Geneva Summer Schools - University of Geneva - Crowdsourcing Sustainable Development

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July 4 - July 10, 2016: Summer School

11 July - 7 August, 2016: Project Work in Collaboration with UN Organizations

In September 2015, world leaders committed to 17 Global Goals (Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs) that over the next 15 years should help end extreme poverty, fight inequality and injustice, and tackle climate change, amongst other things. This effort will only be successful if all stakeholders have adequate information about the progress being made towards each of the goals.

This Geneva Summer School looks at how crowdsourcing technologies, and in particular low-cost open source solutions suitable for deployment in schools, can be used to gather the data needed to track the SDGs.

This one-week event kicks off the ODD summer, a two-month-long adventure across the globe. Students who take this summer school have the option to follow it up with an internship in a lab in Geneva (4 weeks in the period 11 July – 7 August) and a two-week summer school in Beijing and Shenzhen (14-27 August) to turn their ideas into reality. (For more details, click here)

The school brings together students from Tsinghua University in Beijing, from the University of Geneva and from around the world, to help tackle the SDGs with crowdsourcing solutions.

Geneva and its multitude of international organizations offer a unique space for understanding the different dimensions involved in this truly global effort - and provide an exceptional diversity of speakers and educators from a wide range of contexts: the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), the UN Operational Satellite Programme (UNOSAT/UNITAR), the World Health Organization (WHO), the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

By combining seminars with site visits to international organizations and encouraging team-based problem-solving, this summer school aims to give students a deeper understanding of the SDGs whilst challenging them to experiment with concrete and innovative solutions that involve citizens (“the crowd”) in monitoring and SDGs at the local, regional or global level.

After a general introduction to the SDGs and their history and context, student will hear about some of the existing efforts initiated by UniGe – before being introduced to the global dimension by key actors from International Organizations. The programme will then change gear and make students the problem solver – by introducing them to Citizen Science and different crowdsourcing methodologies involving both open source software and hardware solutions..

NOTE: When applying for this summer school, state clearly in your Letter of Motivation, whether you want to follow up with an internship in Geneva (4 weeks in the period 11 July – 7 August) and whether you want to join the summer school in Beijing and Shenzhen (14 August – 27 August). For more details see the blog post about the ODD summer

Please note: Changes to the draft program may be made at any time prior to the start of the course.

Tuition Fees

TUITION FEES AND DEADLINE

Tuition Fees: 2000 CHF

Travel Grants: Some support is available for strongly motivated applicants with experience in hands-on projects related to sustainable development. Please enquire.

Deadline: Extended to June 15, 2016 (midnight CET)