Frequently
asked questions

Frequently asked questions

In this section you will find answers to the most frequently asked questions.

The Learning Planet Institute

The Learning Planet Institute is an association under the French Law of 1901. Created in France in 2006, its objective is:

  • To explore new ways of learning, teaching and collectively developing digital methods and tools in order to train a generation of citizens who will be able to create and share their solutions together;
  • To develop open and collaborative research at a crossroads between life sciences, learning sciences and digital technologies;
  • To help with the transformation of communities as well as that of educational and research institutions, in order to address the challenges of our time.

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Since 2006, the Learning Planet Institute has been dedicated to reinventing learning for all ages, through collective intelligence. Its goal is to build sustainable and inclusive learning societies, capable of facing up to the complex challenges of today’s world. 

The Institute’s mission is to explore, research, and share new ways of learning and cooperating, in order to meet the needs of the youth and the planet. By spreading new tools and encouraging a culture of empowerment, the Institute profoundly transforms organisations. Ultimately, it seeks to lead communities and support “Learning Planetizens” to take care of themselves, the others and the planet. 

To reach these objectives, the Learning Planet Institute creates research and educational programmes based on interdisciplinarity, diversity, and initiative. The Institute relies on the synergies between its different activities: R&D, Education, International Alliance, Transformation of Organisations and Digital Ecosystems.

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In response to the multiple crises (social, environmental and economic), researchers François Taddei and Ariel Lindner

launched the Centre de Recherches Interdisciplinaires (Centre for Interdisciplinary Research, CRI) in 2006, to train the next generation of scientists working at a crossroads between life sciences, education and digital technologies. They are convinced that it is not only necessary but also possible to adopt a new and unique approach to education through research.

The CRI then doubled in size every eighteen months: it started out as a small-scale organisation and it became an internationally renowned institute, a global community with several hundreds partners across the world.

At the end of 2021, in order to increase its impact and to respond to the ever-growing number of requests from public and private actors, the CRI was transformed into the Learning Planet Institute. This change responded to the renewed ambition to co-create a learning society, capable of tackling the complex challenges of today and tomorrow. 

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To collectively build a learning society in order to address the challenges of our time.

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The Learning Planet Institute is a leading player in the world of academia and social entrepreneurship. Grounded in interdisciplinarity, the Institute combines research, pedagogy and technology to help people, collectives and organisations build a learning society for a more sustainable world. We are convinced that young people, life-long learning and collective intelligence are our most powerful assets for systems change. 

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  • Promoting interdisciplinarity – We cultivate critical thinking and exchange between the fields of knowledge 
  • Using collective intelligence – We facilitate peer-learning, creativity and cooperation
  • Cultivating and caring of oneself, others and the planet – We infuse caring, consideration and respect for people and the environment into the life of our community 
  • Welcoming diversity – We celebrate the richness of our multicultural and inclusive community 
  • Cultivating enthusiasm and optimism – We see positive thinking as a force for hope and success 
  • Fostering empowerment – We encourage our communities to think freely and act with agency

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  • Learning by doing and through research – We question the world and design original methods using scientific approaches 
  • Building unique communities – We create physical and digital spaces that favour encounters and co-construction 
  • Experimenting and sharing – We prototype and learn from both our successes and our mistakes 
  • Thinking outside the box – We dream and design creatively our projects, methods and tools 
  • Redefining the rules of the game sustainably – We implement practices that can accelerate large-scale transitions 
  • Using digital innovation to spread – We use technology to explore and share knowledge at an unprecedented scale 

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As the challenges we face are increasingly more complex, interdisciplinary education and approaches to problem-solving are of pressing concern for our democracies, economies and scientific communities. 

At the end of 2021, in order to maximise our impact and to respond to the increasing demands from the public and private sectors, seeking our consultation services to plug into the learning society, the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research (CRI) became the Learning Planet Institute. Under this new name, our goal has been to foster the learning society at an even greater magnitude, in order to meet the challenges of our time. We see the Institute as an accelerator of knowledge and community-building. Thus, we seek to help both individuals and organisations to take part in the shaping of the world’s future. 

The Learning Planet Institute is the next chapter in the CRI’s history, following the initial vision, but focusing more on the learning-society revolution. The new name is a reflection of the ambitious scale of the social impact we want to have, but it is also the fruit of our long-term global partnerships, one of our biggest assets as we set out to achieve new milestones.

