Collection of Sustainabile Programmes
Welcome to the Generators for Sustainable Development (GSD) project’s collection of sustainable programmes. In this compilation, we highlight a number of innovative initiatives that exemplify the GSD project’s commitment to promoting sustainability across sectors. Join us as we explore these impactful programmes, each contributing to a more sustainable and equitable future.
Smart Environment
The Module “Efficiency, productivity, and wellbeing through conscious environmental choices” has been conceived and developed in the framework of the ESG SMART ACADEMY, a complete, modular, flexible and customisable online training programme offered by Smart Revolution on the ESG parameters. The acronym ESG refers to the areas of Environment, Social and Governance, three fundamental dimensions for verifying, measuring, controlling and supporting a company’s or organisation’s commitment to sustainability.
Fresh News Cafe
The Fresh News Cafe is a virtual inclusive learning space developed by English teachers of English Course Department at Folkuniversitetet Uppsala through Design-Based Thinking in the GSD project. It serves disadvantaged learners, particularly students with migrant backgrounds, and their parents. The project combines English language learning, social sustainability and media literacy in an intergenerational setting, promoting critical thinking and communication through the analysis of current news on Padlet.
Eco-Pathway
The Eco-Paths app development and training course aimed to seamlessly integrate technology and history, fostering a deep understanding of the historical and ecological aspects of the Kassel district. Through a collaborative and project-based approach, participants gained technical skills, contributed to the development of the Eco-Paths app and synthesised historical narratives into engaging digital content, resulting in an innovative and impactful learning experience.
GroUp
Our project, titled “GroUp – Design Thinking Innovation Challenge” (‘Gro’ for Groningen University and ‘Up’ for Uppsala University) unites students from Uppsala University in Sweden and the University of Groningen in the Netherlands in a collaborative innovation challenge.
The endeavor was selected for its contemporary relevance— working with the mental health of university students, working with the career paths of university students and building trust in science. We choose topics where a diverse group of students can collaborate together and create conceptual solutions within this short time phrame.
#LearnersAsLeaders
AONTAS, in partnership with Development Perspectives, delivered an advocacy programme for learners on Development Education with a focus on Sustainable Development Goals.
Participants examined and advocated for the needs of adult learners in the field of development education and created content for a #LearnersAsLeaders campaign. They were also critically reflected on their learning journey.
SwedeQuest
The project is SwedeQuest, a learning board game aimed at helping migrants and refugees learn Swedish through interactive play.
Background: The game was conceived as a creative solution to language barriers faced by newcomers in Sweden, addressing the need for a fun, engaging method for learning Swedish that also fosters faster integration into society.
SMART Travel Security
The Module “Introduction to the Travel Security” has been conceived and developed in the framework of the ESG SMART ACADEMY, a complete, modular, flexible and customisable online training programme offered by Smart Revolution on the ESG parameters. The acronym ESG refers to the areas of Environment, Social and Governance, three fundamental dimensions for verifying, measuring, controlling and supporting a company’s or organisation’s commitment to sustainability.
The module at stake refers to the Governance area or SDG8 – Decent Work and it aims at providing an efficient solution to respond to employers’ duty of care as well as to the legislations 81/2008 and 231/2001, which already provide for the employers’ criminal and administrative responsibility for the protection and safeguarding of their personnel on business trips abroad, and to the more recent ISO 31030 on Travel Risk Management (TRM).
It has a duration of eight hours, divided into 2 sections of four hours each, and it is delivered online.
Ambassador for Mobility
The Ambassador for Mobility course was developed as part of the SASSI LLC project. The project addresses the importance of optimising Europe’s labour resources for economic competitiveness and prosperity, in particular by extending working lives across the lifespan. Demographic ageing is identified as a key factor in the need to increase labour force participation in the EU. In order to maintain social support systems in an ageing population, age-friendly policies and practices are needed to facilitate the integration of older workers into the labour market. The SASSI LLC project aims to raise awareness of the need for career guidance in later life, stimulate action and provide skills development support for aspiring ‘olderpreneurs’ to contribute to the economic and social well-being of older workers.
Start for Equal Career
Main objective of the Project is to promote equality between women and men by implementing measures to tackle gender segregation in education and the labour market. Women and men have different economic situations. This is due to the wage gap, which in turn is determined by occupational and sectoral segregation, as well as vertical segregation of the labour market by gender. Girls tend to study so-called ‘female’ specialisations, while boys choose ‘male’ specialisations. This problem is the focus of the Development of an Inclusive Labour Market 2021-2030.
