the Santander Station a chance to get a hands-on experience in new, exciting solutions and find out that holograms and robots in everyday life is not a matter of distant future.
• A concert of the Santander Orchestra – young, talented musicians will perform at the Kostrzyn na Fali festival  under the baton of Adam Sztaba.
• There will also be room for sports emotions in the UEFA Championships zone whose official sponsor is Santander Group.

A visit to the Santander Station will also be an opportunity to support the activities of Santander Bank Polska by beating the rowing record on a rowing ergometer. For each kilometre travelled the Foundation will donate money for the selected social cause.