23 TU Dublin Sustainability Action Lab — A whole-of-university approach

Aims and Objectives

• Establish collaborative relationships where all participants – students, academics, and external collaborators – benefit through shared expertise, co-created goals, and meaningful engagement.
• Enable transformative co-learning opportunities, promoting critical reflection and action around real-world sustainability challenges and themes.
• Advance societal impact through sustainability-focused action; all initiatives are aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals and informed by the competences set out in the EU GreenComp competency framework.
• Continuously evolve through inclusive evaluation and reflection ensuring initiatives remain responsive to the needs of learners, collaboration partners and society.

Initiative Overview

TU Dublin has a long history of engaging society in education across the University’s three legacy institutions. Since 2008, The Students Learning with Communities (SLWC) programme has supported students, academics and a range of external organisations to learn together with a particular focus on working with underserved groups. 

In 2024/2025 the SLWC+ pilot programme explored how SLWC might evolve to more fully align with sustainability learning outcomes and TU Dublin graduate attributes. SLWC+ also trialled some new supports and a new implementation model where participating academics could access support from TU Dublin’s Sustainability and Partnership teams. 

Building on the legacy of SLWC and responding to TU Dublin’s institutional commitment to sustainability, the SLWC+ pilot was supported through the Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) strand of the HEA’s Strategic Alignment in Teaching and Learning Enhancement (SATLE) initiative and the 2024-2025 pilot has informed the operation of Sustainability Action Lab (SAL) – the multiannual  programme to emerge from the SLWC+ pilot.  

The progranmme is informed by EU GreenComp Competency Framework and is designed to contribute to developing the competences needed to address the UN SDGs in areas such as ‘embodying sustainability values’, ‘embracing complexity in sustainability’, ‘envisioning sustainable futures’ and ‘acting for sustainability’. 

The characteristics of SAL include:  

• It is a whole-of-University programme – all campuses, faculties, schools and disciplines are invited to take part.  

• Collaboration partners can be from all sectors of society including:  Civil Society, e.g., Community Groups, Schools, NGOs, Social Enterprises; Industry, where there is a clear sustainability focus and strong SDG alignment; Government, e.g., Local Authority or State Agency, and Internal TU Dublin, e.g., Access & Outreach or other functional area  

• A co-creation approach to identify themes and challenges addressed through the collaboration is encouraged.  

• A Shared Understanding document co-created by Academic Leads and Collaboration Partners describes the scope of each collaboration. 

•  A SAL Celebration & Roundtable event celebrates each project at the end of the academic year.  

• Impact Stories document and amplify the collaborations. 

SAL is arranged in four stages – preparation; mobilisation; implementation; and dissemination & evaluation. 

Cross-function working is required to support SAL with the following inputs: 

• The Sustainability Education team support faculty to integrate sustainability learning outcomes into the collaborations, and work with Societal Engagement to support the collaborations, finalise the Agreement of Shared Understanding between faculty and societal partners, and contribute to implementation of the evaluation approach.  

• The Strategic Relationships Development team support collaborations by working with Societal Engagement to identify suitable partners where required.   

• Societal Engagement, in addition to the above, check-in on collaborations at agreed intervals and act as a contact point for societal partners during the collaboration. They manage SAL, coordinate the inputs of Strategic Relationships Development and Sustainability Education, and enable dissemination, celebration and storytelling of the collaborations. 

Each collaboration is designed to benefit all who take part. The collaboration partner becomes part of a co-learning process that examines an aspect of sustainability that is important to them; students enhance their learning, developing and applying their specialist subject  knowledge and developing relevant GreenComp competences in a particular context while receiving course credits for their work; and TU Dublin academics create an environment for transformative learning for their students. 

Impact and Evidence of Success

The SLWC+ pilot in 2024-2025 successful pivoted the earlier SLWC programme to adopt a whole-of-university approach to engaging with society through sustainability education. Of the initial 14 SLWC+ project proposals, 11 collaborations progressed engaging 24 societal partners across 15 programmes and involving 15 academics and over 200 students. To date, nine of these collaborations have been documented as Impact Stories on the TU Dublin website Sustainability | Impact Stories | TU Dublin. From climate action to quality education, these Impact Stories showcase how students, staff, and societal partners have engaged through the collaborations described to develop local and discipline specific understandings of the SDGs.

Future Directions and Sustainability

Sustainability Action Lab is the multi-annual programme to emerge from the SLWC+ pilot. University-wide strategic initiatives like the TU Dublin Graduate Attributes have informed its development. This year, 27 project proposals are progressing, involving 32 academics and over 400 students across 39 programmes. The cross-function delivery model piloted in SLWC+ will enable Sustainability Action Lab to scale, supported by a SATLE funded Action Lab Learning Coordinator, as it follows TU Dublin’s progress in embedding sustainability learning outcomes into programmes and modules

Alignment and Policy Context

• ESD 2030
• EU GreenComp Competency Framework
• Technological Universities Act 2018
• TU Dublin Strategic Intent 2030
• TU Dublin Strategic Plan 2024–2028
• TU Dublin Climate Action Roadmap

Resources and Supporting Information

• TU Dublin Sustainability Action Lab
• SLWC+ Pilot Collaborations
• TU Dublin Impact Stories

Images

Funding and Acknowledgements

Funding: HEA Strategic Alignment in Teaching and Learning Enhancement (SATLE).