OpenInnoTrain 2024 Melbourne Summer School!
The OpenInnoTrain 2024 Summer School, hosted by RMIT University, Australia, from 5th– 9th of February 2024, provided a fantastic chance for attendees to cultivate their abilities in making a difference and crafting their personal research impact pathways. With a varied group hailing from nations such as Finland, United States of America, New Zealand, Australia, Germany, Spain and Italy, participants grasped the skills to recognize and frame the significance of their research, interact with stakeholders, monitor impact outcomes, and convey tangible real-world effects.
The 2024 Melbourne Chapter of the Summer School, under the guidance of Professor Anne-Laure Mention, Director of ECP for Global Business Innovation, Research & Innovation Capability, and Chief Investigator of the OpenInnoTrain Project, received excellent support from Dr. Avni Misra (RMIT University), Kerry O’Connor (RMIT University), Élia Vallejos Formatgé (RMIT Europe), Ben Johns (RMIT University), and Kateryna Kryzhanivska (LUT University). This event was highly successful, bringing together a remarkable group of early career researchers fully committed to the impactful five-day program.
The program unfolded over a continuous span of five days, offering a dynamic blend of lectures, workshops, speaker seminars, and networking sessions. Its structure guided researchers through a comprehensive journey aimed at understanding how to generate impact at various stages of their research endeavours. Emphasizing the cultivation of skills essential for impactful research, the program focused on assisting researchers in formulating research problems with significant impact potential, contextualizing their work, engaging stakeholders effectively, and devising strategies for tracking impact activities. The program benefited greatly from the invaluable contributions of distinguished speakers, including Associate Professor Letizia Mortara from the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge, Prof Sally Davenport, Director of Science for Technological Innovation, Associate Professor Bernardo Figueiredo, an esteemed researcher and educator at RMIT Australia, and Tristand Badlam, Manager of Library Services Research at RMIT University.
The researchers were organized into six teams, each tasked with presenting a competitive, impact-oriented project to a panel of esteemed judges: Professor Swee Mak, Associate DVC Research Capability at RMIT Australia, Prof Sally Davenport, Director of Science for Technological Innovation, and Associate Professor Letizia Mortara from the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge. These teams pitched innovative project ideas focusing on challenges related to United Nations Sustainability Development goals, Healthtech, Gender studies, and more. Following an elevator pitch format, each team had five minutes to present their ideas and receive feedback from both the judges and the audience. The teams received guidance from highly skilled mentors who travelled from various parts of the world to participate in the summer school program. Mentorship was provided by Dr. Yat Ming Ooi, from university of Auckland, Professor Annukka Jokipii, University of Vaasa, Merja Kangasjärvi, University of Vaasa and Meriam Trabelsi, University of Siena and University of Pisa.
The final pitches underwent rigorous evaluation based on strict impact-oriented criteria, leading to the selection of two winning teams. The first prize, awarded to the team of Ella Guy (New Zealand), Jennifer Pitson (Australia) and Robert Cooney (US), recognized their outstanding project focused on “The Impact of Gender Equity in Corporate Sport”. The runners-up team of Johanna Kalliokoski (Finland), Jonas Wilinski (Germany) and Prashant Kumar (Australia), whose project centred on “Spatial ClimateTech: Urban Analysis for Enhanced Resilience” also received commendation for their innovative approach.
As the host, RMIT University Australia offered a welcoming and well-equipped environment, ideal for fostering meaningful and genuine learning, networking, and relationship-building opportunities. We are particularly grateful for the support and assistance provided by their dedicated local team, which greatly contributed to the success of the event.
Event details:
The summer school will take place, 5-9 February in Melbourne, Australia, and welcomes applications from all over the world and across disciplines. Please note: this is an onsite event (in-person only).
OpenInnoTrain 2024 Melbourne Summer School offers an excellent opportunity for participants to develop skills for creating impact and to design their own research impact journey. Participants will learn how to identify and contextualize the impact of their research, engage with stakeholders, track impact outputs, and communicate real-world impact. The Summer School is a great place to build new connections and explore future collaborations.
Expression of Interest (EOI) to attend the Summer School must be submitted through this form by the deadline: Friday, 1st December, 2023. EOIs will be reviewed and applicants will be notified of the outcome of their EOI on 15th December. Participation is limited to 40 PhD/ECRs to maximise the engagement, so get your EOI in as soon as possible!
Participation in the Summer School is at no cost to the participant (free of charge). Participants must however cover their own transport to, accommodation, and living expenses whilst in Melbourne.
Summary of details
- Participation: in-person only
- Deadline for EOI: Friday, 1st December (23:59 CET).
- Applicants will be notified of the outcome of their EOI on 15th December 2023.
The deadline for Participant EOIs has passed. If you are interested to participate, please send us an email at info@openinnotrain.eu
Summer School Mentors
On the first day of the 5-day program, we will allocate participants into diverse groups/teams (diversity around discipline, experience etc) or approx. 4-5 people.
One Group Member will be allocated to each of the groups/teams to help them understand the OpenInnoTrain canvases and guide them throughout the course of the week during the workshop sessions. Whilst we welcome diversity in mentoring approaches across teams, and do not wish to be fully prescriptive around this role (different approaches are valuable), there will be mandatory pre-event train-the-trainer high-level coaching around the OpenInnoTrain canvases that will be used by the groups. There will be two online train-the-trainer sessions, scheduled for 9th and 17th January – 8 – 9:30 AM CET.
Benefits of being a Summer School Mentor: share your experience/expertise with Ph.D. Students, Early Career Researchers, Network, build/expand your coaching skills, add value to the OpenInnoTrain Summer School program, gain experience using Canvases to ideate and collaborate, experience working in teams across discipline areas, receive a certificate of participation / thanks for your contribution as a Mentor.
Requirements of Mentors: whilst it is not an expectation of mentors to attend the entire Summer School, they must be available for the group work and pitching sessions across the five-day program; commit to participate in the train-the-trainer 2 x 1 hours online sessions (9th and 17th January- 8 – 9:30 AM CET).
Mentor Suitability: Mentors can be senior researchers; postdoc researchers; Ph.D. students with a minimum of 2 years into their Ph.D.; professional staff who work directly with and support research staff – or who would like to up-skill to work with them. If you have any questions about suitability, please email us: info@openinnotrain.eu – we would love to hear from you!
Expressions of Interest (EOI) to participate in the Melbourne Summer School as a mentor must be submitted by the deadline: Friday 1st December, 2023, with outcomes of Mentor selection communicated on Friday 15th December. We expect to need approx. 8 mentors, depending on the participant numbers.
IMPORTANT: You can apply as both a Mentor and Participant as a back-up plan should your Mentoring EOI not be successful.
Participation registration for the Summer School is free of charge, however, participants (including Mentors must cover their own travel, transport, accommodation, and living expenses whilst in Melbourne – applies to people not already living locally). You can now apply to be a mentor through this form.
Deadline application: Friday, 1st December.
Notification of outcome of Summer School Mentor: 15th December2023
Train-the-trainer sessions: 9th and 17th January 2024
The deadline for Mentor EOIs has passed. If you are interested to join, please send us an email at info@openinnotrain.eu
Location
RMIT University (Melbourne, Australia) – Room TBC
Cost
Free of charge
We encourage you to apply ASAP and look forward to successful applicants in Melbourne in February!
Programme
*Note that the programme is subject to slight changes leading up to the event
Schedule
Day 01 / February 5
-
9:00 am
Location
Vienna