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The governance of the Learning Planet Institute is divided into six bodies: 

  1. The Board of Directors
  2. The HR Committee
  3. The Scientific Advisory Board
  4. The Executive Committee
  5. The Transformation Committee
  6. The Management Committee

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The Bettencourt Schueller Foundation, our patron, has supported us since our creation.

The City of Paris and UNESCO are our two major historical partners.

Université Paris Cité, CY Cergy Paris Université, Inserm and Université PSL (Paris Sciences & Lettres) are our academic and research partners, with whom we develop our teaching and research programmes.

About fifteen private and public financial partners allow us to finance the high-impact projects we carry out.

About ten institutional partners allow us to have an impact at a larger scale.

A dozen project partners allow us to implement concrete and ambitious projects alongside them.

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Your advocacy

The Learning Planet Institute advocates a large-scale collaboration to co-build a learning society, capable of addressing the complex challenges of today and tomorrow. In this society, the “Learning Planetizens” would learn to take care of themselves, the others and the planet.

To achieve these goals, the Institute explores, researches and shares new ways of learning and cooperating. It encourages the development of learning ecosystems and communities, working together to find sustainable solutions in the education and health sectors and finding ways to reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.

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In 2015, in order to respond to the new global challenges, 193 countries adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the United Nations, pledging to eradicate poverty, to protect the planet, and to guarantee peace and prosperity for all by 2030. 

In order to “leave no one behind“, the 17 SDGs are closely interconnected. No.4, which seeks to “ensure a fair, inclusive, high-quality education, as well as lifelong learning opportunities for all“, is particularly cross-cutting and crucial: its achievement is a prerequisite for the other objectives. 

The SDGs call for the involvement of all players: states, the international community, NGOs, local authorities, companies and citizens. The creation of the Learning Planet Institute responds to this global call to action

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François Taddei is the founder and president of the Learning Planet Institute. 

He is an internationally renowned researcher in evolutionary systems biology. He now devotes his time to the promotion of education sciences, in particular to the notion of “Planetizens”, in order to allow each of us to learn to take care of ourselves, the others and the planet.

Since 2014, he is also the co-holder of the UNESCO Chair Sciences de l’apprendre (Sciences of Learning), attached to the Université Paris Cité.

He is the author of 2 books Et si Nous ? (English version Learning Planetizen Manifesto) – 2022 – and Apprendre au XXIe siècle (English version Learning in the 21st Century) – 2018 – both published by Calmann-Lévy.

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Your activity

The Learning Planet Institute creates research and teaching programmes based on interdisciplinarity, diversity and initiative. 

The Institute relies on the synergies between its different activities:

  1. R&D (search)
  2. Education (learn)
  3. International Alliance (unite)
  4. Transformation of Organisations (accompany)
  5. Digital Ecosystems (provide)

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It is both!

R&D is a fundamental, interdisciplinary activity. It fuels and supports the four other main activities of the Institute (Education, Digital Ecosystems, International Alliance and Transformation of Organisations). The Learning Planet Institute encourages and implements an inclusive and open R&D: everyone is a potential researcher.

The Education hub creates and transforms educational programmes and practices, at the individual and collective levels, to enable people to learn in alternative ways, both inside and outside of academic institutions. Based on interdisciplinarity and research, its programmes are designed to have both individual and collective impacts, at local and global levels. In so doing, they contribute to building a learning society for a more sustainable world. The Education hub encourages people of all ages to embark on a learning journey throughout their whole lives (with training designed for young people, undergraduates and graduates, as well as executives)

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Created in 2019 by the Learning Planet Institute and UNESCO, the International Alliance is a global community dedicated to the transformation of education and to the co-construction of a learning society. 

The LearningPlanet Alliance brings together diverse complementary actors (NGOs, public actors, cities and territories, schools and universities, social entrepreneurs, companies, students, youth movements, activists, artists…) committed to a common goal: to teach individuals how to “take care of themselves, the others and the planet”. 

Together, they share their knowledge, their pedagogical practices and their field experiences (creating new ways of learning, teaching, researching and mobilising collective intelligence), in order to better prepare individuals and organisations to understand and face, collectively, the challenges of our time. 

The LearningPlanet Alliance has nearly 300 partners worldwide.

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Our 20 years of experience in co-construction, collective intelligence and project-based learning are assets that we wish to share.

The Organisational Transformation division contributes to the evolution of educational systems and to the transformation of organisations – public or private – as well as educational institutions, in order to make them more learning-oriented.

Its activities are based on a twofold approach: 1/ support based on the research process 2/ a training proposal in the form of co-constructed workshops.

