Abstract:

Alzheimer Disease International estimates that 46.8 million people worldwide were living with dementia in 2015 and this number will almost double every 20 years. With these data, the fundamental role played by family caregivers cannot be forgotten. Caring for someone with dementia can be a 24-hour-a-day activity, individuals may become isolated from their family and friends’ network as the disease progresses, and caregiving can become a full-time occupation, may result in depression and poor physical health among carers. All these health challenges as well as demographic changes, rising costs and new family structures increase the demand for new care solutions, being self-care and family carers fundamental on it. It is proposed that Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) solutions (products or services) will become increasingly crucial for them to improve the quality of the care they provide, to increase and/or reinforce their social network and to stay healthy.

There are many ICT products and services, but user-led design and co-creation needs to be much better embedded in the design process. The involvement of users in co-creation results in a product or service that is better suited to the needs of consumers, thus ensuring greater usability and effectiveness. Besides, users are an immense source of knowledge and creative ideas that can help to transform regular products or services into innovative ones and to strengthen the communities in which users live. It is therefore of the upmost importance to create convening spaces to bring together users, designers and providers of ICT solutions but also to develop practical guidance on how to implement design-enabled co-creation. To this end, a lean start-up approach - which focuses on the rapid and iterative development of small but scalable projects – is the most suitable one. Naturally, start-ups are intrinsically linked with Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). Nevertheless, few experiences of entrepreneurship and innovation in classrooms involving the participation of users and companies collaborating with students and teachers exist.

In an effort to aid students in developing their problem-solving skills and to enhance entrepreneurship and innovation in classrooms it is essential to deal with the challenges of today’s society, university academic programs must find ways to update their curriculum and delivery to meet the talent need of the labour market. For this reason, it is proposed a pilot training program, based on a lean start-up approach, in which students from technology, health and social care degrees with end users (caregivers of people with Alzheimer) and ICT companies create products/solutions prototypes tailored to the user needs that will be presented and evaluated by real final users and companies. In this context, learning through entrepreneurship will be the common thread. This proposal illustrates how an academic program can use third and private sector partnerships as a resource to maintain the relevancy of its curriculum. In particular, a university/industry/third sector association collaboration experience is examined to showcase how a real problem at a third sector partner has resulted in a prototype proposal used in the classroom to enhance students’ problem solving and entrepreneurship.

Keywords:

Multi-discipline training, Partnerships in Education, Research and Development, Innovation.