New European Bauhaus Prizes 2023

Initiative category

Identify the award category for which this initiative is being submitted
Reconnecting with nature

Email user
renata.wetter@boku.ac.at

Basic information
Initiative title
ESD Certificate for University Teachers

Full initiative Title
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Please provide a short, catchy description of your initiative to be used in communication towards the public.
The ESD Certificate is an Austrian-wide program that launched in October 2022. Education for Sustainable Development is the foundation for enabling students to shape a sustainable future. However, there is a lack of education opportunities on how to integrate ESD principles into teaching, especially for university teachers. Our program aims to overcome those shortcomings. After successful graduation, university teachers will be able to teach in accordance with a sustainable development.

What was the geographical scope of your intiative?
National

Where was your intiative implemented?
Member State(s) and Western Balkans
Austria

If relevant, insert names of region(s)/municipality(ies) involved
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Does your initiative address mainly urban or rural issues?
It addresses urban-rural linkages

Does your initiative refer to a physical transformation of the built environment or other types of transformations (hard or soft investments)?
It refers to other types of transformations (soft investment)

Has your initiative benefited from EU programmes and/or funds?
No

Has your initiative won an EU prize with a monetary value awarded?
No

Does your initiative has a minimum level of maturity? The minimum level of maturity is exemplified by stakeholder/ initiative promoter commitment to implement the initiative in practice and a clear methodology /approach.
Yes

On whose behalf are you submitting the application?
As a representative of an organization, in partnership with other organisations
If you are submitting this intiative as part of a group, please provide the contact details of the other individuals or organisations
- Name of the organisation(s): Centre for Global Change and Sustainability, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Austria (BOKU)
  Type of organisation: University or another research institution
  First name of representative: Renata
  Last name of representative: Wetter
  Gender: Female
  Nationality: Austria
  Function: Research Associate
  Address (country of permanent residence for individuals or address of the organisation)<br/>Street and number: Gregor-Mendel-Straße 33
  Town: Vienna
  Postal code: 1180
  Country: Austria
  Direct Tel: +43 1 4765499115
  E-mail: renata.wetter@boku.ac.at
  Website: https://boku.ac.at/en/nachhaltigkeit
Social Media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, etc.)
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In case my initiative is selected as a finalist of the NEB Prizes 2023, I agree to share the name (individual and/or organisation’s), email address, website and social media accounts indicated above with other NEB Prizes finalists. I also agree to publish the name (individual and/or organisation’s), website and social media accounts indicated above next to the public description of my initiative in the channels of the European Commission.
Yes

How did you hear about the New European Bauhaus Prizes?
Colleagues

Description of the initiative
Please provide a summary of your initiative
The ESD (Education for Sustainable Development) Certificate is an Austrian-wide program for university and other higher education teachers that was developed by representatives of the Alliance of Sustainable Universities in Austria and launched in October 2022. The program developed from a bottom-up initiative by an ESD working group within the Alliance. It was and still is solely engagement-driven. Education for Sustainable Development is the foundation that enables students to reconnect with nature and act in accordance with the principles of sustainable development. But how can we integrate required competencies to incorporate the principles of ESD and global citizenship in higher education? To date, there is a lack of adequate opportunities for continuing education in the field of ESD, especially for university teachers. The ESD Certificate aims to eliminate those shortcomings by offering a two-semester program to higher education teachers that is completed with a certificate. After successful graduation, teachers will be able to redevelop their teaching in accordance with a sustainable development.
The certificate program is a collaboration of currently seven Austrian universities. Members of these universities teach parts of the program and were significantly involved in the process of creating the certificate. Thus, the program is a unique initiative that also strengthens cooperation between these Austrian universities that in other fields are competitors.
The ESD certificate is open to higher education teachers from different universities and other institutions as well. Currently, 19 participants from 10 different higher education institutions are enrolled in the pilot cohort. The program consists of five modules, including ESD basics, contents and didactic, an in-house training package as well as reflection and supervision. Workshops are held by experts in various fields such as educational science, transformative education, digitalization, or ESD.

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with 5 key words.
Education for Sustainable Development

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
Alliance of Sustainable Universities in Austria

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
Higher Education

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
Continuing education for university teachers

Please indicate the main themes of your initiative with key words
Sustainable Development Goal 4

Please give information about the key objectives of your initiative in terms of sustainability and how these have been/will be met. Please highlight how the initiative can be exemplary in this context.
Regarding the SDGs, our initiative mainly supports SDG4 – quality education – and especially target 4.7. The key objective of the ESD certificate is to offer a continuing education program that gives university and other higher education teachers the tools and knowledge to incorporate the principles of ESD and global citizenship into their teaching. Ideally, all university teachers should complete our program, thus transforming higher education teaching towards a more sustainable future.

