Children’s Book | Once Upon the Future: Everyday Adventures that Change the World

Can an academic research project be turned into a children’s story? Yes, it can! With great enthusiasm and dedication, a team of six SUSPLACE fellows (Anastasia, Alessandro, Angela, Kelli, Lorena and Marta) has been engaged in an experimental co-creation effort to translate their research insights into a Children’s Book. After two years of work, the … Read more

Children’s Book | Once Upon the Future | Foreword by Susanne Moser

About two years ago we embarked on a mission to transform our research learnings into children’s stories. We wanted to write a book about hope and leadership that could inspire readers to bring positive change in their surroundings, reconnect with their environment and bond with their communities.

After a couple of training events, various rounds of writing and re-writing, dozens of meetings and fruitful collaborations with writing coaches, editors, an illustrator and a graphic designer, as well as lots of teamwork, mutual support, and hope, the book is almost finished.

New @SUSPLACE publication: Co‑created visual narratives and inclusive place branding by Catia Rebelo et al.

Catia Rebelo is PhD-candidate at the Sustainable Places Research Institute of Cardiff University. From April 1, 2016, until March 31, 2019, she was appointed at the research project Place Ambassadors of the MSCA ITN programme SUSPLACE. ‘Co‑created visual narratives and inclusive place branding: a socially responsible approach to residents’ participation and engagement‘ by Catia Rebelo, … Read more

New publication | Transformative roles of people and places: learning, experiencing, and regenerative action through social innovation | by Abid Mehmood et al.

This paper discusses the transformative role of people and the places which they inhabit. It advocates the richness and multiplicity of actors and understandings to drive sustainable place-shaping practices. Grounded in the interdisciplinary place-based conceptualisation of social innovation, the paper aims to progress a holistic conceptual framework which integrates the active processes of learning, experiencing, and regeneration to tackle the complex challenges of sustainability.

This article is the third to appear in the Sustain Sci. Special Feature: Exploring the Transformative Capacity of Place-Shaping Practices , edited by SUSPLACE.

How to become an everyday superhero

everyday superhero (noun) :
1) a person that develops superpowers in order to bring change in the places she cares about
2) [becoming an ~] : the desired outcome of reading the anthology “Once Upon the Future. Everyday Adventures that Change the World”

Once out in the world, we hope that our book will inspire its young and not-so-young readers to develop and exercise the everyday superpowers needed to change their little corners of the world for the better. If, in the meantime, you want to start changing the world by making a children’s book on sustainability, here are a couple of superpowers we found useful:

#SUSPLACE2019: Scholar-Activism Zine from SUSPLACE Final Event 

Hot off the digital press we present you the SUSPLACE Scholar-Activism Zine! – Created through the collective work of participants in the Scholar-Activism Zine-making workshop at the Final Event in May and then compiled by myself and Poppy Nicol. 

Zine-making is both process and product. The act of coming together to reflect on our roles as scholar-activists and discuss these before turning our ideas onto paper through drawing, writing, doodling and collage was really important. We also hope that the final product, the compiled zine, will help others to reflect on their own practices well as spark up new and interesting conversations around the role of research institutions and researchers in relation to political struggle and communities. 

New publication: ‘The Legend of the Cosmos Mariners’ by Kelli Rose Pearson

We are proud to annouce the publication the beautiful story ‘The Legend of the Cosmos Mariners’ by SUSPLACE fellow Kelli Rose Pearson! The story has been published in the book ‘Our Entangled Future: Stories to Empower Quantum Social Change’, co-edited by Karen O’Brien, Ann El Khoury, Nicole Schafenacker and Jordan Rosenfeld. Nine short stories, rooted … Read more

Video: Place Ambassadors in Sustainable Tourism

How can we involve people in more inclusive and participatory place branding initiatives? This is the key question that guided SUSPLACE researcher Cátia Rebelo in her research on sustainable tourism. Learn more about her work in this short video. 

This video is the third in a series of short videos that illustrate inspiring examples of place-shaping practices in Europe. In the past three years, SUSPLACE fellows have been looking at a diversity of cases, trying to understand how citizens, (social) entrepreneurs and community initiatives develop sustainable practices and build the capacities to transform their places according to their ideas, needs and demands. The videos aim to bring these practices, and the research findings, to life.

Documentary: Place Ambassadors – shaping better places to live and visit

If we asked you to describe the place where you live and how you feel about it, what would you tell others? What is special about your place? We asked the people of the communities of Llangorse and Bwlch in the Brecon Beacons National Park in Wales, what they would tell visitors about their area? Are you curious to know what they have shared with us? Watch the video to find out!

This documentary is the result of an academic intervention that aimed to explore the advantages and disadvantages of introducing and or strengthening civic participation in tourism and branding planning, and part of Place Ambassadors project.

Once Upon the Future: Everyday Adventures that Change the World

Can you produce a children’s book as part of an academic research project? Yes, you can! With great enthusiasm and dedication, a team of six SUSPLACE fellows (Anastasia, Alessandro, Angela, Kelli, Lorena and Marta) has been engaged in the writing of children’s stories inspired by their research projects. After more than a year of work, they are happy to announce that they are almost done! Preliminary title of the book: Once Upon the Future: Everyday Adventures that Change the World.

Publication: Experiential approaches to sustainability education-towards learning landscapes

In the recent publication Malin Backman et al. critically reflect the current specialist discourse on experiential approaches to higher education for sustainable development (HESD). Limitations to the current discourse are identified, and as a result, an alternative, learning landscape approach to the study of experiential education (EE) within HESD is suggested. Malin Backman was appointed as a fellow at the SUSPLACE research project Connected Learning Spaces from April 2016 till June 2018.

Co-designing Sustainability Learning with University Students and Community Gardens

On an unseasonably warm February afternoon – warm enough to sit outside with no coat on and with a chorus of birds overhead – seven university students and ten community gardeners gathered in a tranquil community garden on the outskirts of Cardiff, Wales. They met for the 2nd Tyfu i Ddsygu (or Growing to Learn) workshop, with the aim to collectively developing a series of hands-on learning projects.