Admission requirements
This course is obligatory for students of the master’s programme Governance of Sustainability. The course is not open for guest students. To participate in the Sustainability Challenge, students need to have completed at least 48 EC of the first year MSc courses.
Description
In this course, students work in teams on a real-world sustainability problem by applying and combining knowledge acquired from thematic courses and the transdisciplinary skills course. The project is commissioned by an external party (i.e., the commissioner) and supervised by an assigned supervisor. In this setting, students are trained to cooperate in an interdisciplinary team and to come up with real-life practical solutions to fulfill the commissioner’s deliverables.
Course Load
Lecture (12 hours)
Tutorial (5 hours)
Self-tuition (263 hours)
Course objectives
By the end of the sustainability challenge, students will be able to:
Integrate perspectives from both environmental science and governance disciplines to solve a sustainability problem
Translate a problem or question of a commissioner to a ‘researchable’ or ‘actionable’ question
Analyze and develop a strategy to tackle a real-world problem
Develop sustainability strategies that can be implemented in their specific societal or organisational context
Manage both internal (e.g., team members) and external (e.g., commissioner) stakeholders
Evaluate and reflect on collaborative skills of self and peers
Manage time effectively
Timetable
In MyTimetable, you can find all course and programme schedules, allowing you to create your personal timetable. Activities for which you have enrolled via MyStudyMap will automatically appear in your timetable.
Additionally, you can easily link MyTimetable to a calendar app on your phone, and schedule changes will be automatically updated in your calendar. You can also choose to receive email notifications about schedule changes. You can enable notifications in Settings after logging in.
Questions? Watch the video, read the instructions, or contact the ISSC helpdesk.
Note: Joint Degree students from Leiden/Delft need to combine information from both the Leiden and Delft MyTimetables to see a complete schedule. This video explains how to do it.
Mode of instruction
The format consists of problem-oriented teamwork in groups of four-five students, two plenary presentations where students present research plan and methodology (and preliminary results), and a poster presentation where students showcase the findings and recommendations of their project. In addition, several lectures and trainings are provided:
The introductory lecture in which the coordinator provides information on the structure, requirements, and objectives of the course.
A consulting skills training in which students will get valuable insights from professional consultants on various aspects, including transforming problems into consulting proposals, tackling sustainability issues, implementing solutions, managing stakeholders effectively, and fostering teamwork.
Two lectures and short tutorials on multi-criteria decision analysis methodologies in which students will learn about problem framing and structuring strategies, such as decision hierarchies and decision generation tables. They will also be introduced to theories that help develop decision recommendations.
Assessment method
The final grade is determined based on the consulting proposal, the final report, two oral and one poster presentations, group-work process, and transdisciplinary skills utilization.
The consulting proposal is a written document on which the group works during the first three week of the course. The consulting proposal details the agreements made between the commissioner and the team, detailing a realistic number of deliverables and an appropriate timeline. The proposal is due after about 3 weeks from the start of the course and is graded according to the rubric.
The final report describes thoroughly and succinctly the strategy to tackle the commissioned problem. As such, the main body of the final report should focus on contextualizing the proposed strategies (with regards to the literature and the boundary conditions of the problem) and detail the approach used by the team to reach such findings. The report should always be scientifically sound and defensible, and professionally presented. The final report is submitted at the end of the course and is graded according to the rubric.
There will be two oral presentations of the work of each group, namely a presentation about the research plan and one about the methodology (and preliminary results). In each presentation session, each group will be given 10 minutes for presenting their work followed by 10 minutes of Q&A. The presentations are graded according to the rubric.
There will be one final poster presentation in which students showcase the findings and recommendations for the commissioner. Poster sessions will take place during the annual symposium. Each poster session will consist of 45 min in which students will present their poster and interact with the public (including academics, industrial practitioners, policy officers and others). The poster session is graded according to the rubric.
Team cohesion, collaboration, proactivity and time management as well as communication with supervisor are assessed through the rubric.
Transdisciplinary skills utilization (communication with external stakeholders and integration of multiple perspectives) are assessed through the rubric.
Specific guidelines for the structure, contents and word limits of the various components are provided in the course manual. All assessments will follow the rubric provided on Brightspace.
Students receive written feedback through Brightspace after each presentation, submission of consulting proposal and final report. Feedback on draft versions of the proposal and report is also provided informally by the group supervisor at least in two moments throughout the duration of the course. Oral feedback from the supervisor is also provided during biweekly meetings.
According to the rubric, the various parts of the course will be graded as follows:
Consulting proposal: 15%
Final report: 40%
Presentation quality: 15%
Group-work process: 15%
Transdisciplinary skills: 15%
The supervisor of the group advices the course coordinator on a grade for the consulting proposal and a grade for each presentation according to the rubric criteria. All partial grades are submitted to Brightspace and are reported in the final rubric. The supervisor of the group, in consultation with the commissioner (where necessary), advices the course coordinator on the grade of the final report and group work process. The coordinator of the course operates as the final examiner and warrants the equality of the evaluations among the groups.
An overall sufficient grade of 5.5 is required to pass this course.
In case of an insufficient grade, then the group is given maximum 5 weeks to submit an additional assignment related to the project and reach therefore a sufficient grade. The maximum final overall grade that can be scored by the group (including the resit) assignment is then a 5.5. The assignment is established by the course coordinator in consultation with the supervisor.
If throughout the process, and at an early stage there are signs of uneven contribution of the group members, the course coordinator has the right to establish and adjust the grade, provided this will be discussed with and approved by all group members and supervisor. The self and peer evaluation form will be used to inform (but not establish) the contribution evaluation (based on the performance of individual members reported by the form).
Reading list
Brightspace will be used for communications and distributing study material.
Registration
As a student, you are responsible for enrolling on time through MyStudyMap.
In this short video, you can see step-by-step how to enrol for courses in MyStudyMap.
Extensive information about the operation of MyStudyMap can be found here.
There are two enrolment periods per year:
Enrolment for the fall opens in July
Enrolment for the spring opens in December
See this page for more information about deadlines and enrolling for courses and exams.
Note:
It is mandatory to enrol for all activities of a course that you are going to follow.
Your enrolment is only complete when you submit your course planning in the ‘Ready for enrolment’ tab by clicking ‘Send’.
Not being enrolled for an exam/resit means that you are not allowed to participate in the exam/resit.
Contact
Coordinators: Dr. Valerio Barbarossa and Dr. Gerard Breeman
Remarks
Students should be available for at least two days a week to work on the project and reserve at least one day a week for team meetings.
Software
Starting from the 2024/2025 academic year, the Faculty of Science will use the software distribution platform Academic Software. Through this platform, you can access the software needed for specific courses in your studies. For some software, your laptop must meet certain system requirements, which will be specified with the software. It is important to install the software before the start of the course. More information about the laptop requirements can be found on the student website.