TE Squad Call June Harvest

“Dialogue on integrating sustainability into higher educaton” with Dr. Estefania Amer

Action steps from the TE Squad Meetup

  • Identify key stakeholders, such as deans, professors, and student council members, who can influence educational policies and curriculum.
  • Approach conversations with a collaborative mindset, seeking ways to support and work together with faculty and administrators.
  • Collect relevant resources, materials, and examples from your university or other institutions that highlight the importance of sustainability in education
  • Take course evaluations seriously and encourage fellow students to provide feedback that highlights the importance of sustainability

Understanding the University System

By familiarizing ourselves with how universities operate, we can identify the right channels and stakeholders to engage with.

Gathering Relevant Material

We discussed the importance of gathering materials and examples from other universities. Sharing resources and best practices can inspire and guide curriculum design.

Collaborative Mindset

Instead of approaching deans or professors with demands, we should ask how we can support them in making sustainability a priority.

Tailoring the Conversation

When engaging with deans or professors, it’s essential to understand their interests and motivations.

Making Allies, Not Enemies

We emphasized the importance of building alliances rather than creating adversaries. Recognizing that everyone involved is intelligent and motivated, we can work together towards common goals

Hosting Sustainability Info Events

We explored the idea of organizing sustainability-focused events specifically targeting student council members. By raising awareness and fostering dialogue, we can inspire student representatives to prioritize sustainability in their decision-making processes.

Collaboration between Students

When students who are knowledgeable about sustainability and students who are familiar with curriculum development combine their expertise, we can advocate for the inclusion of sustainability in our education.

Course Evaluations

We recognized the significance of taking course evaluations seriously and encouraging fellow students to provide feedback can have a meaningful impact on curriculum development and faculty recognition of sustainability’s significance.

What if you were your school or university rector? What would you change? What impact you would like to see? Share your thoughs with our community by participating in the TE Squad Summer Campaign!

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oikos International

posted July 18, 2023

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TE Squad Semester Kick-off harvest

Transforming Education Squad Semester Kick-off Call

On 30th March 2023, the Transforming Education Squad held a “Semester Kick-off Call “that brought together 9 oikees from 4 different oikos chapters. The agenda of the meeting included a check-in, an overview of the purpose and mission of the TE Squad, a session by Sophie Charrios on “Transforming Education – Why you have all you need to change your school & how to find allies on the way“, and a checkout session with harvesting our learnings.

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oikees from Barcelona, Vienna, Graz, Warsaw and Kano chapters

The meeting began with a check-in, where each participant had the opportunity to introduce themselves and share what brought them to the Transforming Education Squad meet up. The attendees came from diverse backgrounds and had different levels of experience with sustainable education, but they all shared a common passion for creating a more sustainable future through education.

After the check-in, Navya Shivaprakash shared the purpose and mission of the Transforming Education Squad to the members. The purpose of the group is to create a collaborative community of like minded  oikees who are passionate about sustainability and transforming education. The mission of the group is to empower oikees and the chapters  by providing  a safe and supportive space for peer-peer learning, sharing best practices and access to resources that support  integration of sustainability into education.

The group then moved on to a reflection session from Sophie Charrios, oikos International. where participants were asked to reflect on 3 important statements:

  • Good reasons Not to embark on transforming your own education to reflect and learn to shake off negative connotations, open up to possibility
  • Where to start? A round of Rob Hopkins “yes and”  to learn that change can happen very fast! > once you have the right teams & allies, it can actually go within 1 semester to implement a new course!
  • What are good questions to ask for inviting your fellow students, professors, university faculty, local government, local businesses, into the important work of transforming your own education
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Miro board activity on “Good reasons Not to embark on transforming your own education.

During the session, the squad members had silent conversations that helped to deepen the conversation and provided an opportunity to reflect, seek solutions, share insights, and learn from each other’s experiences.

Finally, the meeting ended with a checkout, where each participant had the opportunity to share what they had learnt and any key takeaways from the meeting. Some of the key takeaways that we harvested are community support, inspiring sessions, continuous effort, like-minded people, persistence towards our goal.

Overall, the Transforming Education Squad meet up was a valuable experience for all attendees. The meeting provided an opportunity for oikees from different chapters to connect, share their experiences, and work together towards creating a more sustainable future through education. 

Timeline

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Reflection and silent conversation session hosted by Sophie Charrios, oikos International.

The next TE Squad call is taking place on Thursday 27 April at 4pm CEST which is going to explore deeper a whole new topic! Stay tuned for more information.

