Postgraduate Course in Community Service Engineering Technology for empowerment, quality of living, present-day social profit organisations … Faculty of Engineering Technology Faculty of Engineering Science in collaboration with Thomas More A postgraduate course for you? Are you an engineer with an affinity for the social sector? Are you convinced that technology is an important lever for more independence and a better quality of life for vulnerable groups in society? Do you think you can make a significant contribution to social profit organisations as an engineer? Do you also believe that the sector can keep pace with the rapid technological and societal changes by innovating and by making adequate use of existing solutions and services on the market? This postgraduate course bridges the worlds of technology, of the social profit and the profit sector. Above all as an engineer you solve problems for ... people. This programme helps you to extensively get into the social aspects of engineering problems. Once you really understand people and their challenges, you can change lives. This course focuses on technology for social inclusion, empowerment, accessibility of public space, websites and media. It goes into the efficiency of social profit organisations and into the quality of their services. p Huize Zonnelied Ieper - RFID tag detects runaway behaviour of elderly people with dementia (Cera Award project) p MS Center Melsbroek - Cognitive signal analysis (Cera Award project) Admission Requirements The following criteria apply for this course: n The course is open to: • Masters of Engineering Technology, • Masters of Engineering Science, • Masters of Engineering Science: Architects, • BioScience Engineers, • Business Engineers. n Candidates have to demonstrate a good command of English, CEFR B2 is advised. (cf: www.coe.int/lang-CEFR) Admission and Registration Submit your application before September 12, 2014 through www.fet.kuleuven.be/cse/apply. We will inform you about admission no later than September 19. After admission, you can enroll via www.kuleuven.be/registrations The tuition fee amounts to € 3,000. This postgraduate course is recognised as ‘paid educational leave’. Fees can be paid with employer or employee training vouchers. Some students are partly or fully sponsored by the companies they work for. Certificate The postgraduate programme consists of 30 credits. At the end of the curriculum there is a viva about your project for a professional jury. The processes and work done throughout the year are equally important as the project’s technical end result. You will report on your progress and demonstrate that you acted as a socially aware engineer. If you pass, you will receive the official certificate ‘Postgraduate Course in Community Service Engineering’. Cooperation with Cera Award We work closely together with Cera Award. Our graduates are encouraged to compete for a Cera Award (www.cera-award.be). The Cera Award is: n a recognition of your social, communicative and creative skills that you showed as an engineer in a social context; n a beautiful statue that symbolises the cooperation between science and social profit. Our approach? As engineers/professionals you are constantly in touch with and learn from each other. Project work is an important part of the training. Projects are carried out individually or in teams. We start from real needs of people and organisations. Technics remains important but so is the process that you go through. By targeted questions this process comes to the surface and you learn with and from one another about different contexts, the co-creation of technology, technical criteria, user criteria, viable business models, implications for other fields, etc. The project work is supported by course content, which is divided into four modules: 1 . Vulnerable groups in society You will meet the challenges of various vulnerable groups in society. You meet experts by experience who tell their stories and explain what role technology plays in it. Often, they can also say what 'wrong technology' is. Then they mean tools that have been developed with the best intentions, but which do not meet their needs. You will learn about the concept of 'appreciative inquiry' and gain insight into terms such as participation, empowerment, emancipation and inclusion. 2 . Organisations in the social profit sector In this module you will learn about the role and future of the social profit sector. You are introduced to various parties, such as the government and umbrella and advocacy organisations to get a clear picture of the sector. You will learn about the various subsectors and about international perspectives. You reflect on questions such as: How much does the social profit sector cost to a country and what are the returns? How is the sector funded? How difficult is it to manage a social profit organisation and to what extent does it differ from managing a regular business? What are business models for the social profit sector? What is Social Accounting and Social Return on Investment (SROI)? ... 