There are issues in our society that require more than just research from the university. A Citylab can be a solution. Citizens, students, researchers, the municipality, and other institutions are brought together to find solutions. What exactly are Citylabs, and how can they make an impact? We delve deeper with Samira Abbadi and Charlotte Ruitinga of UNIC, the university of the future.
Citylabs are local events that help to identify or discuss local or regional challenges. They can address issues such as racism and exclusion, but also economic, medical or technical issues. These events can take different forms (workshops, panel discussions, seminars), but all aim to involve students, researchers, stakeholders and/or members of the local community.
UNIC is involved in the organisation of Citylabs. UNIC is a European alliance of eight universities located in so-called post-industrial cities. The alliance is now trialling the method as a pilot. Samira Abbadi, programme manager UNIC: "Our vision is that if you want to solve social problems, you have to do this together with citizens. This way is also called participative, we call it 'engaged'. By means of Citylabs, we engage people at an early stage."
Discussing societal issues
"In order to make an impact, cooperation with residents or citizens is necessary," adds Charlotte Ruitinga, programme manager UNIC for Engaged Research (UNIC 4ER). "In essence, it's about entering into a dialogue with different people about certain issues. They may be citizens, but also organisations, NGOs or industry partners. It's really about the co-creation of acquiring knowledge together, learning together and then ideally making an impact with it by offering the results to the municipality or to certain industry partners."
The first Citylab, organised last year, dealt with racism and discrimination and discussed indirect exclusion with women in Rotterdam's Hillesluis district. Samira: "We asked them how they felt about living in the neighbourhood and whether they felt they had access to government facilities like all the people in other neighbourhoods. We found out during the City Lab that people experience exclusion based on the neighbourhood they live in and their origin."
Advice to the municipality
Last 23 March, a local Citylab was organised for the third time by ErasmusX, one of the internal partners of UNIC. ErasmusX is one of 3 central HEQA projects at EUR. Their mission is to future proof education with emerging technologies and create a positive societal impact. As part of this mission ErasmusX has a designated physical space on the South bank of Rotterdam (the so called HefHouse). At this location societal, industry and academic partners come together to create a positive societal impact.
This time, the focus was on the low political participation of young people during the municipal elections in Rotterdam. "The first meeting on this topic had a good turnout," says Samira. "All kinds of people from the municipality and politics were present and of course there were also young people. It was a fun, successful session with delicious Surinamese food." The results will be further developed in the next City Lab in September, with the aim of eventually presenting them as an advice to the municipality.
The beauty of a Citylab is that every Citylab is different, Charlotte and Samira think. Sometimes a Citylab arises from a conversation with a person or group from the city, as was the case with the first Citylab, which was organised in collaboration with stadsmarinier (an official specially appointed to solve the intractable security problems in certain areas) for anti-racism Marcel Dela Haije. In the second City Lab, about the exclusion of women in Hillesluis, the organisation joined an existing initiative.
Samira emphasises that, from the very beginning, care was taken not to talk about people, but with people. "It is not the case that we come up with something, then invite citizens as guests and they are then allowed to say something. We make sure that citizens are allowed to think about the session from the very beginning and that the Citylab takes place in neutral territory."
This means that sessions take place in a community centre, for example, and not at the university. "It is important that it takes place in a place where we are all equal, where there are round tables so that we can all work together on an equal footing," Samira continues. "That way we make sure we are very inclusive and that everyone who participates has as equal a voice as possible in what we are talking about."
"It makes a big difference whether you analyse a dataset from behind your desk or whether you go into the city yourself and really talk to people"
Great ambitions
UNIC has great ambitions with the Citylabs. Samira: "Our great desire is to eventually turn it into a form of education in which it really becomes part of the education within the bachelor and master programmes. But first, we need a lot of people from different programmes who are willing to make room for this. We will also collaborate with our colleagues from Impact at the Core."
Charlotte therefore calls on all EUR staff to become more involved in the use of Citylabs: "Citylabs are not only interesting for students, because you can see what is really going on there, but also for researchers. It makes a big difference whether you analyse a dataset from behind your desk or whether you go into the city yourself and really talk to people. It is a different way of gathering knowledge. As far as I'm concerned, it really is essential."
- More information
Do you work as a lecturer and are you interested in working with UNIC Citylabs? Please send a message to unic@eur.nl for more information.
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