Get in touch with the TE Squad via email or fill this form if you wish to join the squad!

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oikos International

posted April 8, 2023

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Transforming Education Squad Call March 2023

Join us for an exciting Transforming Education Squad Meetup! This month we have , Sophie Charrois sharing her wisdom on : ” Transforming Education – Why you have all you need to change your school & how to find allies on the way”. Let’s come together to share ideas, strategies, and support as we work towards transforming education for a better future.👩‍🏫👨‍🏫📚

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to connect with like-minded individuals from around the world.

Click here to register your attendance or feel free to RSVP on te.squad@oikos-international.org

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oikos International

posted March 30, 2023

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oikos Curriculum Camp 2022!

oikos Camp is back – this summer it’s will be moving to sunny Barcelona!

The Curriculum Camp is our project withing the Transforming Education initiative which brings together teams of young people engaged in projects which mobilize students to bring change to Business and Management education. As such, it allows international teams with members from different cities and countries get together in person and develop their projects. Through oikos Camp teams form, grow and learn through working together on projects with the support and coordination of oikos International. The Camp also provides a platform for the groups to share their work and results made over the course of it with the world.

This year, the Camp will take place from 8-14 August in Barcelona, with support from Aviva Investors and ESADE. It is the second edition of the new format following a successfull pilot in Italy last year, where we saw big projects kick-off or develop like oikos Sustainable Finance Toolkit, LEAP Tools, Positive Impact Rating, Economy Studies and more. You can read more about the projects from 2021 oikos Camp here.

The applications for teams will run through 8 July, and they’re open and free to students on all levels – from bachelor to PhD as long as they’re eager to engage in transforming higher education.

Apply now by filling this form.

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oikos International

posted August 8, 2022

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Counting down the days to oikos Camp

The excitement grows as we near the kick-off of the oikos Camp!

This year 5 teams will gather working together on developing their projects from 8 to 14 August. They will be hosted by our amazing Transforming Education Team with support from oikos International Team and oikos Community Members in sunny Barcelona. More precisely, the participants will be based in a cozy eco village that, while still near and easily accessible from the city, provides a level of seclusion from the everyday life and city noise, making it easier to connect to beautiful surrounding nature and focus of bringing the best out of projects at hand. Throughout the week, our team will make sure that all teams get the space for most fruitful collaboration, provide support with trained coaches and give a platform for sharing the results and outcomes of Camp projects.

The camp teams were created around five projects, with some familiar names – like the Sustainable Finance Toolkit – making a return after last year’s oikos Camp. Two of them are based on the oikos Squad structure – oikos community groups gathering oikees with similar interests and passions. The Curriculum Change Squad is our long-lasting squad which is going to take on a new shape at the camp and will be joined by a new – Story Squad centered around creating and sharing Transforming Education Stories. Finally, the Sustainability Basecamp and Sustainable Business Model are the teams covering topics and areas that have not been previously part of the oikos Camp. If last year’s Camp projects are anything to go by, we are excited to see what the week in sunny Catalonia will bring to the world of Transforming Education!

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oikos International

posted August 3, 2022

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What are the oikos Camp Teams?

The oikos Camp applications are open and run through 8 July!

Over the course of the Camp from 8-14 August you can be a part of one of the teams working on projects in the field of Curriculum Change. To get a better understanding of each of them before applying, we prepared short overviews of each of them:

As a Camp Participant you have an option of joining the existing team with the costs covered by oikos, however if you have a project or a team of your own you wish to be a part of the oikos Camp, you can submit it and create a new team. However in case of forming a new team, in order to attend the Camp you have to fundraise to cover the costs, for which oikos can provide technical support.

Click here to learn more about oikos Camp.

Apply for Camp here.

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oikos International

posted June 24, 2022

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Get ready for oikos Curriculum Camp 2022!

oikos Camp is back – this summer it’s will be moving to sunny Barcelona!

The Curriculum Camp is our project withing the Transforming Education initiative which brings together teams of young people engaged in projects which mobilize students to bring change to Business and Management education. As such, it allows international teams with members from different cities and countries get together in person and develop their projects. Through oikos Camp teams form, grow and learn through working together on projects with the support and coordination of oikos International. The Camp also provides a platform for the groups to share their work and results made over the course of it with the world.

This year, the Camp will take place from 8-14 August in Barcelona, with support from Aviva Investors and ESADE. It is the second edition of the new format following a successfull pilot in Italy last year, where we saw big projects kick-off or develop like oikos Sustainable Finance Toolkit, LEAP Tools, Positive Impact Rating, Economy Studies and more. You can read more about the projects from 2021 oikos Camp here.

