Students complete GCLA course with live interview

Addressing the global challenges of the 21st century requires careful consideration, detailed analysis at the regional and local level, and an interdisciplinary lens. The course ‘Global Challenges, Local Action’ aims to increase awareness of the urgency to address these challenges at multiple scales. This year, students from the GCLA course presented their analysis and possible solutions during a YouTube live interview.

About the GCLA course

The course consists of two elements: a set of keynote lectures that introduced internationally recognized global challenges and project-based investigation where a global issue is analyzed more in-depth. There were almost one hundred students from different countries around the world. “The course provided an excellent platform for understanding the real-world problems and guided us towards finding a local action”, says student Abhishek Mishra. 

“The module was full of learnings, not just academics but also the cultures and traditions of different countries such as Bangladesh, Iran, and India. The most exciting part of the course was the best project challenge.”

Best project challenge

“This year we wanted to share the achievements of our students”, says Sherif Amer. To do so we implemented a ‘best project challenge’ in which the most insightful project was selected in each topic. The selection was made by students and staff using the same evaluation criteria. The groups that performed best during the GCLA course presented their analysis and possible solution to a challenge related to one of these topics: Urbanization, Geo-health, Coastal zones, Food security, and Energy transitions. The project groups with the best presentation were asked to give a ten-minute interview which was live-streamed via YouTube. Karin Pfeffer and Carmen Anthonj were present to interview our students.

“It made me happy that we could let students shine during the YouTube Live interviews. They worked so hard for six weeks in a very difficult setting. Seeing them up on stage with such confidence was nice to see. Students shared their insights on what they learned through the collaboration, and what advice they would give to others.”

Live stream as showcase for GCLA module

“We found the idea of a live YouTube interview to be exciting”, says Mishra. The interview was conducted according to the COVID regulations, only two members were allowed for the interview. "But we liked the idea of inclusion of all members through an introduction video. The questions asked during the interview were carefully crafted, which allowed us to self-reflecting on our work."

I've seen the hard work, time, energy and enthusiasm that our students invested into their projects over the last couple of weeks. There were great efforts in building strong, multidisciplinary, international teams, while overcoming diverse challenges on the way. It was wonderful to watch them move from behind the scenes into the spotlight for these YouTube Live interviews.

Abhishek Mishra further adds: "What is of more importance is that we could spread the word and reach a larger group of people. Live streaming also provides an opportunity to the students and others outside the Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation. This way more people get to see more of the different integrated programs and modules we follow, how we address real-world problems and challenges. I find it important to show others how these studies and group work helps to mitigate problems at a local level.” Within the GCLA course, Abhishek Mishra formed a Geo-Health group with Srikumar Sastry, Maliheh Ghorbanzadeh, Niloofar Layegh Nikravesh and Tanzim Tamanna Afroz. Their project is called “Designing Local Action Strategies to Mitigate Malaria Using Geo-Spatial Tools in Rwanda”.

More information?

Are you interested in the GCLA course or the Master’s Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation in general? Please have a look at our website.