Competencias comunicativas e interculturales y reforma curricular en el marco de la convergencia europea

It presents a study on the importance of the intercultural and communicative competences within the process of European convergence and their inclusion in the scope of the new curricular reform in Spain. In first place, it considers the declarations, documents and actions undertaken in the European Community to improve the plurilingualism and multiculturalism. Secondly, it comments their impact and links in the European Higher Education Area framework. Finally, the treatment given to communicative and intercultural competences in the White Books of engineering is analysed, followed of the recommendations and official documents on the new syllabi.En este trabajo se pretende investigar la importancia atribuida a las competencias comunicativas e interculturales dentro del proceso de convergencia europea y su impacto en las reformas curriculares que están teniendo lugar en España. En primer lugar, se realiza un seguimiento de declaraciones, documentos y estrategias emprendidas en la Comunidad Europea para favorecer el plurilingüismo y la multiculturalidad. En segundo término, se comentan sus interrelaciones en el contexto del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior. Finalmente, como caso particular, se analiza el tratamiento dado a las competencias comunicativas e interculturales en los Libros Blancos en el ámbito de las enseñanzas técnicas, así como en las recomendaciones y documentos oficiales referidos a los nuevos planes de estudio

El tratamiento de la sostenibilidad en los libros de texto de ciencias: ¿ayuda u obstáculo para avanzar en ese sentido?

Se presenta un análisis del tratamiento sobre la situación de emergencia planetaria, el desarrollo sostenible y la sostenibilidad presente en libros de texto de ciencias en España. Se comparan los resultados obtenidos en tres intervalos temporales: 181 libros publicados con anterioridad a la realización de la Cumbre de Río en 1992, 123 editados entre 1992 y 2002, año en que tuvo lugar la Cumbre sobre Desarrollo Sostenible y 42 desde esta fecha hasta la actualidad, incluyendo 11 libros destinados a la asignatura Ciencias para el Mundo Contemporáneo recientemente incorporada en bachillerato. Los resultados muestran que aún persiste un escaso tratamiento de la problemática señalada, con visiones superficiales y distorsionadas que pueden obstaculizar la tarea de construir un futuro sostenible

Responsible research and innovation: an opportunity to reframing science (and technological) education?

Trabajo presentado en: ESERA 2017: 12th Conference of the European Science Education Research Association, 21-25 de agosto de 2017, DublinThe term Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) is gaining currency across Europe and worldwide aiming a better alignment between responsiveness and governance of scientific knowledge production, innovation and citizen participation facing current grand challenges we are living. This broad and complex purpose has been simplified with a normative framework involving six dimensions labeled as public engagement in research and innovation, science literacy and scientific education, gender equality, open access to scientific knowledge, research results and data, governance and ethics. This paper analyses the rationale and ways by which RRI is being introduced in science education field, including 13 projects developed in both formal and informal education. We apply a heuristic approach building on an extensive literature review focusing on Relevance and Responsible Science Education (RSE) and the recent framework proposed by Stilgoe et al. (2013), which comprises the principles of anticipation, reflexivity, inclusion and responsiveness. Our findings show a limited advance in both the understanding and benefits in the implementation of RRI and the existence of fragmented initiatives where the concept remains underdeveloped. The uncritical implementation of RRI and the emphasis in ‘responsibility’ linked to research contrasts with the scarce knowledge of what innovation and ‘responsible innovation’ mean and could contribute to increase imbalances rather than overcoming current barriers in science education. They also reveal the opportunity to open up the debate on a number of aspects ignored or barely considered to date and provide some suggestions for new research avenues in the science education field. In particular, we propose to broaden the inter-disciplinary studies towards comprehensive scopes on the Nature of Science, Technology and Innovation (NoSTI)

‘Shaken, but not stirred’: six decades defining social innovation

Ingenio Working Paper SeriesThis paper examines the evolution in the conceptualization of Social Innovation (SI) under the assumption of SI as a trans-disciplinary construct which comprises a diversity of discourses from different fields and actors. We performed a comprehensive and systematic literature review along six decades (1950-2014), extracting definitions of SI through a search of 2,339 documents in various languages retrieved from Web of Science, SCOPUS and Google scholar. To guide the inductive analysis of pluri-vocal discourses we assume innovation to be a learning-based process, introducing the notion of social practice linked to its intertwined institutional and sociocultural dimensions. We applied mixed qualitative methodologies, combining content analysis based on a social constructionist/interpretivist ontology with cognitive mapping techniques. Our findings identify some core and secondary elements underpinning two complementary perspectives (transformative and instrumental) of SI as scientific construct. They also point to a number of promising avenues for research towards the advancement of a socio-technical theory of innovation.This work has been partly funded by the JAE-Doc grant for the programme ‘Junta para la Ampliación de Estudios’, co-financed by the European Social Fund and the Spanish Ministry of Science (2011-2014).N

