04.02.2024
Urban GoodCamp project successfully concluded: Urban Challenges in the Focus of Learning Processes
Cities face complex challenges that cannot be addressed by a single discipline or organisation. We need to connect across sectors and involve citizens and communities more deeply in addressing urban challenges. It therefore makes sense to include such topics in the education process. We need to equip the coming generations with the right skills and knowledge for a future of quality living.
The Urban GoodCamp project (UCAMP), funded by the EU Erasmus+ programme, was successfully completed at the end of 2023. The project aimed to address the gaps that make it difficult to tackle urban challenges in a cross-sectoral, interdisciplinary way in the education process. The project aimed to develop supporting tools and processes to help universities play their part in addressing challenges in urban regions. Key components are to strengthen the integration with urban communities and innovators and to develop multidisciplinary, problem-based learning processes.
The UCAMP project developed and tested the UCAMP approach in a pilot community of innovators in seven European cities: Madrid, Porto, Paris, Amsterdam, Venice, Helsinki and Ljubljana. The project focused on the development and implementation of innovative UCAMP learning programmes (boocamps or “goodcamps”), which were carried out in six universities or higher education organisations, addressing twelve urban challenges, and involving a total of 180 participants and 24 mentors.
In Ljubljana, IRI UL partnered with the Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology at the Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, where we integrated the UCAMP programme into the curriculum as part of a one-semester course Anthropology of Contemporary Slovenia. We chose mobility as our urban challenge. The programme had three main parts:
- A five-day intensive programme with lectures, workshops and field research, involving two academic mentors and two external experts, as well as guest lecturers from various organisations (e.g. Regional Development Agency of the Ljubljana Urban Region, Institute for Spatial Policies IPoP, University of Ljubljana) The lectures and workshops offered practical insights into the topic of urban mobility, as well as methodological approaches and tools for designing and implementing research projects.
- Two one-day innovation tours, where we visited organisations such as the municipality, a public passenger transport provider and an electric bicycle rental provider. Their staff presented the challenges they face and existing good practices. This allowed participants to better understand the experiences and perspectives of different key organisations, i.e., how mobility is managed and tackled in Ljubljana.
- The programme concluded with a two-day “mini-bootcamp”, where workshops guided the students to reflect on the ethnographic data collected, combine it with theoretical and practical insights, and draw on the findings to develop ideas for project ideas that could address the urban mobility challenges.
The UCAMP programme has had a number of positive impacts, including giving participants the confidence to conduct qualitative research with an applied perspective and in a field that is not normally part of degree programmes. Although applied anthropology is fairly well-established, students often have limited experience of using research findings to design concrete interventions. In this sense, the activities carried out by external mentors were an important element of the programme and offered insights into how research findings can be applied in non-academic settings. In addition, the participants recognised the importance of skills in designing their own research, i.e. formulating research questions and research plans, which is certainly an important competence for their further education and employment.
Based on the experience of the six pilot learning programmes, the project consortium has developed a number of useful resources to enable other educational institutions to develop similar programmes or to integrate such content into their teaching processes. All content is available on the project website, including:
- UCAMP Toolkit (tools and content for curriculum design),
- A thoughtbook Social Urban Innovations and the Supporting Role of Universities (includes contributions from 19 European experts)
- Urban GoodCamp Implementation Report
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLuE-ZYL8HI