Reimagining York’s Mobility Programs: Towards Sustainable, Reflective, and Collaborative Models

Description

This project offers a proactive, collaborative, engaging, and educational approach for York’s student mobility programs through combining international, experiential, and sustainability pedagogies. In collaboration with the UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education toward Sustainability, students will reflect on their roles in meeting the UN sustainable goals individually, through adopting a lifelong holistic sustainable lifestyle, and collectively, through participating in projects and knowledge mobilization in their communities. This project involves two main components. First is the “Sustainable on the Go” initiative where students actively engage in their host communities by contributing a portion of their time to sustainability projects, learning about and addressing host country sustainability challenges and/or partaking in innovative projects. Second is a conference that aims to address calls for the international education community to reimagine its internationalization approaches generally and study abroad programs specifically. Through engaging academics, practitioners, and policymakers in critical discussions, we hope to discuss how the perception of education abroad is evolving in an era of climate change and global pandemics; how to cultivate reciprocal, sustainable, and mutually beneficial study abroad programs; and share innovative models that balance environmental costs with educational benefits.