Progress for Change
The Project aims to strengthen the institutional capacity of the Social Innovation Fund to carry out strategic development in the provision of digitised non-formal adult education public services for the integration of socially excluded people into society and the labour market, and to ensure the effectiveness of these services, through the development of high-quality volunteering and the evaluation of the impact of the services.
DiscGolf
The basic concept was to introduce a unique trend sport to the Western City in Göttingen and to utilize the unique aspects of this sport to establish a community-building project. The focus of the events was thus on building interest in disc golf as a “sport for all” (old/young, regardless of background and social status, alone or in groups, easy to start playing and immediately fun, playing together rather than against each other) in the Western City. We chose traditional local events like the Weststadtfest and Westfest, which are visited by a wide range of people from all over Göttingen in addition to the local community of the Western City
Biochar in Community Gardens
PROGRASS e.V. is an association that was founded in Eschwege in 2011. PROGRASS stands for an innovative and interdisciplinary concept which, taking into account ecological, technical and socio-economic aspects, pursues the development of a sustainable form of grassland management with the aim of preserving biodiversity and cultural landscape.
PROGRASS is part of a joint project of BLINC with the University of Kassel, in the context of which socio-ecological projects are to be developed from grass biomasses, which are not only intended to have a positive climate impact, but also regional civic projects.
These goals fit ideally with the GSD approach, as here, too, new ideas are to be generated in a participatory approach, which are to achieve local added value and at the same time have a positive effect on social relations in local communities.
2 members of the BLINC team designed a training concept for PROGRASS e.V. based on the design thinking approach for the regional development of products from ecologically produced biochar.
The concept was tested for the first time in 2020 with approx. 15 PROGRASS partners from DE, BE, FR and UK and implemented in 2021 with a group of 25 participants from SMEs and start-ups.
Community Sporting Activities
The aim of the project “Children participate in sports, families engage in sports, and the entire community is involved in sporting activities” is to promote the participation of children, their families and physical activity of their families and seniors through sports and educational activities. The special attention in the project is given for participants with fewer opportunities: those with low income, families at risk, single parent families, lonely senior citizen.
The project implementation team (partnership) in Kaunas communities carried out the following activities during 36 months:
Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion (DEI) at the workplace
The module “Train Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion (DEI) in your workplace” has been conceived and developed in the framework of the ESG SMART ACADEMY, a complete, modular, flexible and customisable online training programme offered by Smart Revolution on the ESG parameters. The acronym ESG refers to the areas of Environment, Social and Governance, three fundamental dimensions for verifying, measuring, controlling and supporting a company’s or organisation’s commitment to sustainability.
The module at stake intends to raise awareness to the importance of Diversity, Equality and Inclusion (DEI) in the workplace, resulting in more inclusive, diverse and gender-equal organisations. This topic was chosen because DEI are all part of the social aspect of Sustainable Development, which is very relevant, especially in the workplace.
Community Organising Training
The project Community Organizing Training for Community Leaders is based on the need to systematize the steps in community work in marginalized Roma communities.
In Slovakia, there has been a long-term work in marginalised Roma communities, whereby the principles of social services or community development are applied in community work carried out by employees of community centres or social workers. However, there is a long-standing lack of an educational process for active members of the community who want to become active, interested in their community and to move problem-solving to happen mainly within the capacities of the community itself.
The principle of community organizing thus responds directly to this challenge.
Community Organising Training
The main theme of this project is active citizenship. This theme is conveyed through the board game “Let’s organize”, which informally and non-frontally aims to simulate the functioning of the fictitious city of Tanoburt. At the end of the game, the participant has the experience of being part of a community where every step of each participant is seen.
The final result is that the participant tries out the use of tools of active citizenship in the simulation, such as elections, petitions, protests, or building communities and civic initiatives, which they can then use in real life.
Schools for Democracy
Schools for Democracy is a year-long, systematic programme to develop critical thinking and human rights education. It was created in response to the absence of new approaches to 21st century civic education in formal education in Slovakia. At the same time, it responds to the importance of democratizing the school environment and promoting values-based, cross-curricular education in primary and secondary schools in Slovakia.
The SDG Advocate
The SDG Advocate Training programme, delivered by Development Perspectives, was devised to support those working in the adult and community education to develop their knowledge and skills in Global Citizenship Education. It works with 26 students and a critical dimension is supporting them to develop action projects within their practice. It results in confident and skilled individuals who are networked as SDG Advocates across Ireland.