The end of the last school year also marked the end of the first version of the Challenge Institute. For the past two years, the’Challenge Institute (IDD), co-founded by the Learning Planet Institute and - led by Université Paris Cité, is tasked with transforming the university in conjunction with Sustainable Development Objectives (SDGs), set by the UN.
Part of the“Excellence Initiatives”At Université Paris Cité, funding was renewed for the Institut des Défis, whose mission has become a necessity. This is an opportunity to take stock, to learn from these actions, to refine them and to capitalize on the resources produced for the next two years.
The IDD's first historic mission is to transform the university (and by trickle-down, society), by disseminating the methods and challenges of collective intelligence and sustainable development. Over the past two years, the IDD has initiated several projects by drawing on the Learning Planet Institute's emblematic know-how, as well as its methodology, tools and environment. Focus on one of these projects: The Challenge Lab.
This year, the Labo des Défis, a creative, entrepreneurial and participative residence, supported 8 project leaders for three and a half months. On June 23, the project leaders presented their achievements to a panel of judges, each contributing to the development of education and sustainability.
- Another dance: Giving the body and emotions a place in university teaching.
- Virtuosi Kids : Musical awakening is within the reach of all children.
- SaVvHa : Making a living out of your profession... and passing it on
- M.U. Mobile Utile : A personalized system for preventing musculoskeletal disorders and integrating people with disabilities.
- The Phoenix project: A place for textile artisans to exchange ideas and ideas, and to get other people thinking about what a more sustainable textile craft might look like.
- A whole village: Turnkey solutions for welcoming newcomers to a school and enhancing the skills of teaching and support staff.
- EcoGenA: Licence pro de Génie écologique en alternance avec des Apprentissages Actives et Accessibles pour tous-tes.
- Innovation: Discover the Community of Practice and its many benefits.
THE INSTITUT DES DÉFIS EVOLVES: THE UNIVERSITY FEEDS THE CITY, THE CITY MUST ALSO BE ABLE TO ENTER THE UNIVERSITY
Adapting the strategy of Université Paris Cité, the’Challenge Institute s new ambition is to create meeting points between researchers - who produce knowledge - and citizens - who may need it in their everyday lives.
Edna Pezard is a researcher working on the sense of insecurity felt by vulnerable people (women, children, the elderly, the disabled, etc.) in urban spaces. Support from the Institut des Défis will enable her to train local decision-makers (in arrondissement town halls) to integrate these issues into the design of public space (often designed by men), as well as to set up a participatory approach (exploratory walks, interviews, etc.) with residents of a Paris district, so that they can take part in the search for solutions to improve urban space.
Among the planned deliverables, training for students at UPCité's School of Urban Planning will enable them to integrate in utero this issue of urban insecurity so that they can design safer, more inclusive spaces for their future jobs.
For example, by involving local agents in the research process, the university not only feeds society, but also benefits from its expertise. The Institut des Défis has added a new dimension to its activities: a territorial and local dimension. The various IDD programs have been redesigned to fit in with community projects, in order to create for and with local citizens and decision-makers.
TRAIN TEACHERS TO ENCOURAGE THE EMERGENCE OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS AMONG THEIR STUDENTS
Within the University, and in addition to setting up programs, the Institut des Défis has sensed a strong need to train teachers in the challenges of sustainable development. The IDD has therefore integrated a global approach to sustainability into its programs: it is by training teachers that they will then be able to train students in these issues.
A NEW TEACHING UNIT «ECOLOGICAL TRANSITION AND SOCIETAL ISSUES» BASED ON THE CREATION OF ECOLOGICAL PROJECTS
A free «Ecological Transition and Societal Challenges» (TEES) teaching unit (UE) was created at Université Paris Cité by Gaëlle Charron, accompanied by teams from the Institut des défis. The TESS EU was inspired by the ODD semester already launched at Learning Planet Institute for students in the Frontières du Vivant bachelor's degree program.
The aim is to enable students to grasp the challenges of sustainable development and to create projects with a sustainable approach. Each of their projects must meet the sustainable development objectives defined by the UN.
Visit June 8th, A hundred students enrolled in the first edition of the cross-disciplinary «Ecological Transition and Societal Issues» course presented their work on raising awareness of these issues.
In addition to the teaching content it provided for the EU, the IDD helped Université Paris Cité teachers to base their learning on concrete projects (project-base learning), in addition to lectures.
A SUMMER SCHOOL ON TEACHING SUSTAINABILITY, WHICH SERVES AS AN EXAMPLE
From mid-June to the end of July, with MakerLab, the IDD helped organize the SDG Summer School from the Learning Planet Institute, on climate-related health issues. The summer school welcomed 18 students from all over the world, in partnership with Tsinghua University and the‘University of Geneva.
At the same time, Université Paris Cité and the Learning Planet Institute, through the Institut des Défis, organized a symposium on “pedagogy for sustainability”, dedicated to players in the teaching of transitions in higher education. The aim of the two-day event was not only to discover inspiring initiatives in the teaching of transitions through the sharing of innovative educational experiences, but also, via a pedagogical role-playing game, to collaboratively reflect on and imagine what could constitute a common core curriculum to operationalize the recommendations of the Jouzel-Abadi report. In fact, this symposium is part of the dynamic of the “Raising awareness and providing training on the challenges of the ecological transition and sustainable development in higher education”This is one of the recommendations made by Jean Jouzel, climatologist and vice-president of the IPCC, who recommends that students in the first year of their bachelor's degree 100% be trained in sustainability issues within three years, regardless of the discipline they are studying. And in order to train students, we first need to train teachers. With this in mind, the Learning Planet Institute's summer school opened its doors to these teachers, so that they could observe their own ways of doing and learning, and pass them on to others.
Round-table discussion on the Jouzel report, feedback and ways to teach the transition on a massive scale in France. @lpiparis_ pic.twitter.com/5LEtUeiReP
- Tuyet Tram DANG NGOC (@dntt) July 6, 2022
After two years, the Institut des Défis has closed its first chapter. Building on its experience, the program will continue to raise awareness of sustainable development issues, while adopting a more global approach. As a logical follow-up to this systemic approach, in September the IDD aims to launch various action programs on the’inclusion. This new area of research and experimentation promises to enrich the projects of the Institut des Défis and the Learning Planet Institute.