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R&D at the Learning Planet Institute

In order to promote the transformation of learning—and thus to have a positive impact on the planet—the R&D department uses research and technology to develop projects focusing on:

  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Learning and collective intelligence
  • Frugal innovation
  • Individual and collective transitions

These projects are thought of and conducted according to their final purposes.

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In addition to these projects, the Learning Planet Institute incubates the ELiS (Engaged Life Science) project, which coordinates all the life sciences initiatives until the end of 2024.

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  • In 2007, the Learning Planet Institute hosted the Université Paris Descartes – Orange Chair Approches innovantes de la recherche et de l’enseignement (Innovative approaches to research and teaching).
  • In 2012, the Initiatives d’excellence en formations innovantes (IDEFI) (Initiatives of Excellence in Innovative Training) of the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) (French National Research Agency) supported research programmes focused on learning. 
  • In 2013, we hosted activities dedicated to citizen science (Citizen Science – European funding).
  • Since September 2018, thanks to the support of the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation, the Learning Planet Institute has hosted researchers and enabled the creation of laboratories. 
  • The Unité Mixte de Recherche (UMR) (Joint Research Unit) U1284 – a research unit of Inserm and Université Paris Cité – was created in January 2020. Hosted at the Learning Planet Institute, it welcomes researchers—and their research projects —selected by the Scientific Advisory Board.
  • Within the frame of the new national five-year plan (2025 – 2029), the Learning Planet Institute explores new partnerships to host researchers interested in our R&D subjects.

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Education at the Learning Planet Institute

We are an association that works mainly with French public universities (Université Paris Cité, CY Cergy Paris Université, Université PSL), which are among the most advanced in the transformation of higher education, addressing technological, civic and societal transitions. 

The Learning Planet Institute also works closely with international universities (University of Geneva – Switzerland, Tsinghua University – China, Harvard University – United States, Arizona State University – United States, UCL – United Kingdom, etc.) which also carry out higher education transformation projects.

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We have nearly 2,000 alumni, both undergraduates and graduates, with international backgrounds and trajectories. Wa also have an average of 350 students every year. They are all ambassadors of our legitimacy in this field.

  • “The Learning Planet Institute breaks down barriers so that we can be more daring. The audacity and latent madness in us can come out! They try to de-form us so that we can build ourselves in our own way” Flora, alumna 
  • “The Learning Planet Institute really made me more curious. I already was, but way less. The Learning Planet Institute has made me ten times more curious” Julien, alumnus

The quality of our education projects and programmes is recognised and evaluated by independent teams:  

  • The university degree programmes are evaluated by the Haut Conseil de l’évaluation de la recherche et de l’enseignement supérieur (Hcéres) (High Council for the Evaluation of Research and Higher Education), for the renewal of our accreditations. Here is an excerpt from the 2018 report on the Frontières de l’Innovation en Recherche et Éducation (FIRE) (Frontiers of Innovation in Research and Education) Doctoral School: “This Doctoral School is quite remarkable and the committee has no particular recommendation. The institution’s Doctoral College could be inspired by the Doctoral School’s governance principles and their spin-off within the other doctoral schools.
  • Evaluation of the Initiatives d’excellence en formations innovantes (IDEFI) (Initiatives of Excellence in Innovative Training) of the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) (French National Research Agency). Here is an excerpt from the 2015 report: “In short, this crossroads of innovation on education and research is a whirlwind spiral that has generated an uncommon dynamic since the very beginning. The achievements are multiple and reach many audiences, from elementary school children to employees to doctoral students, and this in both diploma and qualification training.
  • Savanturiers – École de la recherche, publication of the evaluation report 2016-2018, under the direction of Marc Demeuse (director of the Institut d’administration scolaire, INAS, Institute of School Administration, of the Mons University and member of the Conseil scientifique de l’Education nationale, Scientific Council of National Education) and Emilie Carosin (researcher at the Institut d’administration scolaire, INAS, Institute of School Administration, of the Mons University): an evaluation in the form of an intervention on Savanturiers – École de la Recherche, in August 2028. The programme is carried out since April 2022 by the association AFPER.
  • The Réalise tes Rêves RtR) (Make your dreams come true) project, winner of a call for inclusive projects by the French Ministry of Labour, Full Employment and Inclusion —as part of the Plan d’investissement dans les compétences (PIC) (Skills Investment Plan)—was launched in 2018. It has been the subject of conferences and publications in scientific journals.

