Openlab’s creative master’s students develop solutions to societal challenges from the city and the region. Submit your challenge for the coming semester. Openlab accepts challenges from Region Stockholm and the City of Stockholm for the interdisciplinary master’s course Innovations for Societal Challenges (also called Challenges for emerging cities). The challenges should be based on the concrete needs in the organization and in society, and focus on areas where you would benefit from thinking in new ways and/or want to find new solutions. Fill out the form at the bottom of the page to submit a challenge to the course!
About Openlab’s master’s course
In this multidisciplinary master’s level course, a team of qualified master’s students from different universities and disciplines dedicates 20 weeks to your challenge. Typically, four challenges are accepted per semester, with one student team per challenge. The students work with the Design Thinking method and develop prototypes and ideas based on the needs of end users and other important target groups in order to produce the best solutions. As a challenge giver, you will obtain user insights and proposed solutions in a final report as well as student presentations and dialogue with the group. The course is held in English.
All student projects are presented at the bottom of our master’s course page, where you can access previous master’s course projects.
Selection
Openlab makes a selection of incoming challenges based on the extent to which:
- The challenge relates to Openlab’s mission to address complex societal challenges.
- The results have the potential to be scaled up or spread.
- The challenge is connected to the global goals and agenda 2030.
- The challenge is anchored in the management of the organization that applies.
Tip: formulate a good challenge
- Formulate the challenge as a question that begins with the words “How can we…”
- Choose an area where you need to think in new ways and test solutions.
- Identify concrete needs and a clear user/target group.
- Don’t suggest a solution.
- Consider the connection to the global sustainability goals.
Your commitment
Participating as a challenge giver in the course is free of charge and open to Region Stockholm or the City of Stockholm, from unit level to administration or company level.
The commitment includes that you participate on at least three occasions during the course and act as continuous support for contacts and questions in relation to the project. You are expected to present the challenge to the students at the start of the course (January/February for spring semester or September for autumn semester) and actively participate in concept delivery after half the semester (Spring: March, autum: October) and final delivery (Spring semester: May/June, autumn semester: January). The course usually has many international students and communication with the student groups as well as presentations in the course are mainly in English.
To give a challenge to Openlab’s master’s course
Watch our recorded webinar about what it means to give a challenge to the master’s course (approx. 40 minutes). Note that the dates in the year wheel are not for the current year.
Submit a challenge via the form
Fill out the form to submit your challenge. Challenges are collected continuously during the year. Selection for the fall and spring semesters takes place in November and May, respectively. Double check that all mandatory fields are filled in, otherwise the challenge will not be sent. Once the challenge has been sent, a confirmation message will appear at the top of the form.
Having trouble filling out the form? Download the form as a word file and send the completed form to ivar.bjorkman@openlab.se.
