Call for researchers: Arqus R.I. Pilot Training Programme “Arqus Transfer Skills”

The Arqus R.I. project is launching the online pilot training programme “Arqus Transfer Skills”, to explore the many ways in which universities engage with their local ecosystems and offer a platform to exchange on these issues.

As universities are moving towards more participatory and open forms of doing research as well as communicating scientific output, there are a lot of new and challenging arenas for researchers to engage in.

Arqus R.I. invite academics and researchers from all career stages and all disciplines coming from the Arqus universities to participate. The programme will cover a wide number of topics related to various forms of transfer of results created in universities, communication with different stakeholders and practical examples of transfer activities from Arqus universities.

If you are interested in the training programme or one of the topics/sessions foreseen in it, please, register here until 3rd May.

The trainings will take place online, the link will be sent only to registered participants.

The trainings will be recorded and material might be used for further dissemination purposes.

Programme (CEST):

Date	Time	Topic
5th May	10:00-11:30	Introductory Workshop “Re-Thinking Transfer or the 3rd Mission of University”
9th May	13:00-14:40	Science Communication
15th May	13:00-14:30	Social Innovation
5th June	10:30-12:20	Transferrable Skills: From Research to the Market Outside Academia
6th June	13:00-15:15	Transfer in Sustainability: Circular Economy Approaches

Detailed programme (CEST):

5^th May. Introductory Workshop “Re-Thinking Transfer or the 3rd Mission of University”

10:00 – 10:05	Opening
10:05 – 10:50	Transformative science and challenge-based learning – the role of transdisciplinarity in a changing world. For addressing challenges such as the twin transitions of climate and digitalization, the universities’ first and second missions (research and education) need to be adapted and the third mission (co-development and societal impact) needs to be strengthened. It is no longer sufficient to increase the amount of highly-specialized academic knowledge, but universities’ agendas have to align with societal missions, so universities become incubators of transformation. Digitalization will have to be guided by these missions and human wellbeing. Arqus can respond to these challenges by pulling together expertise and experience of its partner universities. Dr. Holger Hoff (University of Graz). Transdisciplinary Interface Manager in the Field of Excellence Climate Change Graz. He is an environmental scientist, with focus on planetary boundaries, teleconnections in the Earth system, sustainable production and consumption and SDG implementation.
10:50 – 11:20	tbc
11:20-11:30	Questions, discussion

9^th May. Science Communication

13:00 – 13:05	Opening
13:05 – 13:45	How to successfully communicate – for (young?) scientists”. While increasingly becoming a key aspect of doing research, communicating one‘s scientific output, especially to a lay audience, requires its own skillset and can often present a challenge. How do you break down your findings to make it understandable while maintaining complexity and scientific value? What language should you use in which context? How do you approach different communication formats? This session will delve into several strategies to improve one‘s science communication efforts, a skillset that is increasingly valuable for one‘s academic career as well. Veronika Rogenhofer. Public Relations Coordinator at the Wegener Center for Climate and Global Change
13:45 – 14:25	Co-designing public engagement in practice: field notes from NEWSERA project Lesson abstract. Public engagement seems to be paving the way for new baselines for knowledge creation and innovation paths that include the contributions of regular citizens and other stakeholders. This lecture will give the chance to consider some of the challenges of public engagement as they have been addressed by the NEWSERA project, a three-year-long Horizon 2020 project. Taking stock of the experience of NEWSERA outcomes, the lecture will explore the barriers and opportunities connected to public engagement. Prof. Paolo Giardullo (University of Padua). Assistant Professor in Sociology at the University of Padua. He works at the intersection between Science and Technology Studies (STS) and Environmental Sociology. Besides continuative matching these scholarships, he currently works on practices related to Citizen Science and public engagement.
14:25-14:40	Questions, discussion