Do systemic collaboration and network governance matter? Living Labs beyond user-driven innovation

Despite the emergence and fast expansion of Living Lab (LL) around the world, little research has been conducted on the concept of LL from the perspective of both technological and social innovation and network governance. This paper critically reviews literature on the LL concept and other ‘innovation labs’ involving cross-border collaboration between private, public, and third sectors. Furthermore, we develop a framework outlining key analytical dimensions (context and aims, innovation types, stakeholders, partnership models, supporting, institutional environments, collaboration and network governance practices) and discuss findings from a study of an international sample of 120 LLs

The impact of one of the most highly cited university patents: formalisation and localization

Ingenio Working Paper SeriesThis paper examines the underlying mechanisms of knowledge diffusion and interrelationships between formal and informal channels attending to the localisation of spillovers between university and industry. With this aim we present a historical in-depth case study centred in one of the most highly cited university patents, developing and applying a theoretical approach that combines formalisation and localisation analytical dimensions. Our findings show how knowledge diffused through channels with different degrees of formalization (patent licenses, “pure” spillovers and consultancy contracts with the inventors). The case also evidences the pervasive delocalization of several knowledge diffusion channels and the complexity of achieving local impact, even at a privileged environment like California. The crucial diffusion mechanism channel stemmed from bidirectional knowledge flows between the university and a non-regional company, which provided the university with the specific fabrication capabilities needed to create an open-lab programme, which ultimately achieved local impact.Peer reviewe

Social innovation futures: beyond policy panacea and conceptual ambiguity

Social innovation is once more an increasingly popular notion circulating as an apparent means to solve the Grand Challenges of the 21st Century. But this common-sense idea of social innovation is based on a quasi-concept, where processes of innovation are absent. To restore some academic rigour to this important concept, we argue more attention need be paid to these innovation processes in social innovation, and that there is value in using innovation concepts drawn from other areas of innovation studies (disruptive innovation, innovation systems, institutional innovation and socio-technical transitions) in highlighting how small-scale social experiments can ultimately lead to the solution of pressing societal problems. Through a subtle critique of the current policy conception of social innovation, it is possible for the field of Innovation Studies in general to help provide better insights into social innovation processes and ultimately to lead to better support frameworks and interventions for promoting solutions to these Grand Challenges.We would like to acknowledge the financial support of the Eu-SPRI Forum for our exploratory project “Social innovation futures: beyond policy panacea and conceptual ambiguity” for developing the ideas in this paper.Peer reviewe

Competencias comunicativas e interculturales y reforma curricular en el marco de la convergencia europea

It presents a study on the importance of the intercultural and communicative competences within the process of European convergence and their inclusion in the scope of the new curricular reform in Spain. In first place, it considers the declarations, documents and actions undertaken in the European Community to improve the plurilingualism and multiculturalism. Secondly, it comments their impact and links in the European Higher Education Area framework. Finally, the treatment given to communicative and intercultural competences in the White Books of engineering is analysed, followed of the recommendations and official documents on the new syllabi

Team collaboration capabilities as a factor in startup success

[EN] This paper discusses the role of team collaboration as a building block for cultivating capabilities in technology-based startups. This conceptual framework draws on a literature review of innovation and entrepreneurship research to understand the intra-organization collaboration mechanisms among team members in technology-based startups. Introducing the concept of team collaboration capabilities represents a new approach to understanding the interaction conditions that give rise to new capabilities from a venture team as its organizational base. Rapid new capability building represents a competitive advantage in environments characterized by innovative technological change, known as dynamic capabilities.We are grateful to the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología de México (CONACyT) for funding Anna Karina Lopez-Hernandez s Ph.D. research grant. We also thank the Conselleria d Educació, Investigació,Cultura i Esport (GV/2018/003) for financial support for this research. We are indebted to Pablo D Este for his detailed and insightful feedbackLopez-Hernandez, AK.; Fernandez-Mesa, A.; Edwards-Schachter, M. (2018). Team collaboration capabilities as a factor in startup success. Journal of Technology Management & Innovation. 13(4):13-22. http://hdl.handle.net/10251/154377S132213