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The Learning Planet Institute (formerly CRI – Centre for Interdisciplinary Research) has also contributed to several major publications in the field of education, including: 

 

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Since the creation of the association, our two major pillars – learning and collective intelligence – have guided our education activity.  

  • 2006: creation of the first interdisciplinary doctoral school Frontières du Vivant with the Universities of Paris Descartes and Diderot (which merged in 2020 to become Université Paris Cité)
  • 2009: creation of an interdisciplinary Master’s degree, Approches Interdisciplinaires du Vivant (Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Living Matter), with the Universities of Paris Descartes and Diderot (which merged in 2020 to become Université Paris Cité)
  • 2011: creation of an interdisciplinary Bachelor’s degree, Frontières du Vivant (Frontiers of the Living Matter), with Université Paris Descartes
  • 2012: the Institute was awarded the label Initiatives d’excellence en formations innovantes (IDEFI) (Initiatives of Excellence in Innovative Training) from the Agence Nationale de la Recherche (ANR) (French National Research Agency), which allowed the creation of a new course in the Master’s programme, formerly called “FOSTER/Edtech”, now “Learning Sciences”
  • 2013: implementation of activities inside and outside of school (Savanturiers – École de la recherche, now run by AFPER); development of learning by doing with the MakerLab; development of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses)
  • 2014: UNESCO Chair in Sciences de l’apprendre (Learning Sciences), renewed in 2018 and 2022
  • 2017: accreditation of the doctoral school by the Paris Sciences et Lettres University
  • 2018: creation of the École Universitaire de Recherche Interdisciplinaire de Paris (EURIP) (Paris University School of Interdisciplinary Research)
  • 2019: creation of the Institut Des Défis (Challenge Institute) by Université Paris Cité and the Learning Planet Institute and launch of the Digital Sciences course of the AIRE Master programme
  • 2020: launch of training programmes for NEET (Not in Education, Employment, or Training) people
  • 2022: hosting of the CY Cergy Paris Université/ESSEC Bachelor Act and development of the Bâtisseurs de Possibles (Builders of Possibilities) programme for students and teachers

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Since its creation in 2011, the Frontières du Vivant (FdV) (Frontiers of the Living Matter) Bachelor’s degree has been an experimental programme developing and testing new teaching methods. By maintaining its focus on an interdisciplinary approach to life sciences, the degree has trained hundreds of students and seen the creation of dozens of projects.

At the same time, the Learning Planet Institute has grown, evolved, and adopted new orientations. After 13 years and 11 generations of students, the FdV experience will come to an end in 2024.

We would like to thank all the people (students, teachers, coordinators, directors) who have taken part in this wonderful adventure.

FDV Frequently asked questions

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Since September 2022, we have been hosting in our campus this experimental Bachelor’s degree Learning to Lead Transitions, created by CY Cergy Paris Université in partnership with ESSEC (a business school attached to CY Cergy Paris Université). 

This  Bachelor’s degree course, which leads to a diploma, enables high school graduates to study project management in the fields of ecological, civic and societal transitions. Almost 43% of the first group of students are scholarship holders. 

We provide our expertise on pedagogical issues and make our teaching facilities available.

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The University School of Interdisciplinary Research of Paris (École Universitaire de Recherche Interdisciplinaire de Paris – EURIP) was co-created by Université Paris Cité and the Learning Planet Institute. It is supported by the French National Research Agency (ANR). Its particular feature is that it focuses both on basic and applied research, at a crossroads between life sciences, learning sciences and digital sciences. 

EURIP is an interdisciplinary graduate school, based on collaborative learning, pedagogical innovation and scientific research methods. It trains excellent multi-skilled students and researchers, capable of meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the fields of health and education. 

EURIP brings together the Interdisciplinary Approaches to Research and Teaching (AIRE) Master’s degree and the Frontiers of Innovation in Research and Education (FIRE) Doctoral School, as well as high-level laboratories. These programmes are being renewed for the next five-year plan.

EURIP 1 Frequently asked questions

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The university degrees that we have been offering for several years within Université Paris Cité have confirmed the need to propose a specific training offer dedicated to professionals or professionals in transition.

With a new proposal for executive education – consisting of short programmes, a professional Master’s degree and a professional Doctorate – the start of the 2023 academic year should thus be marked by an expansion of our training offer.

The national diplomas are developed within the framework of initial training in higher education. Our executive courses are designed as mid-career courses, based on the principles of scientific research. Their credibility is ensured by our academic know-how.

These courses are part of high-level continuing education.

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