Graduates of the program will be able to
- Know and convey different forms of knowledge through other forms of teaching and learning than conventional academic teaching usually offers.
- Critically consider their own subject in relation to Sustainable Development and communicate its potential contribution towards a sustainability-oriented societal transformation.
- Design learning processes in a way that enables students to inter- and transdisciplinarily reflect societal problems and empowers students to collectively decide and act towards a sustainable transformation.

Please give information about the key objectives of your initiative in terms of aesthetics and quality of experience for people (through design, positive emotions and cultural benefits) and how these have been met. Please highlight how the initiative can be exemplary in this context.
All workshops and work packages have been carefully designed and piloted by the experts within the ESD working group of the Alliance of Sustainable Universities. After each workshop, plus as larger processes in the middle and at the end of the program, a reflection and feedback process is initiated. Participants are welcome to contribute towards content and workshops. Thus, the initiative is constantly refined and developed further, in an inclusive process that involves all stakeholders.

Please give information about the key objectives of your initiative in terms of inclusion (ranging from accessibility and affordability for all to inclusive governing systems, design for all principles or new societal models) and how these have been met. Please highlight how the initiative can be exemplary in this context.
The ESD certificate is open to higher education teachers of all fields, irrespective of their experience with ESD or Sustainable Development. Through its flexibility, the program offers benefits to all participants, regardless of their already existing know-how. The first cohort of the program is offered free of charge to all participants. This can only be accomplished through the engagement of the involved experts.

Please explain the way citizens benefiting from or affected by the initiative and civil society have been/will be involved in the initiative and what has been/will be the impact of this involvement on the initiative
University or higher education students are by many considered the opinion leaders of tomorrow. By giving their teachers the tools and knowledge to incorporate ESD into academic teaching, their education might become transformative by a means of enabling those students to contribute towards a more sustainable future. Civil society is thus affected implicitly by a transformation of higher education starting from inside the universities.

Please explain how different stakeholders at various levels (local, regional, national, European) were engaged in the design and implementation of the initiative.
The ESD Certificate is the result of an initiative of the ESD working group of the Austrian Alliance of Sustainable Universities. The working group consists of experts on ESD and other concepts of education leading to a more sustainable future. These experts are researchers and university teachers in various fields linked with Sustainable Development. Their common interest is to incorporate ESD principles broadly into academic teaching and developing means and methods to do so. A core team of experts in the ESD working group started with a series of workshops on various topics regarding Sustainable Development for universities’ in-house continuing education programs. The goal of the workshop series was a critical reflection on sustainability concepts and conveying selected principles of ESD and their didactic implications at the respective universities. The core team participated in all of the workshops themselves, and held a separate workshop to implement a joint continuing education program regarding ESD for all universities. All workshops were evaluated by the experts with respect to content and didactics, further embellishing the final concept of the ESD certificate. The biggest challenge was to develop a program with a common core for all participants that is still flexible towards the different core areas of participating universities and the interests of participating teachers. Designated coordinators at each participating university ensure consistent quality in regard to content and didactics.

Please explain which disciplines and/ or knowledge fields were reflected in the design and implementation of your initiative. Please explain how representatives of these different fields interacted with each other, and what the added value of this process was
The universities that were initially involved in creating the ESD certificate are the Alpen-Adria University Klagenfurt, the BOKU University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna, the University of Leoben, the Paris Lodron University Salzburg, the technical university Graz, the University of Graz and the University of Innsbruck. Experts on different aspects of educational research, transformative education, global citizenship and ESD are part of the ESD working group where the initiative to develop a certification program stems from. Through both offering and participating in a pilot workshop series a critical reflection and evaluation process was started that eventually led to the work packages offered in the current pilot cohort of the ESD certificate.

Please highlight the innovative character of the initiative, when compared to mainstream actions in the field of the initiative
The ESD certificate is the first university-encompassing ESD certification program for higher education teachers in Austria. It is a bottom-up initiative of the ESD working group members and still without funding. Participating universities support the idea, but as of yet the initiative is solely driven by the experts and their engagement in creating content and coordinating the program.
With its focus on ESD itself one could argue the innovative nature of the program, as ESD clearly means a divergence from more conventional approaches to teaching.
The flexible nature of the program, which allows participants to set their own main focus by choosing different workshops, allows higher education teachers of all fields and levels of experience to participate and benefit by its contents. It involves a lot of reflection processes where the own teaching is reflected on and it is reviewed how sustainability and ESD may play a larger part.
Participants are welcome to become content creators themselves and workshop creators participate in the program as well, thus leading to a strong interaction between experts and participants and blurring the borders between those roles.

