Abstract:

In this decade, many universities are integrating the United Nations 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Climate Change, the Circular Economy, along with other goals towards sustainability, into their organisational objectives.

However, the incorporation of these issues as curricular content in university studies is developing in a diverse and irregular way.

The European Union (EU), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development and other international organisations are calling for higher education institutions to incorporate green skills in their degrees as a necessary step to accelerate the ecological transition of the economic model, as a response to the triple planetary crisis: climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss.

The Technical University of Madrid (UPM) leads the European Engineering Learning Innovation and Science Alliance (EELISA), initiative funded by Erasmus+, the EU Programme for education. Within this alliance, one of the main objectives is to achieve a real impact on society following the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the SDGs.

The Energy2win project, renewable and responsible energy, has been selected and funded by UPM within the EELISA initiative, as a pilot experience. The project aims to evaluate educational methodologies that integrate technical engineering skills, green skills and social challenges in a real application.

The project has started in September 2023 and is running in four engineering faculties of the UPM, in three bachelor's degrees and two master's degrees, with 124 students involved during the academic year 2023-24.

Over the course of a semester, engineering students work in groups through the Challenge-Based Learning methodology, students develop a project focused on renewable energy with application in a local community. The professors define the objectives, design the work stages, and evaluate the competences achieved. At the end, each group presents its result and there is a discussion among all the groups and professors.

The Energy2win project is supported by an external partner, Iberdrola company, a multinational electric utility global leader in clean energy, which gives technical support to the students, shows them real conflicts between renewable energy and territorial development, as well as strategies and measures to find innovative solutions with the local community.

At the end of the semester, each student is assessed based on their team's overall result and their individual performance. After passing the evaluation, within the framework of the EELISA partnership, the student obtains a credential, which verifies the achievement of technical, environmental and social skills.

This higher education training experience demonstrates how an engineering education activity can be designed to combine the technical skills of renewable energy, green skills, and the social vision of sustainability in local communities.

This methodological model is being documented as a pilot experience, including the production of educational materials and learning resources, rubrics and metrics for assessment. The final objective is to promote the transfer of results so that it can be replicated in other universities in the EELISA alliance.

Keywords:

Challenge-Based Learning, green skills, sustainability, SDGs, renewable energy.