Programme

• Course title: Social Innovation and System Shifts
• Number of ECTS: 6
• Course code: SDSI-15
• Module(s): Social Innovation and System Shifts
• Language: EN
• Mandatory: No

– Recognise the complexity and inter-dependencies of social worlds and natural worlds relating to our conceptions of business for society and the environment. 
– Understand relations of diverse legal forms and governance of enterprises. 
– Appreciate value conflicts between personal beliefs and ethical considerations within oneself and others. 
– Develop a simple business plan placing primary on social objectives and community needs rather than individual profits. 
– Recognise that there may be multiple legitimate but irreconcilable perspectives on many issues, and that it takes negotiation: listening, giving and taking to find ‘acceptable’ solutions.  Propose solutions to disputes arising from disparate worldviews and underlying values by applying methods for relating perspectives from diverse interests and disciplines to each other. 
– Recognise the relation between different approaches to financing enterprise and the uses of ‘profits’ in the business model. 
– Make judgments and take a personal stance on the meaning of social enterprise for sustainable development in specific situations, building on the reflexive understanding that to know your own position you have to understand the position of others.

This course introduces diverse concepts and examples of social business, social enterprise and entrepreneurship, by differentiating these from each other and from traditional approaches to business and not-for profit organisations to address local problems. The course highlights how such novel approaches to doing business, meeting new and unmet community needs, learning, and organising for collective action can provide a powerful approach to meet new local challenges our societies face in view of rapid global change in the natural and social world.  The course provides a framework for making personal judgments on successful and sustainable social enterprises, and their distinguishing elements.

• Course title: Peer Group Project
• Number of ECTS: 4
• Course code: SDSI-5
• Module(s): Peer-Group Project – Winter Semester
• Language: EN
• Mandatory: No

• Learn about the devil in the detail of a particular issue and what challenges and opportunities are found when trying to transform a field of practice. Develop recommendations as a group on this topic leading to concrete actions and more general strategies for transition to a more sustainable society.


• Work with your group’s multiple perspectives towards understanding the issue and how theory and methods presented in the Core Courses of the Certificate can be applied to addressing a complex problem. Practical group work allows us to experience and critically discuss the merits and limitations of working with academic concepts, analytical frameworks and methods in practice. 


• Gain experience with group dynamics within your peer group (including different priorities from diverse sets of values being defended by different group members) and social learning in a diverse, non-hierarchical self-organized group to tackle a social and/or environmental issue.


• Strengthen soft-skills such as developing thematic expertise, communication, networking, time management, self-competence, formulation of English texts, awareness rising, event organization, creation of questionnaires, critical thinking, and problem solving – depending on the project and possibilities.
  

It is important that the group feels ownership of the purpose of the peer group work. Whilst we offer five overarching topics to choose from, the group will define their specific joint goals and objectives of what they would like to achieve within that topic. The peer group together thereby determines what they commit to do at the outset and assume shared responsibility for this. 

Peer groups are an experimental field for bridging the gap between practice in real life and academic concepts and methods encountered in the courses. Peer groups also allow to gather experience working in small and diverse groups of volunteers where there is no real hierarchy or formal command control relationship, as you would if you were to mount a citizen’s initiative on a sustainability challenge with a group of like-minded people, or neighbours. Peer group work is self-organized, it is planned in peer group meetings that are scheduled by the peer group participants when convenient for them, and each peer group has a mentor who provides advice and joins meetings as needed.

• Course title: Global Environnemental Change in the Anthropocene
• Number of ECTS: 6
• Course code: MAGEO-4
• Module(s): Global Environmental Change in the Anthropocene
• Language: EN
• Mandatory: No

 
 
On completion of the module a student should be expected to be able to:

Understand the relation between human activities and natural processes determining the quality of the environment (incl. the political and management dimension).
Apply concepts of risk, vulnerability, adaptation, mitigation and resilience in
analysing
policies relating to global environmental change.
Apply the concept of ecosystem services for taking environmental change into account in spatial planning policies.
Understand merits and limitations, and potential abuse of scientific observation and assessment and associated uncertainties.
Make judgments on the quality of science underlying evidence-based policies.
Evaluate EU and Luxembourg spatial planning and environmental policy recommendations.

