Dialogue series on the SDSN report: Accelerating Education for the SDGs in Universities
Channel: SDSN
Date: 2020-11-19

Universities and other higher education institutions have a critical role in helping society achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including by harnessing their learning and teaching functions to provide Education for the SDGs. However, the SDGs require deep and radical transformations in each country. Incremental approaches will not be enough to tackle the urgent and complex challenges outlined by Agenda 2030. In order to play a leading role in these transformations, universities will also need to evolve.

Universities have developed sophisticated systems to deliver high-quality education and research while remaining independent from political and economic changes. These characteristics often go hand in hand with structural constraints to rapid change. However, the SDGs can offer a framework to guide profound institutional evolution. Many higher education institutions are already embracing the SDGs as a source of transformation and reinvention. But is the sector, as a whole, acting fast enough? And are the changes sufficiently deep, given the pace and scale of change and the timeline signaled by the SDGs?

Join us for this discussion focused on Chapter four of our recently launched guide Accelerating Education for the SDGs in Universities!

Agenda
1. Welcome
2. Transforming institutions: Otto Scharmer - Senior Lecturer in the MIT Management Sloan School and co-founder of the Presencing Institute
3. Panel discussion:
Wendy Purcell - Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and former President of  Plymouth University
Luce Beaulieu - Executive Director at the Interdisciplinary Center for Research on Sustainable Development Operationalization (CIRODD)
Sarah Mendelson - Professor at Carnegie Mellon and former US Representative to the ECOSOC at the UN
Amelia Clarke -  Associate Professor & Associate Dean of Research, University of Waterloo
4. SDSN Report Presentation: Accelerating Education for the SDGs in Universities
5. Closing remarks
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About the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN):

The UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) was set up in 2012 under the auspices of the UN Secretary-General. SDSN mobilizes global scientific and technological expertise to promote practical solutions for sustainable development, including the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Climate Agreement. SDSN works closely with United Nations agencies, multilateral financing institutions, the private sector, and civil society.

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