Trinity launches course on the Challenges to Achieving Sustainable Development
Posted on: 04 August 2017
A free, four week online course ‘Achieving Sustainable Development’, developed by a collaboration of four Trinity College Dublin Schools launches on 11 September 2017.
What challenges are we facing to create a better world?
What is the future for the world around us? What challenges are we facing collectively to stop conflict, improve healthcare, build sustainable cities, and enable access to clean water and sanitation? How do we measure our impact?
This new course is open to anyone interested in the future of our world, and how we can improve it together. Trinity experts in Ecumenics, Economics, Engineering, and Medicine have come together, coordinated through the Trinity International Development Initiative, to share an innovative course exploring the challenges to sustainable development in our world.
Explore the global Sustainable Development Goals
Governments of the world have signed up to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a UN initiative for international development. The course explores the links between five of the global SDGs: peace, healthcare, sustainable cities, water and sanitation, and gender equality. Learners will examine fascinating case studies from Ireland, Uganda, Sri Lanka, Colombia, India, and Korea which look at the impact of development on real lives, and challenge how we think about making our world a better place.
Coordinator at the Trinity International Development Institute, Dr Mairead Finn, explains: “Achieving sustainable development is the collective challenge of our time. How can we work together globally to achieve peace, access to healthcare, improve sanitation, and ensure sustainable cities? Through Trinity’s work with partners around the world, we engage with some of the complex issues arising in projects related to sustainable development. This course explores five of the interconnected Global Sustainable Development Goals, launched by the UN in 2015 and evaluates the challenges we face in aiming to make the world a better place”
Lead Academic and Associate Professor at Trinity’s School of Medicine, Dr Martina Hennessy said: “This course is for learners who care about the future of our world, to engage in a discussion about how we can all contribute to achieving sustainable development. It has been a pleasure to collaborate with colleagues across Trinity working in Medicine, Economics, Ecumenics and, Engineering who all bring important perspectives on tackling some of the greatest global challenges that face us”
The course will tackle complex questions on sustainable development by exploring real world examples:
- Is world peace the most important goal for sustaining development?
- How can we ensure that healthcare is available to the most vulnerable?
- What are innovative ways to provide sanitation services in cities?
- How can we measure the impact and outcomes of development projects?
Since 2014 Trinity has reached over 60,000 learners from more than 100 countries worldwide through free online courses in Irish History, Successful Ageing, and Exercise Prescription.
Open to anyone, wherever you are in the world, now you can take part in a Trinity education from the comfort of your own home.
Register today on the Futurelearn platform
