Opening Workshop
To begin, all students participate in an online Grand Challenges Opening Workshop--an interactive, accessible common experience. The workshop introduces participants to one another and the reflective process, encouraging them to consider the complex nature of FANH grand challenges and the importance of collaboration and stakeholder analysis in goal setting. This workshop sets the stage for their collaborative learning within FANH Grand Challenges.
Grand Challenges Colloquium
This common, grounding experience introduces each annual cohort of students to the scope of the Grand Challenge Annual Theme. An eight-week intensive online course, the Colloquium provides the context and science-based content knowledge that students will need to credibly take on the challenges offered in the subsequent Signature Experiences. In addition, the Colloquium provides students with professional development. The cross-institutional resources built into this project ensure knowledge experts and professional development experts recruited from participating institutions achieve broader impact. Learning objectives for the Colloquium ensure that participants acquire a strong foundation in the Grand Challenge Annual Theme and FANH topics. Considering economic inequities, students will be offered, but not required to enroll for credit at participating institutions.
Signature Experiences
Signature Experiences are offered in multiple formats to allow each participant flexibility in what best accommodates their needs. Signature experiences include the Design Challenge, Hackathons, and Field Course described below. Students will be matched to one or more of these experiences based upon their preferences and availability.
In the optional Hackathons, student problem solvers from multiple institutions will form working teams, and develop innovative solutions for a food justice challenge, concluding the event with solutions presented and evaluated based on workability, feasibility, and usability.
The optional semester-long Design Challenge is a local, in-person opportunity for students to identify and propose solutions to a local problem related to food justice. Design Challenges are in seminar format, emphasizing design thinking, creativity, critical thinking, and collaboration on solutions to issues attached to food justice. Understanding the inter-relationships and complexities of what are termed “wicked problems” (i.e., issues so inter-related that a singular solution may lead to further problems unless they are tackled at a systemic, structural level) is central to each design challenge.
This seven-day in person experience immerses students into a deeper exploration of the annual theme within a given community. The Field Course provides student participants with experiential learning opportunities through the application of the widely used “place as text” model to explore the annual theme. Thus, students experience real-world constraints, opportunities, and realities of the topic from the blended scientific expertise of the Field Course coordinators and the lived expertise of local communities. The curriculum is packed with local community visits, team building, problem solving, and culminating projects.
The annual program ends in a Culminating Conference for all participants to reflect on their learning and to provide a forum for cooperative learning among students from their signature experiences.