SDSN Association
Information on the purpose of your organization
The SDSN Association has three core purposes: 1) to support the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) in its program of activities and operational work plans as directed by the Leadership Council and Executive Committee of the SDSN; 2) to create quality online content on sustainable development through its SDSNedu core initiative at no cost to students and practitioners; and 3) to support and tailor the integration for sustainable development instruction into existing graduate, undergraduate, and secondary school programs through blended models of learning.
Information on your programmes and activities in areas relevant to the subject of the Summit and in which country or counties they are carried out.
The primary activity of the SDSN Association since its creation in June 2014 has been the production and administration of educational content on sustainable development as part of its SDSNedu online education initiative. To date, seven full-semester massive open online courses have been produced, covering topics as varied as climate change science and negotiations, global public health, human rights and inequality, and planetary boundaries. The courses are designed to provide accessible content and to generate lively discussion around the Sustainable Development Goals, as they will be adopted in September 2015 at the SDG Summit. Additional courses are in development to ensure that each facet of the SDGs is presented comprehensively and in a way that is globally relevant, to spark discussion and collaboration.
The first four courses have had roughly 120,000 enrollments, with students representing all 193 member states of the UN. While all the courses are presented at the global level to ensure relevance to all students, the experts presenting the material are widely varied in their geographic origin, experience, and perspectives, and students are encouraged to carry on local discussions of the presented material using the collaborative tools of the online platform. All SDSNedu courses are offered completely free of charge to anyone in the world with an Internet connection.
The courses directly address the content of the Sustainable Development Goals and their implications for policy makers around the world. As a result, the SDSNedu initiative of the SDSN Association is highly relevant to the Summit in which the SDGs will be adopted.
Information on activities at the national or international levels
The SDSNedu courses engage faculty and experts globally and across thematic areas. To encourage broader uptake of the content, however, the regional and national networks of the SDSN are encouraged to localize the courses through blended learning. The SDSN Association works with the regional and national networks to make this content available in a way that is relevant to the local context. So far, the SDSNedu team of the SDSN Association has worked with the Mediterranean region, the Brazilian region, and the youth contingent of the SDSN, which is currently based in the Australia-Pacific region.
Organization have an annual report? (YES/NO) (should contain financial statements and a list of financial sources and contributions, including governmental contributions)?
NO -
List of members of the governing body of your organization, and their countries of nationality
The SDSN Association is governed by a Board of Directors, whose members are listed below:
- Jeffrey Sachs, Director, Earth Institute (United States of America)
- Guido Schmidt-Traub, Executive Director, SDSN (Germany)
- Chandrika Bahadur, Director of Education Initiatives, SDSN (India)
- Patrick Paul Walsh, Professor, University College Dublin (Ireland)
- Jennifer Gross, Gross Family Foundation (United States of America)
In addition, the work of the SDSN Association is advised by the Leadership Council of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, and a full list of its members can be found here: http://unsdsn.org/about-us/leadership-council/
Copy of the constitution and/or by-laws of the organization (WORD or PDF only), or a weblink to it
150211_SDSNAssociationBylaws_Adopted17June2014.pdf
