SUSTAINABLE MINDS: A LEARNING EXPERIENCE ENHANCING SUSTAINABILITY AWARENESS THROUGH A CHALLENGE-BASED APPROACH

Contemporary youth will face an exacerbation of environmental, social and economic issues such as deforestation, natural resources use and poverty. According to the World Meteorological Organization report on State of Climate Services published in 2023, air pollution engendered 7 million deaths worldwide in 2020. To raise students’ awareness about sustainable development goals, we organized an event on March 4-5 at ESPRIT School of Engineering, celebrating World Engineering Day for Sustainable Development. Our main goal was to emphasize the positive impact of engineers on shaping a more sustainable world. The event structure includes a hackathon, with key phases, starting with keynote speakers to explore critical learning outcomes, followed by an exploration of challenges related to specific united nations sustainable development goals (SDGs) (Nations, 2015). Teams were then engaged in focused design-thinking (DT) and problem-solving sessions, leading to the creation of prototypes. In today’s ever-changing educational environment, the ongoing challenge is engaging students while fostering their creativity and critical-thinking skills. This paper delves into the realm of the ”Sustainable Minds” Hackathon, a challenge-based learning (CBL) experience that involves faculty members, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and industry partners. We aim to share our experience and provide valuable insights into the implementation of CBL in higher education, particularly in the context of promoting sustainability and meeting some of the SDGs. We therefore discuss the findings arising from the event, highlighting that the integration of CBL with SDGs marks a major step forward in higher education. This association goes beyond simply improving understanding of real-world challenges; it also underlines the importance of responding to society’s needs and promoting responsible innovation.