 

Global change in the anthropocene” is an optional course in two programmes: the Master in Geography and Spatial Planning and in the Certificate in Sustainable Development and Social Innovation. It is part of the common Introductory module “European Territorial Trends and Policies” in the Master of Geography and Spatial Planning and it counts as auxiliary course towards the Certificate in Sustainable Development and Social Innovation.This course provides an overview on global environmental change and current accounts of the role of human activities in this. The nine sessions start with an introduction on sustainability science on current scientific descriptions of the functioning of the earth system and the role of the biosphere in stabilizing environmental conditions on earth. Subsequent sessions address sea level-rise, risks of flooding and land-use change with a focus on agriculture. Cross cutting themes that are also addressed in dedicated sessions include citizen science, challenges in the characterisation of complex dynamic social-ecological systems and interpretation and communication of scientific uncertainty. Recurring themes are the merits and pitfalls of current approaches to developing evidence-based policy and working with indicators for planning purposes, and the concluding session compares diverse approaches to anticipating future change, and provide a platform for critical discussion of the most relevant overarching EU and Luxembourg policies.

 

10% participation
30% assignments
60% final report

• Course title: SCCS – Science & Citizens meet Challenges of Sustainability
• Number of ECTS: 6
• Course code: SDSI-11
• Module(s): Science and Citizens meet Challenges of Sustainability
• Language: EN
• Mandatory: No

You will join a diverse learning community, guided by our interdisciplinary team of natural and social scientists and practitioners, who are working closely together and cross-question each other. Learning will largely occur through group interaction during sessions, and the development of a joint report on the course. An alternation of closed lectures, public lectures and engaged learning activities will offer possibilities to engage with diverse view points on each issue. The engagement of practitioners will ensure societal salience, and the open lectures will allow you to connect to public reactions and debates on the issues. Conceptual tools provided in the engaged learning activities highlight challenges and facilitate the drawing together of diverse perspectives and disciplinary approaches where possible.

How can ‘science’ meet challenges of sustainability? What responsibilities can citizens assume in a knowledge society? We think of Science as a social institution, on the analogy of The Law or The Churches or Medicine. We know that it is realized by individuals in particular organizations, each with defined tasks, privileges and ethical responsibilities; these are derived from a variety of ‘contracts’, some explicit with the State, others informal with various sectors of society and individuals. Traditionally science was mostly conceived as autonomous, detached and objective, creating a ‘fountain of facts’, the fruits of which are passed on to Society. The responsibility of Society traditionally was to provide room and means for science to unfold.

This conception is however slowly changing: In the face of the great acceleration of human impacts on planet earth and the very fabric that supports all life, sustainable development needs recognition of uncertainty, complexity and issues of social and personal ethics. Accordingly, the concept of knowledge production has been fundamentally revised over the last decades. The development of science, technology and social norms, rules and laws, are increasingly conceived as linked or ‘co-produced’. Awareness of and the possibility to act in the face of uncertainties from complex intertwinement of science, technology, politics and social practices are desirable, for scientists and citizens alike. However, in the age of the Anthropocene, citizenship and associated responsibilities and rights is gaining new dimensions, both with respect to knowledge co-creation in a networked society, and with respect to environmental stewardship.

• Course title: SCCS Peer-Group Work
• Number of ECTS: 4
• Course code: SDSI-10
• Module(s): Science and Citizens meet Challenges of Sustainability – Peer-Group Project
• Language: EN
• Mandatory: No

• Course title: Sustainability Reporting Process
• Number of ECTS: 4
• Course code: SDSI-14
• Module(s): Sustainability Reporting Process
• Language: EN
• Mandatory: No

The main aim of the course is to enhance students’ sustainability reporting knowledge to be prepared to give guidance to report makers, users and readers to utilize reports more effectively.

On completion of the course successfully student will: 

• Gain familiarity with the current sustainability reporting scene 


• Understand the legislative framework surrounding sustainability reporting in Europe 


• Understand double materiality assessment and the requirements of different frameworks and standards 


• Understand the emphasis of the European Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) and Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) 


• Be capable of carrying out critical analysis of sustainability reports for improvements
  

Politicians and people in organizations of all sizes, regions and types are taking decisions every day that have impacts on the businesses, the society, and the environment.

The ability to manage, measure, and report on these impacts towards positive effects based on transparent and trusted analysis, are crucial for taking informed strategic decisions and to the advancing sustainable development. Stakeholders, as consumers or investors, with better understanding of factors beyond financial considerations, contribute to making more sustainable decisions. Students will learn about the key processes towards sustainability performance, including strategic approach, business model, stakeholder analysis, double materiality, key performance indicators and measuring.  The implementation of recognized reporting standards and frameworks to the core of an organization that goes beyond financial reporting will be introduced.  Students will acquire necessary information to be able to understand the corporate sustainability landscape needed to be change agents for the future of sustainability reporting.

Based on course participation (20%), student presentations (20%) and written assignment (60%)