The Challenge Based Innovation A3 (CBI A3) is an educational program under ATTRACT Academy which brings together Master level students from universities across three continents to work in multidisciplinary teams combining methods and practical techniques to address the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), as well as understanding and using the ATTRACT technologies.
The current edition of this program is composed of 20 students divided into six teams, and they are exploring challenges related to their local context but especially linked to SDG 12: Responsible Consumption and Production. In this regard, some weeks ago they had the opportunity to go to CERN IdeaSquare to learn, get inspired and kick off their projects through different sessions which helped them to explore the connection between the challenges and the ATTRACT technologies.
“I think it is an extraordinary opportunity for students to participate in the CBI A3 program as they learn to work with people from different backgrounds and places, but also have the chance to work with researchers from the ATTRACT R&D&I projects. So, this is a fruitful experience that will help them in their future careers”, explained Aaron Down, Course Director at Swinburne Design Factory Melbourne.
During their stay in Geneva, students had the chance to visit the United Nations Office and the CERN facilities like the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment but also attended presentations of experts on human-centred design, orders of magnitude calculations, systems thinking, discard studies and futures. Furthermore, this time at CERN IdeaSquare was also used to unpack and learn more about the various ATTRACT technologies from the researchers.
The multidisciplinary teams will still work on their projects during the following weeks to explore design development and implementation strategies for 2030, as they will have to showcase them at the Gala Final which will be held in May 2024.
It should be noted that the CBI A3 program, which targets students from health sciences, design, engineering, computer science and the arts, is coordinated by Design Factory Melbourne at Swinburne University of Technology (Australia) in partnership with inno.space at Hochschule Mannheim (Germany) and New York City Design Factory at Pace University (United States of America).
More information about the CBI A3 program is available here.
