opening doors project
The purpose of OPENING DOORS is to co-develop an interdisciplinary, intersectoral, & international educational offering for post-graduate researchers. Our goal is to shape more innovative, socially aware, integrative and employable research graduates, ready to meet the challenges of the future. This will be accomplished through a challenge-based, open, online educational course. Course participants will develop doctoral competencies that are valued in open innovation networks, enabling them to thrive in complex knowledge networks such that career prospects in both academic and non-academic environments are enriched. The specific objectives of OPENING DOORS are to:
- identify the graduate skills that are valued in open innovation systems through interviews with employers, PhD graduates and educators in those systems
- co-design an educational course for PhD and postdoctoral researchers in collaboration with industry, government, community, university stakeholders including PhD students, that uses real-world challenges as the basis of collaborative learning opportunities.
- enable students to manage interdisciplinary, intersectoral and international connectivity through an open, online learning environment. Reflexivity, interdisciplinary team communication processes, intercultural sensitivity, digital skills and career development will underpin the learning process. This work is vital in an era where open science practices are becoming the currency in many intersectoral innovation networks
Opening Doors was a 17-month project, with five interrelated work packages.
- Work Package 1, “Skills Intelligence” is led by the National Training Fund in the Czech Republic and this involves conducting interviews with diverse stakeholders in Ireland, Denmark and the Czech Republic to gain an understanding of the skills that are valued in open science/open innovation environments.
- Work Package 2, led by Maynooth University, involves the co-design of the course curriculum.
- Work Package 3, led by Aarhus University, is where the online environment is designed and piloted in two iterations of the 3-week course, underpinned by a course evaluation.
- Work Package 4, led by University College Dublin focuses on disseminating the findings of the course design work, the course itself and related resources to stakeholders who can implement this work.
- Finally, Work Package 5 ensures that the work can be delivered efficiently to the highest quality.