Where it started
HEDS has its beginnings in several places.
One important starting point came in spring 2021, when Lotta Fröjdfeldt participated in a higher education course on teaching and sustainability at Södertörn University. As part of the course, participants were asked to develop an existing course or create a new one.
Lotta had previously been involved in Open Networked Learning (ONL) and saw possibilities to combine its open, collaborative and problem-based approach with higher education didactics for sustainability. A first draft of what would later become HEDS emerged from this work.
From an idea to a collaborative course
During summer 2021, colleagues from different higher education institutions were invited to explore the idea together. Discussions continued online during the autumn, and in spring 2022 a smaller group of universities began working towards a pilot.
The ambition was to create an international and collaborative course where educators from different disciplines and institutions could explore sustainability not only as course content, but through their own teaching practice and educational contexts.
The initiative received support from the Swedish Council for Higher Education (UHR), which contributed to the development of the pilot and preparations for the first full course iteration in 2023.
The early collaboration included colleagues from Mälardalen University, Linköping University, Mid Sweden University and Karlstad University. Since then, participants and contributors from many other institutions and countries have become part of HEDS.
Why problem-based and collaborative learning?
From the beginning, problem-based learning (PBL) has been central to HEDS.
Sustainability questions rarely have one simple or universally applicable answer. They involve different values, knowledge traditions, institutional conditions and disciplinary perspectives. HEDS therefore creates a learning environment where participants can investigate questions together rather than follow a predetermined path towards a single solution.
The international and interdisciplinary PBL groups have become an important part of the course. Participants bring their own professional contexts into the inquiry, encounter perspectives different from their own and collectively decide where deeper exploration is needed.
The pedagogical design has been influenced by Open Networked Learning while gradually developing its own HEDS practice. You can read more about this on the Pedagogical approach & design page.
A course that continues to evolve
HEDS is not designed as a finished course that is simply repeated each year.
Each iteration creates new experiences, questions and ideas for development. Participant reflections, PBL group experiences, facilitator conversations, course evaluations and discussions among contributors all inform the preparation of future iterations.
An important part of this continuity is that former participants are invited to remain involved. Some return as facilitators or co-facilitators, while others contribute to topic development, course coordination, research or other forms of educational development.
In this way, knowledge and experience developed within one course iteration can become a resource for the next.
This does not mean that every part of HEDS changes each year. The collaborative PBL groups, international and interdisciplinary encounters, learner agency and inquiry-oriented approach remain central. At the same time, the structures around the learning process continue to be tested and refined in response to what we learn.
Learning beyond the course
The learning that emerges through HEDS does not necessarily end with the final webinar.
Participants take ideas back into their own courses, programmes and institutions. Some collaborations continue after the course, and experiences from HEDS have also contributed to research, publications and further educational development.
We see this ongoing exchange between participation, practice, facilitation and course development as an important part of the HEDS community.
Earlier iterations
HEDS has developed through several course iterations since the first pilot.
Visit the Archive to explore earlier iterations and see how the course has evolved over time.