Complex societal challenges, such as climate change and water management, require innovative approaches to which international and interdisciplinary higher education can contribute. The "International Virtual Seminar - Water and Climate" (IVS-WaC) will be a digital-collaborative module with international partners from Denmark, Greece, the Netherlands, Portugal and Romania and will be directly embedded in existing study programmes.

In the IVS-WaC seminar, two teaching-learning formats are used, which contain both asynchronous and synchronous elements. On the one hand, all students are taught the 6 main topics through guest lectures by the lecturers and experts from the field. On the other hand, students work in small groups on a term paper on one of the topics and develop a short film or podcast to share the results with all participants and beyond.

In total, 30 international students (advanced Bachelor's or early Master's level) will be able to develop a variety of skills in 6 thematic areas that address current challenges of sustainable water and climate management. They are supervised by 11 participating lecturers who actively engage in the seminar and provide current discourses and comprehensive competences in water and climate research, which are additionally sharpened by 2 practice-oriented expert lectures (authorities, international networks, NGOs).

October 2021 - September 2022

The IVS-WaC project is funded with 50,000€ by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) in the funding measure International Virtual Academic Collaboration - IVAC.

• Department of Environmental Sciences, Open University of the Netherlands, The Netherlands
• Department of Environment of Aegean University
• Department of Paleontology, University of Bucharest, Romania
• Department of Planning, Aalborg University Copenhagen, Denmark
• Department of Science and Technology, University Aberta, Portugal