What happens when academic exchange goes beyond lectures and becomes a process of co-creation, mutual learning and societal engagement?
This semester, an inspiring collaboration between the Master’s Programme in Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship (MISIE) at the University of Coimbra and the Graduate Programme in Law and Innovation at the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (Brazil) demonstrated exactly that.
The initiative was led by two long-standing members of the EMES community: Sílvia Ferreira, EMES Board member and Institutional Representative of the University of Coimbra, and Lars Hulgård, EMES founder and Honorary Member, currently working as a professor at the Federal University of Juiz de Fora.
The exchange connected students and faculty from both institutions through a series of online activities exploring social innovation, public policy and societal challenges. It included lectures by Lars Hulgård on Social Innovation Ecosystems in an Era of Crises and Tipping Points and by Sílvia Ferreira on Public Policy Promoting Social Innovation: The Example of Portugal.
However, the most remarkable outcome emerged from the collaborative work carried out by the students themselves. Working across borders, they designed and organised a joint session, shared experiences from their local contexts, including the devastating effects of the storms and flooding that hit the two regions in a week’s space, and developed and exchanged social innovation proposals addressing contemporary societal challenges in Portugal and Brazil.
The dimension of academic training across borders was welcomed by the students. Here expressed by Niara Britto from the Federal University of Juiz de Fora:
“I genuinely believe that taking this course allowed us to broaden our worldview, especially by engaging with different perspectives, research approaches, and fields of knowledge. Both Professor Silvia’s class and the Joint Seminar awakened aspirations that, in some way, had already existed in my academic imagination.
These experiences represented unique opportunities for internationalisation moments in which we could practice communicating with the wider academic world while discovering new paths, possibilities, and realities that, although distinct, are sometimes surprisingly similar.
Such opportunities have certainly marked my master’s experience in a very positive way and will likely influence my trajectory as a researcher.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude, first to Professor Lars and also to Professor Silvia, whose dedication to teaching and academic exchange truly embodies the art of education.
Even within a relatively short period of time, these experiences contributed to making me a more attentive and complete researcher, more aware of the vastness of knowledge and possibilities that exist beyond our immediate academic environment.“
Building on the course, Lars Hulgård and the students from UFJF are currently preparing a joint report presenting the Juiz de Fora innovations addressing elements of post-disaster recovery, and all contributors recognised as equal co-authors. The report will be shared with the Mayor of Juiz de Fora, extending the impact of the initiative beyond the classroom and into the public sphere.
For Silvia and Lars, this experience represents a powerful example of what EMES has always sought to encourage:
collaboration, engaged research, mutual learning and the co-production of knowledge across countries, institutions and generations.
This initiative illustrates how EMES members continue to build bridges across borders and disciplines, creating spaces where research, education and societal engagement come together.
It is also a beautiful reflection of the spirit that has animated EMES over the years: advancing knowledge while contributing to positive social change.