EEU413 Sustainability Challenge Summer School

• Topics

  This course is designed to provide a relevant academic experience to help students gain in-depth insights into sustainability and business development. Through readings, guest speakers, case discussions, lectures, and student presentations, students will learn to think creatively and entrepreneurial with a sustainability-conscious mindset.

  The course is developed in close collaboration with the https://klimastiftelsen.no/Norwegian Climate Foundation (Klimastiftelse), Norway’s green think tank. The objective of Klimastiftelse is to spread knowledge and ideas to a wide audience about climate change and climate solutions. The goal is a society without emissions of man-made greenhouse gases. The climate foundation believes in openness and cooperation.

  Klimastiftelse will formulate a sustainability challenge that that forms a point of departure for course work and the group assignment. More specifically, the students will translate the sustainability challenge into a concreate business idea by linking the sustainability challenge in clear user needs and wants, which are subsequently transformed into a sustainable business model.

  To accomplish this overall objective the students will be introduced to, and actively work with, concepts and innovation tools like :

  • Effective teamwork
  • Effectuation
  • Design Thinking
  • Business Model Design
  • Pitching

• Learning outcome

  Knowledge -upon successful completion the student

  • has obtained knowledge on concepts, theories and frameworks in design thinking and business model design related to sustainability;and
  • has a working understanding of design thinking and business model design processes and to apply it on sustainability issues.

  Skills -upon successful completion the student

  • can articulate the role of design thinking and business model design in creating innovative responses to critical social and sustainability needs;
  • can identify opportunities within social and sustainability issues; and
  • can use theories, concepts and frameworks to understand central mechanisms and practices.

  General Competence -upon successful completion the student

  • can analyse relevant academic and practical/professional problems related to the exploration and exploitation of sustainability and business opportunities;
  • can identify sustainable business opportunities where profitability and responsibility are at stake; and
  • can apply his/her knowledge and skills in new areas in order to carry out advanced assignments and projects.

• Teaching

  1. Digital session 5th of June 2023

  General introduction of the Summer School. Introduction of the participants. Practicalities of the summer school and stay in Bergen.

  2. Summer School in Bergen 21st  - 30th of June 2023

  Two-week session with daily sessions between 9-16, with a 1 hour lunch break

  The students will work on an assignment when they are at NHH, but the students can adjust the assignment before the final hand-in date. This hand-in date will be announced later. The final version of the assignment is submitted via Wiseflow.

  During the weekend, the course participants will be offered an excursion, so they get familiar with the city of Bergen and the gateways to the fjords.

  3. Digital session after the Summer School (TBD)

  The summer school concludes with a digital reflection session. The date of this session will be agreed upon during the 2 weeks in Bergen.

• Restricted access

  Intake of a maximum of 40 students. Uptake in the course is based on a letter of motivation and transcript of grades from the completed Bachelor degree. Priority is given to students at NHH, HVL, UiB and students from the Engage.EU network. 

  Deadline for application is 24 March.

  We inform students on acceptance into the course before the 5th of April. Accepted candidates have to confirm their participation by the 20th of April.

  Please note that we require a minimum of 20 students. With fewer numbers we reserve the right to cancel the summer school. This decision will be taken soon after we have an overview on how many students have accepted to join the summer school, but not later than 1st of May. 

• Required prerequisites

  Students need to have a completed bachelor degree and be enrolled in a master program.

• Compulsory Activity

  To obtain course approval, students have to attend and actively participate in all the online and offline components of the course. We keep record of attendance and participation.

• Assessment

  Group term paper. Students work in groups (3-5) on the paper throughout the duration of the course. The course coordinator is responsible for forming the groups

• Grading Scale

  Pass/Fail

• Programme Affiliation

  This course can be included as part of the elective courses in Master`s programme in Economics and Business Administration (MØA). It is not included in any of the profiles (major or minor). As the course may have a size (number of ECTS) that deviates from the ordinary course sizes in MØA, the student must ensure that the sum of elective courses is sufficient to satisfy the requirement in MØA.