Following our March call for participants, the ENGAGE.EU Student Circle on societal impact is now formed and running. On Tuesday, 2 May, the Circle held its first online session.

ENGAGE.EU’s Student Circle is a crucial activity within the Engaged Society pillar. Students from all seven member universities of the Alliance will meet online regularly over seven weeks. Following the Design Thinking method, together they will work out what university societal outreach means from a student’s point of view, what they would like to see accomplished in this regard, and what one needs for that.

The students will work collaboratively with each other, initiate small research projects of their own, design personas, and ultimately develop a prototype that includes as many relevant and student-related aspects of societal outreach in higher education as possible.

In parallel, ENGAGE.EU is currently circulating a broad survey across all seven partner universities which takes on the same questions the perspective of staff, teachers, and researchers. Ultimately, we plan to bring together the various perspectives on university societal outreach in a participatory process and design a common framework model.