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Poster Short Abstract

The poster presents our main takeaways from the cross-university teaching project "Citizens Consider(ed)", focusing on citizen science as a field for transformative learning, both for students and for lecturers. It provides a case study for integrating citizen science into higher education.

Poster Abstract

The aim of the teaching project “Citizens Consider(ed)” was to create and implement a concept for a cross-university teaching format that would enable students to develop their own citizen science projects at the intersection of AI and sustainability. With funding from the “Lake Constance Arts & Sciences Association,” we were able to provide student groups with a budget to cover project costs and to invite guest lecturers who complemented our expertise.

The use of citizen science as a research method in a transdisciplinary course across universities has the potential to help students understand major socio-political issues, such as AI-based sustainability concepts from different perspectives and logics, to make them tangible by analysing specific application contexts, and to generate new insights for research and practice through collaboration between students and citizen scientists. In addition to thematic knowledge and research experience, students acquire key future skills by collaborating with citizen scientists, which prepares them for application-oriented, transdisciplinary project work. They then put these skills to the test in a supervised setting.

A crucial element of the project was learning what it means to act and create impact within a local context. Through their citizen science initiatives, students gained insight into how research can contribute to community engagement and social cohesion, fostering a sense of agency and self-efficacy. It furthermore inspired them to make connections between theoretical knowledge and how it can be translated and used in collaborative settings.

Our poster portrays the main project pillars and summarises crucial insights, challenges, and opportunities that grew from the teaching project. It will focus on citizen science as a field for transformative learning, both for students and lecturers.