Anne Snick - Fellow at World Academy of Arts and Science, KU Leuven,
Luca Corazzini - Professor of Economics, University of Venice "Cà Foscari"
James McGeever - University Lecturer & freelance copyeditor, Klaipeda University
Current complex societal challenges require technical and economic innovations that restore planetary health while achieving social justice. Since universities are structured in separate disciplines, standard curricula ignore the complex, non-linear interactions among technology, economy, ecology and culture. Today, sustainable development requires a collaboration among all competences, technical as well as social, ethical and creative. How can Higher Education offer learning spaces to foster these cocreative talents to achieve sustainable development?
Changing the curriculum is not the goal, for we need strong disciplines. STEAM+ proposes complementary, ‘extra-curricular’ learning spaces bridging the disciplines, using real social and ecological settings as their ‘classroom’, and engaging teams including various (academic as well as non-academic) agents. Talent programs allow for flexible design of transdisciplinary programs adapted to local or regional contexts, and can be made available to all learners.
The STEAM+ project explores transdisciplinary talent programs as a way to empower learners for sustainability. After describing the general pedagogical principles, we will present two cases (Venice and Klaipeda). There will be ample room for discussion, so we can learn together what actors in higher education need to feel ready for launching their own transdisciplinary learning labs.
Anne Snick has a background in philosophy of education, always questioning what we really mean when we say something is ‘good for human development’. Especially now that this concept of development turns out to deplete planetary ecosystems and to threaten the future of young generations, she explores alternative pedagogical models. Anne works as an independent researcher (connected to the Club of Rome and the World Academy of Art and Science), and is partly country responsible for Belgium in the Erasmus+ project STEAM+.
Luca Corazzini is Professor of Economics at the Department of Economic Sciences of the University of Venice “Ca’ Foscari” and faculty member of the international honors college “Collegio Internazionale – Università Ca’ Foscari di Venezia”. He is also the Coordinator of the Bachelor Degree in Economics and Business, University of Venice “Ca’ Foscari.” Finally, since June 2017, he serves as President of GuardAvanti, an Italian NGO involved in projects aimed at improving the life conditions of children in developing countries. His research interests focus on behavioral and experimental economics, mainly in the field of voluntary contributions to NGOs, bidding behavior in complex auction, voting, and the determinants of subjective well-being. His research outputs appeared on international journals such as the American Journal of Political Science, Economic Journal, Experimental Economics, European Economic Review, Journal of Public Economics, and many others.
James McGeever is currently a university lecturer and a freelance copyeditor. Previously he wrote and implemented sustainable urban mobility projects and worked with partners in all EU member states. Even earlier, he worked with NGOs in international sustainable development. He is widely travelled, loves city life, a keen urban cyclist, avid reader and sometimes wishes he had a greater knowledge of technology!
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