Ongoing courses
Programme
CBI A³ is focused around using design innovation to develop outcomes that connect CERN technology with societal needs in a tangible way.
Desired outcome
The challenges are framed by the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs), and the solutions aim to solve problems on the local level of each respective design factory. The outcomes are aimed for 2030. Therefore teams explore strategies for implementation considering future scenarios for 2020, 2025 and 2030.
How it started
A³ is a Design Factory Melbourne initiative, which builds on earlier CBI pilots at IdeaSquare CERN.
Participating entities
Design Factory Melbourne, inno.space Mannheim, New York City Design Factory, Porto Design Factory
Programme
CBI Barcelona, running for the first time with only Catalonian universities in 2018, brings together students from three universities in Barcelona to solve societal challenges with the help of CERN technology.
Desired outcome
The projects are an elaborate mixture, where the technologies derived from research at CERN meet societal, human-driven needs.
How it started
CBI MED, a collaboration between Spanish and Italian universities, grew in popularity so much that the two countries’ courses had to be divided in two separate courses: CBI Barcelona and CBI X (2017) / CBI ER (2018-2019)
Participating entities
ESADE Business School, Istituto Europeo di Design (IED) Barcelona, Polytechnic University of Catalonia
Programme
Design the Future (DTF) is a 1-2 week workshop that takes place at CERN IdeaSquare. The workshop is open to students from all backgrounds (e.g. Science, Engineering, business, Humanities, Design etc.).
Desired outcome
The general objective of the workshop is that MSc level interdisciplinary students teams discover 1) What CERN is by interacting directly with CERN researchers, 2) What is happening at CERN and how innovation happens at the world’s largest particle physics research institute 3) How to think disruptively and 4) How to build future world scenarios in which social aspects and technology interlink and propose transformative technology concepts.
How it started
DTF started as a pilot course in 2018. The pilot stemmed from the idea of expanding the conventional design thinking methodology into a more explorative multiverse thinking method. In multiverse thinking, the students are encouraged to overlook current technological constraints and instead aim for futuristic scenarios taking place in 2050.
Participating entities
In the first pilot, participating students were from the Tampere University of Technology, Basque universities BIC Araba and UPV/EHU, as well as Italian students from CBI ER
Programme
In CBI Emilia Romagna (ER), students from Italian universities work in teams to create and prototype ideas for a sustainable future. The programme is a spin-off of CBI Mediterranean, where students from both Italian and Spanish universities participated in. As CBI MED grew in popularity, a decision was made to diverge it into two country-specific courses.
Desired outcome
The challenges are built around real-life problems presented by the sponsoring organizations.
How it started
UNIMORE was part of the very first CBI pilot. Since then, they have participated every year, and the collaboration has been extended to other universities in the area of Reggio Emilia.
Participating entities
University of Bologna, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, and University of Ferrara (Italy)
Programme
CBI Tampere (CBI @ TAU) is an intensive 3-month project course where student teams tackle societal problems. The UN SDGs act as a basis for defining the problem.
Desired outcome
The project solutions aim to be technological and applicable in the very near future. Students are also strongly encouraged to continue with their project after the course
How it started
The collaboration started serendipitously from a high-energy physics collaboration participants from Finland visiting CERN.
Participating entities
Past Courses
Programme
CBI MED was a project course where multidisciplinary student teams and their instructors collaborate with researchers at CERN to discover novel solutions for the future of humankind.
Desired outcome
The projects were an elaborate mixture, where the technologies derived from research at CERN meet societal, human-driven needs.
How it started
Italian and Spanish universities from the previous years’ first CBI courses organized a course in 2015 – 2017 to build on the lessons learned from previous years’ iterations.
Participating entities
ESADE Business School, Istituto Europeo di Design (IED) Barcelona, Polytechnic University of Catalonia, UNIMORE, Politecnico di Milano
Programme
The second iteration of CBI focused on thoughtful designs from students. Students from European and Australian business, engineering and design schools, working together with some of Cern’s brainiest scientists, have developed prototypes for a range of wearable technologies — including garments for the elderly that prevent hip fractures and wrist monitors that trigger more socially-aware behaviour among young people with Asperger’s syndrome.
Desired outcome
Demonstrating the value of fundamental research to society.
How it started
The second iteration continued from the previous years’ CBI pilot course.
Participating entities
Aalto University, ESADE Business School, Istituto Europeo di Design, Polytechnic University of Catalonia, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Swinburne University of Technology, UNIMORE
Programme
CBI 2013 – 2014 was the first pilot round for the Challenge Based Innovation course. In the course, students were given challenges related to learning as well as technologies developed at CERN.
Desired outcome
The students developed a solution for peer-to-peer learning, as well as a solution for improving the way children in the autism spectrum learn communication skills.
How it started
Also known as CBI One, the idea of the first pilot course started from finding societal applications for CERN technologies developed by the EDUSAFE and TALENT projects.
Participating entities
Aalto University, UNIMORE and the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA)