IO1. Circular & Socio-Civic Learning Hub Virtual Space

io1

Circular & Socio-Civic Learning Hub Virtual Space

VISION

“The pilot CIRC.LE Hub will be promoted by the participating Universities and then grow beyond this partnership.” Strong existing partnerships between universities and extended learning providers make it possible and easier to set up programs quickly. The Hub is intended to be a place where the intellectual curiosity and confidence of participating students are nurtured as they explore and develop the skills of purposeful learning.

MISSION

The pilot CIRC.LE Hub is a positive environment that celebrates the diversity of our community and fosters the development of students into purposeful learners through targeted academic support and leadership opportunities. Through meaningful conversations and collaboration with academic advisors, students are empowered to practice skills and competencies for academic success and reflect on how to achieve their goals.

What do the HUBs provide for the students?

HUBs provide coordinated professional learning and consistency across learning platforms. School and extended learning partnerships can support alignment by proactively identifying professional development needs and providing coordinated training.

Opportunities, real-life experiences, trainings, workshops + scholarships, study commemorative medals and awards

Main objectives

Engaging students of bachelor and follow-up master’s programs with an extraordinary interest in the field of study and related activities, so that the students’ professional potential could be developed during their studies.
To help the development of students who can become well-prepared candidates for future jobs.
To improve students’ knowledge, soft skills and attitudes to the requirements of the modern labour market, providing them real-life experiences and giving them the ability to be successful on this market.

To provide guidance and support the students to facilitate communication.

Strengthen partnerships between universities.

Research and knowledge sharing.

Forming the development of independent learning and digital skills.

To enable students to post assignments and communicate with the teacher and the classmates.

Professional experiences

Inventing and searching for new raw materials

Optimization of consumption

Design of collection and recovery systems

Increase the efficiency of production processes

Minimization of waste generated, alternative use

Rethinking used products

Educational material for the rising generation

Creating an IT background to reduce waste

Rethinking travel modes to reduce CO2

Knowledge

Foreign language education (English, technical English),
Practical professional knowledge,
Sound practical capability.

Abilities

Critical and analytical thinking
Independent decision-making
Cooperation capabilities
Teamwork and management
Self-monitoring
Ability to work under stress conditions
Complex problem-solving ability.

Soft skills

Creativity
Communication skills (foreign language skills)
Written and spoken
Social platforms
Management reporting
Presentation skills
Software skills (digital competence)
Collaboration, teamwork and negotiation skills.

Attitudes

Due to their lack of experience, they are nervous about taking on the responsibilities that are expected of them in working life with the consequence that they avoid responsibilities and the possibility of failure and frustration. So, this the gap in attitudes can be considered to compromise independence in acting and thinking. Also, the young generation react emotionally and manifest defensive behaviour when frustrated or criticised. Usually they are disappointed when criticised.
Experimental learning will increase student engagement and improve their attitude toward the profession. The HUB would play a remarkable role in the educational process, classroom and extracurricular activities, which definitely affect the attitude positively.

Detailed workplan

IO1.T1. Definition of the functionalities of the Virtual Space (Leader: UPM. Participants: All). This task defines the functionalities of the open space, including the register for open calls, SOC learning experiences, open resources (both already existing resources and those generated by the SOC experiences) and CIRC.LE challenges (in the form of a repository that feed the learning experiences).

− IO1.T2. Design of the appearance of the Virtual Space (Leader: ITU. Participants: UM, UPM). This task defines the visual identity of the open space, including the template to be used according to what is defined in IO1.T1.

− IO1.T3. Web development of the first usable prototype in CMS (Leader: ITU. Participants: UM, UPM). Upon completion of this task, we will count with the first usable virtual space, to be used during the first transnational SOC experiences. ITU is in charge of hosting and creating the virtual space, including different prototypes. Mockups. Final development in CMS, including personal areas and repositories. UM and UPM supports this work and revise the different prototypes.

− IO1.T4. Implementation and monitoring of the use of the prototype virtual space (Leader: UM. Participants: UPM). Data from the usage of the platform during the pilots, along with CMS plugins and human analysis, will be used to monitor and possibly improve, within IO1.T3., the final virtual space. UM, with the support of ITU and UPM, analyses the use with the help of a dedicated plugin in CMS, along with other tools (e.g. Google Analytics). UM is especially dedicated to SEO marketing and similar strategies, to ensure the best possible positioning of the platform on the web. UM leads the feed and monitoring on the use of the platform, including the feed of CIRC.LE challenges in the virtual space and the detection of improvements to be done within IO1.T3.

This project commits to empower new generations of professionals working in a circular transition with a socio-civic compromise. To that end, we establish the Circular & SOC Learning (CIRC.LE) Hub; a meeting point for students, professors, transdisciplinary experts, society at large, and decision-makers, working together with a circular and sociocivic compromise. In the Circular & SOC Learning Hub, students reflect on challenges by evaluating social and civic implications and become co-creators and active part of the challenge. This humanizing approach is here considered as the perfect complement to the technical skills for a true application of circularity principles. The CIRC.LE Hub creates a multi-stakeholder, participatory, democratic mutual learning and knowledge transfer platform and puts on the table complex dilemmas and “out of the box” ideas for students’ social and civic development and promoting local action and global thinking. This contributes to boosting the concept of the European Engineer. The pilot Circular & SOC Learning Hub will be promoted by the participating Universities and Associated Partners and then grow beyond this partnership.