Reach out and touch: student training community projects for sustainability - a case study

Abstract

Purpose As one of the five concrete actions recommended for implementing sustainable development at universities (internal operations, institutional framework, research, education and capacity building), capacity building has received the least research attention. Although capacity building can be a tangible implementation of outreach that offers empowerment to universities, it is currently unclear how capacity building can be operationalised in concrete activities and which parties represent the university and the community. The purpose of this study is to provide the idea that capacity building can be organised through student training projects. Design/methodology/approach To provide support for our suggestion that student training projects can act as an implementation method for capacity building, an illustrative case study is presented. The case study concerns an academic consultancy training project for students in the domain of sustainable development. Findings The case study analysis reveals that, as an implementation method, student training projects can provide benefits for both universities and communities. It appears that student training projects do not depend on individual engagement, on individual university staff members or on research grants and that they provide community members with access to resources, expertise and experiences of academics. Moreover, student training projects overcome the major challenges of both power distance and continuity. Originality/value To summarise, student training projects may provide a new, promising avenue as an implementation method for capacity building that provides substantial benefits and overcomes the challenges of other methods mentioned in the existing literature.

Promoting sustainable development goals: Role of higher education institutions in climate and disaster management in Zimbabwe

“…Such empowerment can be demonstrated through capacity building. Among all the recommended actions universities should embrace towards SD, such as research and education (Adams, Martin & Boom 2018 ; Lozano et al 2015 ), capacity building has gained much research attention (Hooge & Van Dam 2019 ).…”

Authentic assessment targeting sustainability outcomes: a case study exploring student perceptions

“…Considering that achieving sustainability goals on a small scale is a valuable work experience ahead of tackling larger projects, educators need to consider how to balance efforts to foster a productive teamwork experience with achieving sustainability goals. One solution is described by De Hooge and van Dam (2019), who provided extra teaching staff to coach students on teamwork specifically (and separately from the content delivered by the academics). Konrad et al (2020) incorporated teamwork training sessions and guided individual reflection to help students develop teamwork competencies and manage interpersonal conflicts, with the goal of actively embracing conflict as a learning opportunity.…”

“…Thus, authentic assessments focused on sustainability can foster transferable skills that students will then take with them after graduation to enhance sustainability-relevant skills in the broader workforce. In other words, it supports capacity building (De Hooge and van Dam, 2019). Several scholars have argued that educational practitioners who work in sustainability fields need to focus on promoting problem-based learning (Wiek et al , 2011) and on instilling holistic and interdisciplinary ways of thinking (Warburton, 2003).…”