The applications for teams will run through 8 July, and they’re open and free to students on all levels – from bachelor to PhD as long as they’re eager to engage in transforming higher education.

Apply now by filling this form.

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oikos International

posted June 22, 2022

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Curriculum Change in progress: Transforming Education in Graz

The Curriculum Change team as part of oikos Graz was established with the start of the winter term 2020 and currently has eight active members. Our main goal is to increase the inclusion of sustainability topics in all study programs. In the following paragraphs we summarize the activity of our team. 

Firstly, we are still collaborating with the RCE (Regional Centre of Expertise Graz-Styria) at the university of Graz which supports our common goal: sustainable education. Together we established a new free elective module at the university, the “basic module sustainability” which is open to all students and study programs. It aims to educate the students in sustainable development and its different dimensions, starting from the basics. 

In the Winter Term of 2020/21 the new module “basic module sustainability” started with more than 370 students taking part. The lecture was held in a hybrid setting with around 100 students on-site. The rest was able to follow online.

Furthermore, we are continuing to hold the oikos lecture, substituting the last lecture in the course “introduction to business administration”. There we teach about sustainable business and economy to first year students. For Summer Term 21 we could switch to holding the lecture online. Through these lectures we reach a great number of students aiming to be future entrepreneurs and economists. There are several hundred students enrolled every year:

  • Winter Term 20: 954 students
  • Summer Term 21: 442 students
  • Winter Term 21: 695 students

The lecture units were held by two oikees and are obligatory to any first-year students starting with Business Administration, Economics or Sociology studies. The content of the lecture unit is relevant for the final exam.

Student Survey

In the Summer Term 21 the Curriculum Change Team at oikos Graz started its survey “Transforming education at the University of Graz towards sustainability”. With a total of sixteen questions the study aims to examine the students’ needs towards sustainability in their study programmes. 

Through a broadly spread marketing campaign we reached more than 500 students and received 333 complete answers. The results of this study can be found here (german). We are starting lobbying activities at the faculty level of the University of Graz. This is going to be an exciting journey itself, so we will create a new story for this as soon as we progress!

To promote our activities we hosted a social media campaign for curriculum change education and experiences. This was established as a cooperation of oikos Copenhagen, Lisbon, Vienna and Graz through an initiative at the NexGenLead. In this joint project we created videos highlighting our achievements in curriculum change at our universities. 

One of oikos’ main goals is to integrate sustainability into universities’ curricula, so this campaign was about explaining what curriculum change is and to give some insights into our curriculum projects and how oikos Graz fosters the transformation of economics and management studies. Also, followers were encouraged to take part in curriculum change by taking part in a short survey, to talk to professors and fellow students to raise awareness for the importance of integrating sustainability into studies, to join student initiatives that represent the needs of students and are promoting educational transformation projects or to participate in existing academic offers on sustainability, to show interest in them and give feedback. 

Relationship with oikos International

As we were part of the CC squad from the first moment, we could use the opportunity to connect with other chapters to develop joint projects. Furthermore, the monthly meetings are a great way to exchange ideas and learn from each other. We are very thankful for all of the inputs we received either from other chapters or from the international team that facilitates the sessions to ensure a productive and healthy atmosphere. 

Education for schools 

Another major interest of the team is education at schools. The aim is to bring sustainability education and insights into school classes. This also gives us the chance to present sustainable study programs to the pupils to widen their perspectives after school.

  • First session online for two German school classes (15-17 years old) in June 2021 was held by two oikees.
  • “Klimabildung für Schulen” (Education on Climate for Schools) partnership with Climate Change Centre Austria, Scientists for Future, Students Association for Sustainability and University of Graz (Wegener Center) is a program where we support by helping to set up the lectures and facilitating them. 
  • -Part of Sustainability Team at University of Graz
    1) Sustainable Design Thinking Challenge (Cooperation with SAP, SAP next-gen, University of Graz, Graz Holding, Energie Steiermark and ÖH Graz) was a three day online team event to create disruptive solutions for local sustainability challenges. The student participants could earn two ECTS for their respective study programs and it was implemented as part of the sustainability days that were initiated by oikos Graz in 2016 and are now highly supported by the University itself..  