15^th May. Social Innovation

13:00 – 13:05	Opening
13:05 – 13:45	What is a social innovation lab? How to organize a call for social innovation labs? A social innovation laboratory is an instrument to think in common with an experimentation and prototyping approach, combining reflection and orientation to action, in order to generate solutions to the complex challenges that affect the common good in our time, whether in neighborhoods, in institutions, in organizations, or in society as a whole. We will address practical issues to setting up a social innovation labs call in universities. Impronta Granada is one of our most challenging initiatives in this regard. Prof. Esteban Romero-Frías (University of Granada). Professor at the University of Granada. Director of Medialab UGR- Research Laboratory for Digital Culture and Society. His research focuses on issues related to culture and digital society, particularly in matters of innovation, learning and analysis of social networks in various fields.
13:45 – 14:15	Service Learning – Public Benefit Oriented Engagement in Teaching. Service Learning is an important field of action of student knowledge transfer and particularly well suited for knowledge transfer from the humanities and social sciences. In a simple and effective way, students can combine social engagement with their professional education. Students bring their knowledge to bear, for example, in concrete cooperation with non-university partners such as schools, associations or companies. When students work together with non-university partners in civil society, culture or business on concrete problems, both sides benefit. Judith Zimmermann will first briefly introduce the instrument “Service Learning” as such as well as the necessary prerequisites for planning and implementation. The approach will then be illustrated using examples from Leipzig University before concluding with time for questions from the participants. Judith Zimmermann (Leipzig University). Officer for Strategic Knowledge Transfer Development.
14:15 – 14:30	Questions, discussion

5^th June. Transferrable Skills: From Research to the Market Outside Academia

10:30-10:35	Opening
10:35-12:05	Do you have what companies are looking for? Skills identification and promotion. During this session, the topic of skills developed during the PhD, and more particularly soft, transversal and transferable skills will be addressed. Participants will learn how to identify their skills and how to value them to recruiters. The session will be composed of moments when the whole group is present and exercises in small groups. Carole Allouche and Stéphanie Thillet (Claude Bernard University Lyon 1) are career experts with much experience in counselling PhDs on their professional integration.
12:05 – 12:20	Questions, discussion

6^th June. Transfer in Sustainability: Circular Economy Approaches

13:00-14:00	Competitiveness of enterprises and local SME systems. Sustainable/circular business models. In this session, the focus will be on the introduction of the circular economy framework and how environmental sustainability can be integrated into companies‘ strategy to strengthen their competitiveness. Circular business models will be presented. Prof. Eleonora di Maria (University of Padua). Professor at the Department of Economics and Management. Her main research topics concern the competitiveness of enterprises and local SME systems with respect to internationalization processes, environmental sustainability and business innovation, technological innovation in organizations and business networks, sustainable business models, environmental and social sustainability, and new forms of enterprise.
14:00-14:30	Promote the implementation of strategies and instruments of the circular economy paradigm to facilitate the transition towards a more sustainable economy in economic, social and environmental terms. Prof. Valentín Molina-Moreno (University of Granada). Department of Business Management.
14:30-15:00	The boost of bio- and circular-economy:  the quintuple helix model in practise. Driving innovation and scaling up new sustainable solutions requires multi-actor partnerships involving public, private, academia, and the civil society, and in close syntony with the natural environment. Cooperation culture shapes how principles of circular economy and bioeconomy are implemented in practice. Given the potential for improving the use of biological waste and cooperation between geographically proximate companies and farms, development opportunities of industrial symbiosis were chosen to be analyzed in the five selected Lithuanian municipalities. The case study of industrial symbiosis in selected Lithuanian regions, which covered socio-economic, business and technological aspects, will be elaborated during the presentation. Dr. Inga Matijošytė (Vilnius University). Senior researcher and head of the Sector of Applied Biocatalysis at the Life Sciences Center. Her research interests include searching for new/novel biocatalysts, developing of biocatalysts and their application in biocatalytic processes, bioeconomy development.
15:00 – 15:15	Questions, discussion

Call published on 21 Apr 2023