Please describe which elements of your initiative could be replicated or transferred to other places, groups of beneficiaries and contexts. This may involve, for example, aspects of the methodology, technology, processes, products, learnings, etc.
The ESD certificate is limited to Austrian universities. A similar nation-wide ESD certification program could be taken up by other universities in other countries. Adaptations would be needed depending on knowledge and expertise of the experts, but we are willing and happy to share our own experiences in creating a bottom-up ESD certification initiative.

A similar certificate could also be beneficial in the school environment.

Please describe the methodology or approach used in your initiative.
Education for Sustainable Development is the main methodology, while other aspects such as transformative education or global citizenship also played and are still playing a part in the creation of the program. The program and work package creation is an iterative process, with the current pilot cohort creating feedback and a reflection process that will help structure the next cohort and so on.

Please explain what kind of global challenges the initiative addresses by providing local solutions
Globally: SDG4 - Quality education for all by a local initiative with a special focus on target 4.7.

Please detail the scope of progress in the implementation of the initiative. This can include already demonstrated results/outputs related to the chosen Prizes category, and the already achieved benefits from the initiative for direct and indirect beneficiaries. This can also include a development plan of the initiative, with a particular attention to the steps envisaged in the year following the application, and including envisaged results and benefits from the initiative
Currently the pilot cohort has enrolled – there are 19 participants from 10 higher education institutions. 7 universities were involved in the creation process and are still involved in coordination and content creation. The first cohort will graduate with an ESD certificate in October 2023 which is also the time the second cohort will start. We aim to include even more participants in the next cohort. We want the program to stay free of charge, however, this depends on the achievement of funding for future cohorts.

Please provide documents that demonstrate the maturity level of the initiative and commitment to implement the initiative in practice (e.g.: evaluation report, final or mid-term initiative report, certification, publications, building permit, grant agreement, letter of support, partnership agreement, etc.)
Web link
Web link
- https://nachhaltigeuniversitaeten.at/zertifikat/
If relevant, please describe how your initiative contributes to developing new competences, especially in the context of the European competence framework on sustainability.
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Please attach at least 6 high resolution images or visual representations of your initiative to your application.
If you would like to upload additional documentation, please upload or write below.
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By submitting your application you confirm that you are the copyright owner of the images provided and that they can be used by the European Commission for the purposes of promoting the New European Bauhaus on all platforms (websites, print, social media and other).
Yes

By ticking this box, you declare that you are not in in one or more of the exclusion situations foreseen under Article 136 of the Financial Regulation.
Yes

By submitting this application, I declare that I am not related to the entities subject to EU restricted measures under Article 29 of the Treaty on the European Union (TEU) and subject to Article 215 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU (TFEU)1, and entities covered by Commission Guidelines No 2013/C 205/05), which are not eligible to participate in any capacity.
Yes

By ticking this box, you declare that all the information provided in this form is factually correct, that you assume sole liability in the event of a claim relating to the activities carried out in the framework of the contest, that the proposed initiative has not been proposed for the New European Bauhaus Prizes in any other category or strand and that it has not been subject to any type of investigation, which could lead to a financial correction because of irregularities or fraud.
Yes

By submitting your application, you guarantee that you are the author or have the rights to proceed with the application and to authorise the use of the initiative and that you have obtained any necessary consents, licenses or assignments from third parties and included copyright notices when necessary
Yes

By submitting your application, you understand that all the applications that meet the eligibility requirements will be shared for the purposes of the selection processes, and notably published on the secured platform prizes.new-european-bauhaus.eu and for the purposes of the promotion of these on the New European Bauhaus website and/or other European Commission communication channels. In this sense, the applications would be widely available. Applicants should ensure that they present their initiatives, initiative, in such a way that they could be shared without giving rise to intellectual property related concerns. If your submission is selected as one of the finalists, it will additionally be shared for the purpose of the public vote that will take place. The European Union is granted a licence to use and share your application with the general public and the official external experts for the purposes of the selection process, including the voting. The European Union has the right to use the images and visual materials and the description provided in the application for communication purposes related to the contest and beyond. Rights granted comprise the right to store, reproduce, display, publish and communicate or distribute copies in electronic or digital format, including, but not only, through the internet. Unless you have disclosed your name, the European Commission has no obligation to share your name when using or disseminating your contribution to the public. The European Union cannot be held responsible in case any submitted initiative, initiative is found to infringe third party’s rights. The European Union shall be neither responsible for the use that third parties may do of the applications or related content.
Yes

By submitting your application, you acknowledge that you read and understand that the ‘Guide to Applicants’ of the NEB Prizes 2023, available online in the website of the NEB Prizes 2023, is an integral part of this application form and that it must therefore be observed when completing and submitting your application.
Yes