Enhancing the sustainability of Higher Education Institutions through a participative approach of all involved actors thus making university campuses greener is at the core of the UNI-ECO project.
In this context, the UNI-ECO Summer School 2022 has been held from 6th to 10th June in Utrecht (Netherlands) with the participation of project partners and students of all four partner universities. The training activity was hosted by Utrecht University’s Green Office, which is the organ at the university dedicated to aligning the university’s activities to the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations. The Green Office team in Utrecht is actively fostering biodiversity, green mobility and energy savings for the whole University campus and hence represents a comprehensive solution to the challenges that HEIs face in terms of sustainability.
The programme included lectures on Circular Economy, Water and Biodiversity, a sustainable campus tour, and a visit to the Botanical Gardens. Some topics covered by the lectures are addressed by the UNI-ECO training modules available on the UNI-ECO e-learning platform. The platform supports HEIs communities in the implementation of living labs as well as provides the opportunity to take to study the created e-learning modules.
Furthermore, students and university employees were invited to participate in the activities and present their Green Challenge projects. These projects represent different challenges in terms of sustainability identified by the partner universities and the teams in the different countries at their local campuses were actively proposing solutions to overcome them. Among them were for example an initiative to change all lights to LED in order to save energy in Dublin, a circular approach to foster biodiversity and enhance composting in Barcelona University or the creation of a reusable coffee cups system in line with circular economy at the Utrecht University Campus. Participants actively discussed these and worked on sustainable solutions for the different local campuses and exchanged best practices. All winning projects of the UNI-ECO Green Challenge 2022 can be found here.
In the final month of the project, partners will finalise the training modules on the e-learning platform based on the feedback gathered during the Summer School 2022 as well as hold a final conference open for the public in Rome.
About the project
UNI-ECO – Practical & collaborative tools for sustainability innovation in the university is co-funded by the European Commission under the Erasmus+ programme, KA2 – Strategic partnership in higher education.
Partners
- UNIVERSITE DE MONTPELLIER (France, coordinator)
- UNIVERSITAT DE BARCELONA (Spain)
- THE PROVOST, FELLOWS, FPUNDATION SCHOLARS & THE OTHER MEMBERS OF BOARD OF THE COLLEGE OF THE HOLY & UNDIVIDED TRINITY OF QUEEN ELIZABETH NEAR DUBLIN (Ireland)
- UNIVERSITEIT UTRECHT (the Netherlands)
- EOTVOS LORAND TUDOMANYEGYETEM (Hungary)
- UNIMED – UNIONE DELLE UNIVERSITA DEL MEDITERRANEO (Italy)
- CESIE (Italy)
For further information
Read more about UNI-ECO and see the project website.
Contact Paula Luise Goltzsche: paula.goltzsche@cesie.org.
