The FAIR project aims to design, develop and evaluate a Masters Course in the field of Energy Poverty Alleviation Technologies in South Africa. It will also develop innovative learning material that will offer students a tailored perspective, participating universities the chance to exchange best practises, modernize, renew and align their curricula towards innovative skills and competencies necessary to effectively address the urgent societal need of energy poverty.The Masters Programme encompasses the different sources of knowledge and experience required by the discipline. Also, beyond coursework, the program is structured around:- industry placement, in relevant businesses, government agencies, etc.- digital learning, to allow modern forms of learning, as well as to enable contribution from experts across the globe in the development of the program.-promote cooperation, exchange of know-how and good practices in the subject area between EU and SA HEIs.-establish viable synergies and links with industry players and public authorities in order to address their needs in specialized personnel, and enhance the employability of FAIR graduates.-contribute to local economic growth and social inclusionThese specific objectives will be achieved by:-Developing the Master degree in the area of Alleviating Energy Poverty Technologies;-The establishment of FAIR labs -Developing tailor-made VET courses to cover the immediate personnel training needs of the local, regional businesses and public authorities- Training the academic staff of SA HEIs - Community-level awareness raisingDespite South Africa’s governments’ ambitious plans towards energy poverty alleviation, there are no graduate programmes that prepare specialists in the field. The project responds to the urgent need for high-quality educational programs that produce ‘fit-for-job’ graduates and “reskill” energy industry professionals and public authorities’ personnel.

The ELEPHANT consortium consists of 6 SA and 2 EU HEIs that shar expertise and apply a transversal multidisciplinary holistic approach to empower research capacity in a One Health (OH) approach. Being reference for specific activities, participant’s leadership and responsibility for design and implementation of OH teaching will be enhanced. Creation of a virtual research platform aims at sustaining project information, OH educational and research results and practices and communication also beyond the project period and allows other SA or SADC Universities to share knowledge and expertise and values such as: Legal compliance, ethics, research integrity, inclusiveness.The involvement of associate partners shows connection with, and impact on society, through demand driven research and knowledge transfer, to communities, industry and policy makers.SA participants will improve their quality in teaching and research (training) by enforcing capacities in terms of better equipped laboratories, standardized methodologies and continuous interactions, within and beyond the project period, with all staff of other partners and graduate students. This will positively impact evidence based One Health interventions to improve health and welfare of animals and humans Ultimately, the SA HE institutions will improve their reputation in research by increasing publication numbers in high ranked scientific journals. Their impact on society will be focused especially towards policy makers by sharing data and strategies to put in place science based, and One Health focused, hazards (disease and pollutant) surveys, prevention and intervention/control and a reduction in the wildlife-livestock conflicts. The project will largely involve communities that will be engaged in participatory OH activities, and will benefit from increased hazard awareness and control. The latter to be facilitated in collaboration with industry.

Forestry is critically important in South Africa for two reasons: the production and processing of forestry resources has untapped potential for development in addressing the job creation crises and on the other hand forestry is a key leverage point for the global climate change challenge. In particular, entrepreneurs can develop next-generation opportunities to address these challenges in novel way. However, South African forestry graduates lack the 21st century key competences needed to think systematically, act entrepreneurially and to be experts of climate-smart forestry. Problem-based-learning (PBL) is a powerful research-based methodology that Aalto and HAMK have extensively used in international development efforts. PBL integrates the complexity of real-world problems into curricula implementation, and this helps students to create problem solving and critical thinking skills upon which the entrepreneur decision making rests. FOREST21 will capacitate HEIs in student-centered learning, in network-based learning ecosystem building and in practices of climate-smart forestry. FOREST21 undertakes PBL- and climate-smart forestry trainings and the methodology is piloted for contextualization through students’ field works. Each HEI will take a specific role: Aalto, INN and HAMK facilitate methodology, climate-smart forestry and institutional capacity building and INN leads the quality process. All South African forestry HEIs participate FOREST21 with their expertise and defined objectives and together develop PBL-FOREST21 Teacher Manual and establish PBL-FOREST21 Network for peer support and further development of the curricula and methods. All HEIs participate in the student field challenges. The results are disseminated throughout South Africa with facilitation of Associate Partners.

South Africa is committed to aligning itself with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Climate Change Agreement. The Council on Higher Education (CHE) has pointed that South African aspirations for SDGs are vested in the work and roles of academic staff. The CHE (2014) also pointed that the subject content knowledge and pedagogical knowledge of most South African university staff is poor and that this is a major cause of inadequate learner achievement and mismatch with employability needs. There is no systematic attempt to infuse SDGs in HEIs so far and most of teaching methodology applied in the partner institutions, as well as in South Africa in general, focuses on lecturing and limited use of: i) problem-based learning strategies; ii) placed-based pedagogy; ii) utilization of ICTs as enabling pedagogical tools, and other innovative teaching/learning tools suitable to address SDGs challenges. This mismatch should be bridged through the professionalisation of undergraduate academic teaching to address SDGs in multiple disciplines. HEIs in South Africa should introduce and promote cross/interdisciplinary approaches to teaching, learning and assessment, helping students develop their breadth of understanding and building knowledge and practice on SDGs. The proposed project addresses the modernization of curricula in multiple academic disciplines to infuse SDGs through capacity building of academic staff in innovative teaching and learning tools, methodologies, ICT-enabling pedagogical approaches in nationally prioritized subjects, such as biology, agricultural, environment, engineering, health. By the end of the project, there will be a significant cohort of academic teaching champions, who will drive wider changes in their HEIs and society by implementing SDGs in line with the South Africa’s National Development Plan and in alignment with the 2030 Agenda for SDGs.

In a globalized world characterized by modes of economic production requiring the ongoing production of new knowledge, Africa will only compete if it is able to participate as more than a producer of raw materials for ‘reinvented’ goods. In order to do this, Africa needs to increase its research production. This will only be achieved if more doctoral graduates are produced and if its existing scholars are supported to work at the cutting edges of disciplines and subject areas. However, the need for economic development is not the only reason for an increase in research production. Knowledge contributes to the stability of democratic societies as does the opening up of the capacity to be involved in research production to those who have been previously marginalized. This project differs from many others aimed at increasing research capacity by focusing not on the development of structures, such as programmes, units or policies but by working in the ‘cultural domain’ to foster the development of research rich environments in which academics and postgraduate students can thrive. Social scientists constantly remind us that culture is as important as structure but it is the ‘softer’ cultural elements that are often overlooked. The project does this by fostering scholarly engagements intended to share African scholarship and thought and provide role models and practices for others to emulate. A second element of the project involves adapting a highly successful course on postgraduate supervision so that it too addresses the cultural domain and makes supervisors aware of covert assumptions and elements of practice that may exclude rather than include.Finally, the project fosters collaborations amongst partners aimed at developing the capacity to manage and plan research in culturally sensitive ways which draw on best practices but which are nonetheless cognizant of multiple ways of experiencing the world.