Category Archives: Education

Education

Sign in now for the course A global Sense of Place!

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A Global Sense of Place (RSO-55306) is an optional interdisciplinary course on sustainable place-based development for students from various master programmes (e.g. MDR, MES, MID, MLP, MUE, MOA, MFN). The course builds on the BSc course RSO-56806 Sociology and Anthropology of Place-shaping providing an introduction to place-based approaches in development. Knowledge of this introductory course is an advantage, but is not assumed.

The course aims to make students acquainted with an interdisciplinary and place-based approach to development. A relational place-based approach is seen as key to the understanding of interrelated rural and urban transformation processes and ergo sustainable development.

By means of this course students will achieve profound understanding in key-concepts and methods on place-based sustainable development. Work from key thinkers in sustainable place-making will be critically discussed and examined on the basis of various cases. Guest speakers are invited to reflect on place-based approaches to sustainable development and illustrate these through case studies. Ultimately students will acquire a place-based perspective on development.

Different interdisciplinary themes will be addressed such as:
• a relational approach of place and space;
• key thinkers on place and space and politics of place;
• community development
• cultural approaches of place-based development
• ‘the human dimension’, encompassing collaboration and leadership
• ‘defence’ of places and conflicts

If you are interested or want to register for this course, please send a mail before October 4th to lummina.horlings@wur.nl

Request for (graduated) students (on short notice) interested in effective cooperation

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The province of North-Brabant is organising two events in September and October and is looking for student who want to take part in the preparation and participate in various activities, such as sessions with young students on ‘learn to cooperate’.

This in the context “Learning about cooperation” in the European Social Innovation Week ESIW.nl) in Tilburg from 15 till 19 september 2014 and the Dutch Design Week (DDW.nl) – from 18 till 26 oktober 2014.
In a creative process concepts will be developed so that participants in both events experience cooperation. Input will be provided on themes such as trust, connectivity and translation in the context of the topsectors (such as AGRO).
Students of various disciplines can contact the organiser and do these activities in combination with other activities such as a secondment or master thesis. Follow-up activities are also possible. This can offer graduated students experience, as a step towards employment.

Interested students should directly contact: Ernest van Hezik
Advisor TGLE. Tel.: 06-53296993

The course Sustainability Leadership starts soon!

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The course sustainability leadership: new concepts and practices PAP-52806 will start in Period 1. If you are interested, please register soon.

Profile of the course
The governance of sustainability issues in their environmental, social and economic dimensions requires leadership that goes beyond many of the leadership models and practices. Potentially relevant forms of leadership include collaborative, visionary, complexity, adaptive, value-based or eco-leadership. Yet these emerging leadership concepts are elusive just as the concept of sustainability. This course approaches this challenging field by asking some key questions: How does sustainability leadership differ from other types of leadership? How can the contribution of actors (individual and collective) as sustainability leaders be analysed and evaluated? Who are the most successful sustainability leaders and what makes them effective?

Course themes
1) Traditional (hierarchical, positional) versus new (emergent) forms of leadership
2) Leadership to achieve what? Sustainability and sustainability related goals
3) Different types of leaders (individual v.s collective, private vs. public etc)
4) Leadership at different scales and governance levels: from local networks to global negotiations
5) The means of leadership: knowledge, values, power and legitimacy
6) Evaluating successful leadership: functional and ethical dimensions

Activities
The course consists of a mixture of lectures, tutorials and individual feedback sessions with students. The students grade will be based on tutorial assignments, an exam paper and the presentation of this paper.

For who?
This is a master course, open for students in different disciplines. Courses in social science are a helpful background but not obligatory. Students with no social science background can receive extra support in the form of individual feedback on their exam paper.
If you need more information, please contact the lecturers: S.Karlsson-Vinkhuysen or L.G.Horlings.

Food and the City: free online short course

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Registrations are now open for the Universities West Midland online short
course: Food and the City.

The course will run for 6 weeks from 2nd June 2014 and is completely free.
The course consists of 12 lessons, with 2 released each week.

It is designed to take around 20 hours to complete and will comprise of a
mixture of written materials & videos along with other media and links to optional background reading.

There will be a light level of assessment throughout and opportunities to interact with the course tutors and other participants. The course has designed the materials to be suitable for participants from a range of backgrounds who are interested in urban food issues.The course has been developed by academic experts from West Midland universities though the Food-Smart City project.

For more information and to sign up please visit http://www.foodcitycourse.com