This presentation compares the two main gifted education programmes for undergraduate students in the Netherlands and Germany. The programmes were evaluated and will be compared in terms of the institutions involved, the educational objectives pursued, the nature of support provided to the students, and the anticipated effects (Netherlands), respectively the achieved effects (Germany). The Dutch study focuses on the Sirius Program established by the Dutch government which invited universities to submit their own plans for the promotion of student excellence. The successful applications are analysed with respect to the above mentioned criteria. The German study focuses on the ideational support means, which is a varied enrichment programme provided by several national foundations that is supported with money and guidelines by the German government. The scholarship recipients were interviewed in large online surveys ( N1 = 2379 and N2 = 1614). Both programmes are endowed with public funding and thus are shaped by political objectives. Also, both programmes are conducted by non-governmental institutions: universities in the Netherlands, and basically political, religious and social foundations in Germany. Thus, the presentation provides insights in theory and practice of gifted undergraduate education in both countries. The discussion will address the impact of political objectives and organizational structures on the reality of gifted education. Strategies for educators to accumulate scientific knowledge about gifted education, about evidence-based goals and about real life limitations will be provided. The different evaluation methods will be discussed in order to find out the best practice for research.
This presentation compares the two main gifted education programmes for undergraduate students in the Netherlands and Germany. The programmes were evaluated and will be compared in terms of the institutions involved, the educational objectives pursued, the nature of support provided to the students, and the anticipated effects (Netherlands), respectively the achieved effects (Germany). The Dutch study focuses on the Sirius Program established by the Dutch government which invited universities to submit their own plans for the promotion of student excellence. The successful applications are analysed with respect to the above mentioned criteria. The German study focuses on the ideational support means, which is a varied enrichment programme provided by several national foundations that is supported with money and guidelines by the German government. The scholarship recipients were interviewed in large online surveys ( N1 = 2379 and N2 = 1614). Both programmes are endowed with public funding and thus are shaped by political objectives. Also, both programmes are conducted by non-governmental institutions: universities in the Netherlands, and basically political, religious and social foundations in Germany. Thus, the presentation provides insights in theory and practice of gifted undergraduate education in both countries. The discussion will address the impact of political objectives and organizational structures on the reality of gifted education. Strategies for educators to accumulate scientific knowledge about gifted education, about evidence-based goals and about real life limitations will be provided. The different evaluation methods will be discussed in order to find out the best practice for research.
Education for sustainability scholarship argues that sustainability competence is more than cognitive domain learning that is traditionally (over) focused on reason, knowledge application and testing. Affective domain is missing from the education curricula in general (Sowel, 2005, Dernikos et al, 2020), and in Higher Education in Sustainability (HES) (Shepard, 2008). Yet, “it is possible to construct an argument that the essence of education for sustainability is a quest for affective outcomes” (Shepard, 2008). For example, there is a link between personal values and sustainability performance (Potocan 2021), and emotional intelligence has been seen to be “the foundation of a more cooperative and compassionate [sustainable] society” (Estrada, Rodriguez, Moliner, 2021).
MULTIFILE
City labs are a promising form of smart governance, providing a ‘smart interface’ between public and private actors, including citizens, through co-creation. Recent scholarship sees ‘experimentation’ - implementing projects with the goal to learn rather than to achieve a predetermined outcome – as a key feature of city labs and their contribution to the adaptability of an urban region. However, in practice, city lab practitioners struggle with this role and need guidance on how to set up, carry out and learn from experiments. TEK4Labs aims to enhance scientific understanding of the conditions required for city labs to take up their experimental role in governance successfully, as well as to provide practical guidance for city labs by developing an ‘experiment kit’. The project will take a transdisciplinary action research approach, combining literature review, survey and interview methods with co-creation design workshops and field testing involving city lab practitioners. TEK4Labs will be carried out by ICIS-UM researchers in collaboration with Stimuleringsfonds Creatieve Industrie and its network of Dutch city labs.