3 . Technology and the social profit sector In this module, the social profit sector and technology are placed in relation to one another. When do people win with technology? You extensively discuss a number of cases and the ethics of technology. You are introduced to the industry of assistive technology. You will study and analyze the accessibility of buildings, public space and accessibility in the wider sense (e.g. regarding ICT). You examine the acceptance of technology and services to enhance the use of technology. We look into how sad is it when the technology developed is not used? In this section you will also study the socio-technical system design, since because of their analytical skills engineers can contribute significantly to the design of organisations. We know all about the social profit sector We know all about engineering 4 . Interdisciplinary Module In this module you continue to build bridges between different worlds. You discuss the economic, ecological and legal implications of technology and the need for a multidisciplinary approach and how this can be achieved in practice. Topics include: open innovation, business models, ‘creative commons’, the co-operative type of business ... You train your social skills: storytelling, active listening, dialogue, leading groups in co-creation ... Several learning activities in this module are interdisciplinary and international thanks to the European Lifelong Learning Project Community Service Engineering. This means that you are in touch with students from other professions and other countries to learn from and with each other. Easy to combine work and study Face-to-face contact time is kept to a minimum so the combination with a job is feasible. Classroom activities are organised on Fridays and Saturdays: a nice compromise for the investment of your personal time and that of your possible employer. About one third of the time you meet each other face-to-face. For the other two thirds learning is made possible thanks to an interactive online learning environment. On this platform you can find a lot of learning materials. Our classroom activities are largely recorded (video) so you can consult the presentations again or catch up. Group interaction and individual assignments (including feedback) are mainly organised virtually. You can make your own arrangements and work on a self-selected time, place and pace. The ‘real life’ project that you choose will depend on your technical background and preference of a subsector in the social profit sector. You can select a project idea from the KU Leuven pool, but you can also start from a project idea of the organisation that you work for. In this way this postgraduate course offers an opportunity to examine the potential of products or services in the social profit sector or to get one-step further in their development or implementation. You get the chance to work on a project for your employer. Without this course time for such projects may not have been found. International Dimension The postgraduate course is fully taught in English. The interaction between actors in the curriculum will be in English. The programme is open to an international audience of graduate engineers. The pool of project ideas from the university has a number of project proposals from foreign organisations. This means you can work for an international employer if you wish. Both KU Leuven and Thomas More are partners in a European consortium for Community Service Engineering. There is a close cooperation with the University of Porto (Portugal), The Hague University of Applied Sciences in the Netherlands and University West in Sweden. These partners work on projects in the same context. In the curriculum there is room to compare topics across country borders. As a student, you are invited to get to know each other, work together and learn from one another. The course has been developed in cooperation with the Olin College of Engineering (USA). International guest lecturers from the US and elsewhere will take part in the virtual environment. Why take this course? Engineers with the additional profile of ‘Community Service Engineering’ can play a role in: n n n the social profit sector itself; companies in assistive technology; companies that seek market and/or product potential in the social profit sector. Based on their projects’ end results, graduate engineers can start their own business in an international niche market or perform consultancy assignments for the social profit sector. Socially aware engineers are particularly widely employable in the labour market, because they have been trained at the crossroads between different disciplines and have interacted with a range of audiences and organisations. Thanks to these contacts with partners in the field, our graduates build an extensive network within the field of Community Service Engineering. Organisation, location and timing The course is an interdisciplinary programme. The bridge is made between engineering and social work. The organising partners are the faculties of Engineering Technology and Engineering Science at KU Leuven in collaboration with Thomas More’s group of Health, Wellbeing and Teacher Training. Face-to-face activities are alternately organised on the campuses of the Faculties of Engineering Technology and Engineering Science in Geel and Leuven. The course starts in October 2014 and ends in May 2015. Classes are on Fridays and Saturdays. The curriculum is largely organised through the virtual learning environment. Actors Various actors are involved in the curriculum: n n n n n n n Professors and teachers of both KU Leuven and Thomas More; ‘Real life’ experts/end users of technology; representatives of vulnerable groups in society; Representatives of social profit organisations; Entrepreneurs; Representatives of intermediate organisations; including advocacy organisations; Policymakers; Guest lecturers or experts. Given our ideas on project work, there is room for specific subjects at the request of students. KU LEUVEN FACULTY OF ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY W. de Croylaan 6 box 2000 3001 LEUVEN, Belgium www.fet.kuleuven.be More information KU Leuven Faculty of Engineering Technology Faculty of Engineering Science in collaboration with Thomas More Group of Health, Wellbeing and Teacher Training www.fet.kuleuven.be/cse cse@kuleuven.be Contact: Inge Vervoort tel. + 32 14 56 23 10 With the support of the Fetzer Institute and the Lifelong Learning Programme of the European Commission v.u.: Kris Willems, W. de Croylaan 6 bus 2000, 3001 Leuven Partners: