January 2018 – Integration and Implementation Insights

Overcoming a paradox? Preparing students for transdisciplinary environments

September 11, 2024January 30, 2018

machiel -keestra_jan-2018 — Machiel Keestra (biography)

By Machiel Keestra

How can we adequately prepare and train students to navigate transdisciplinary environments? How can we develop hybrid spaces in our universities that are suitable for transdisciplinary education?

These questions were considered by a plenary panel, which I organised and chaired at the International Transdisciplinarity Conference 2017 at Leuphana University, Germany. Three major educational requirements were identified:

long-term collaborations with businesses, as well as non-governmental, governmental and community organisations
teaching particular dispositions and competencies
preparing students for intercultural endeavours.

Ten steps to make your research more relevant

February 10, 2025January 23, 2018

By Christian Pohl, Pius Krütli and Michael Stauffacher

authors_christian-pohl_pius-krutli_michael-stauffacher — 1. Christian Pohl (biography)
2. Pius Krütli (biography)
3. Michael Stauffacher (biography)

Interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research often aims at broader impact in society. But, how can you make such impact happen?

A researcher might face a number of questions (s)he was not necessarily trained to address, such as:

How can I be sure that my research question will provide knowledge relevant for society?
Who in this fuzzy thing called society are my primary target audiences anyway?
Are some of them more important for my project than others?

Over the last several years, we developed 10 steps to provide a structured way of thinking through how to improve the societal relevance of a research project, as summarised in the table below.

Four questions to guide arts-based knowledge translation

January 22, 2026January 16, 2018

By Tiina Kukkonen and Amanda Cooper

authors_tiina-kukkonen_amanda-cooper — 1. Tiina Kukkonen (biography)
2. Amanda Cooper (biography)

Arts-based knowledge translation refers to the process of using artistic approaches to communicate research findings to target audiences. Arts-based knowledge translation continues to grow in popularity among researchers and knowledge mobilisers, particularly in the health sector, because of its capacity to reach and engage diverse audiences through the arts. But how might researchers, with or without experience in the arts, actually go about planning and implementing arts-based knowledge translation?

What makes research transdisciplinary?

September 11, 2024January 9, 2018

By Liz Clarke

What do we mean by transdisciplinarity and when can we say we are doing transdisciplinary research? There is a broad literature with a range of different meanings and perspectives. There is the focus on real-world problems with multiple stakeholders in the “life-world”, and a sense of throwing open the doors of academia to transcend disciplinary boundaries to address and solve complex problems. But when it comes to the practicalities of work in the field, there is often uncertainty and even disagreement about what is and isn’t transdisciplinarity.

Let me give an example.