→ We won the green gown award in 2020 for this project!
2)COPERNICUS Alliance (European Network on Higher Education for Sustainable Development

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oikos International

posted June 14, 2022

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Curriculum Change Squad Call April 2022

Join the CC squad meeting to meet great students who work on curriculum change, learn from their experience and share yours! No matter if you are just thinking about starting curriculum change project at your university or if you have loads of experience with curriculum reform. THIS IS THE SPACE FOR YOU!

CC Squad meetings are oikos international’s online meeting point to learn and share our Curriculum Change Initiatives. These last two months we have had workshops to rethink on our progress and kick off our projects full of energy!

Our last 2021 workshop was conducted by Hendrick Berberich, a specialist on story-telling, story sharing and harvesting. Our oikees had the chance to reflect on their stories and find the golden nuggets that are hidden in them both in their successes and failures.

In 2022, we kicked off the year with Joris Tieleman, co-author of the book “Economy Studies”. With him, we explored how to conduct a successful transformation in the existing curricula and how to overcome usual challenges in this initiative.

More information about the next call is coming soon!

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oikos International

posted April 29, 2022

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oikos St. Gallen Curriculum change journey

The oikos St. Gallen curriculum change team consists of Luna, Robin, Daniel, Sandro and Carina as the project head. In the following, we hope to give you an insight into our work of the last year. The overview will be structured like our separate team responsibilities: Assessment year (Carina), IWÖ (Luna and Robin), Open Evenings (Daniel), Sustainable Finance (Sandro) and StartWeek (Luna). 

During our summer holidays, Anna, former President of oikos St. Gallen, had a conversation about curriculum change in the assessment year with the president of University of St. Gallen’s (HSG) Student union. To better understand the context: The assessment year stands for the first two semesters at our university, where every student has to pass the same exams in order to finally decide for a specific major in the third semester. There is currently a single lecture about sustainability in one of five obligatory courses in the entire year. Apart from this, we did not notice the topic being mentioned once in the entire year, sustainability is most certainly not integrated as well as it could be. The president of the Student Union liked our idea, so, in July, Carina organized a first meeting with him, Anna and two representatives of HSG’s institute for economy and the environment (IWÖ). After this pitch he agreed to introduce her to the heads of the assessment as well as one of HSG’s vice presidents. The second meeting in November and the pitch to convince all these stakeholders for our vision for change for the assessment required a lot of preparation, we put the final presentation in the appendix of this mail. Carina presented to them our evidence that there is so much demand for more sustainability in the curriculum and, to our own surprise, they agreed with every single point and had a lively discussion on how to make as many little (and later bigger) changes as possible!

Luna and Robin are closely working together with the IWÖ and started to scan all the course fact sheets to find out whether courses already implemented sustainability in any way. This being very time intensive and the necessity to repeat the procedure every year lead them to the idea to start the More is more – Sustain the change campaign: At the moment they are designing a survey for all professors to clarify whether they teach or mention sustainability in their courses. When this survey is completed, it will be sent per email to all professors together with an invitation to the Open Evenings taking place in March 2022.

The Open Evenings Event in March 2021 to spark the conversation about curriculum change was a success but the question of how to drive actual change from a student perspective still remained. That is why, in collaboration with the oikos St. Gallen sustainability week, we will focus even more on the invitation of stakeholders such as program managers and professors. Here, Daniel is coordinating the contact with the sustainability week and the speakers.

A Business administration bachelor finance professor reached out to us respectively the oikos St. Gallen sustainable finance team because he is trying to replace one of the case studies in his course with one about a sustainable company. Apart from searching for this case study, Sandro and the sustainable finance team explored the opportunity to create an own, student-made sustainable finance course. However, a new course needs to be registered over a year before its implementation which is why this idea seemed to be rather unrealistic for our one-year team members.

HSG offers the “Managing Climate Solutions” certificate, where groups of Master students help shape our university’s infrastructure in a sustainable way. One of these groups recently contacted us and asked for our support to convince the administration of the StartWeek to address sustainability in their case study (all assessment students participate in this week at the beginning of their studies and work on a case study about a global challenge). Luna will have a meeting with them soon.

There is a lot more background organization and administration necessary in order to make all of these projects possible. We are constantly receiving many opportunities for curriculum change and our strategy seems to have developed in a very emergent way. As a group of students with limited time resources we always try to focus only on the options that show that are most promising to implement real curriculum change at our own university. We are super proud of the work we do and are happy to announce that one of our teamies, Sandro Tissi, has most recently been elected as the new president of oikos St. Gallen!

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oikos St. Gallen curriculum change team

posted April 5, 2022

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