Learning resources for sustainable design in engineering education

Abstract

This paper presents the results of the Circular Design Project, European project funded by Erasmus+ Knowledge Alliance within the social business and the educational innovation field. The project have three major learning objectives: to increase and improve the learning strategies of Design for Sustainability; To gather and cluster open educational resources in Innovative Design for Sustainability; To train up innovative and entrepreneurial designers in Design for Sustainability. This was achieved through a knowledge co-creation process and the development and pilot training materials in order to teach and train students, faculty and enterprise staff of the design sector. The project formed by 12 partners is organised around four country hubs in Ireland, The Netherlands, Catalonia and Sweden. Each country Hub consists of one university, one company and one national design association. The project main results are: • The Open Educational Resources database (http://circulardesigneurope.eu/oer/) where resources in Circular design are clustered in three taxonomies: Categories (First-timers; Practitioners), Level (Beginner; Intermediate; Advanced) and Tags (calculator; report; …). • The Best Practice Publication, shows the whole design process, materials, challenges, problems and other key issues of Circular Design case studies • Four international one-semester internships for undergraduate design students in the four universities with the participation of 11 companies and 45 students. • The Circular Design Digital Fabrication Lab Handbook to introduce students, companies and academics to the open-source, participatory, experimental and design & build approach within digital fabrication labs. • The Professional Development Course in circular design. • The Policy Paper in Circular Design Education