Discussing healthy learning cities: an interview with Prof Mike OSBORNE and Dr Yulia NESTEROVA, University of Glasgow

An interview by Dhruti CHAKRAVARTHI

The 23rd ASEF Summer University (ASEFSU23) on “Sustainable Cities for a Liveable Future” was a 3-month long interdisciplinary Hackathon that attracted over 80 youth participants from 39 countries across Asia and Europe. Divided into a range of groups, participants were tasked to collaborate, guided by experts and mentors to develop ideas for sustainable cities. The programme was set in the backdrop of rapid urbanisation across South Asian countries. The Hackathon culminated in the conceptualisation of innovative ideas and solutions to tackle intersectional urbanisation issues specific to Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.

Professor Michael Osborne is Professor of Adult and Lifelong Learning within the School of Education at the University of Glasgow. Dr Yulia Nesterova is a Lecturer in Education and International development with the School of Education and was a Research Fellow within SHLC. The University of Glasgow and SHLC joined the 23rd ASEF Summer University on “Liveable Cities for a Sustainable Future” as partner organisations and provided intellectual support to the programme development. Ms Dhruti Chakravarthi, alumni of ASEF’s Education Department, had the pleasure of interviewing both Professor Osborne and Dr Nesterova on healthy learning cities.

Dhruti Chakravarthi: How have the institutions that you have been affiliated with been engaged in the SDG 11, particularly in the spheres of teaching, learning, research or any active projects and initiatives?

Professor Mike Osborne: We work with a wide range of partners in Asia and Africa on research projects, for example in Bangladesh, China, India and in the Philippines. SHLC’s core research focuses on the relationship between education and health and creating sustainability in cities at the neighbourhood level. Funded by the UKRI under the Global Challenges Research Fund, SHLC also supports a whole range of smaller scale projects across worldwide. Our main objective is strengthening the capacity of researchers, and researching how education and health synergize in order to create sustainability at the neighbourhood level. Ultimately, our research work contributes to SDG 11. However, we are also looking at SDG 3 and SDG 4, and there are many other SDGs that are linked to our work. It is interesting to see that education is not always strongly connected with other service sectors within cities and, hence, rather functions in a silo.

Dr Yulia Nesterova: In 2021 we set up a collaboration with UNESCO’s International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP) in Paris. Our collaboration is focusing on conducting research on how cities respond to SDG 4. For example, how do city authorities and other education actors work together to build quality, inclusive and equitable education in their respective context. We have also added a focus on climate change and environmental systems sustainability. How can education and different actors support climate and environmental sustainability?

Dhruti: That’s very interesting. So, in context of that, and your research, what is the importance of integrating lifelong learning projects within educational establishments? And how does this contribute specifically towards sustainable development?

Professor Osborne: SDG 4 focuses on both education and lifelong learning. When we think about education, we often think about formal systems: schools, colleges, and universities. If we use the more global term of lifelong learning, we associate it with learning that occurs through non formal and informal means. In other words, there are a whole range of different institutions outside of formal schooling that can offer learning opportunities. And there are all sorts of informal ways in which people can access learning. We have to remember that schooling occurs during a relatively short period of your lifetime, from the age of five, to 21, or 22. If you happen to be lucky, you carry on learning throughout the life course. It is very important for institutions to be able to offer lifelong learning opportunities, from the cradle to the grave, and to support learning across the lifecourse.

Education does not always have to follow formal traditional formats. Informal learning opportunities are equally important, and these opportunities are not typically faciliated by institutions. In our work on learning cities with UNESCO, we understand learning to be a much more inclusive process than simply that which is offered through formal institutions. Learning occurs across all services and sectors. It can occur at a neighbourhood level through informal community organisations. It can occur circuitiously in day-to-day life, and can for example be mediated by cultural assets and environmental services. These are all potential providers. Therefore, if we want to achieve the objectives of SDG 4, we need a thriving lifelong learning system and a thriving learning city system in place in our cities.

Dhruti:

Thank you so much for shedding light on that. Yulia, in regard to your research, can you tell us more about the spatial inequalities within education and health that you’ve observed?

Dr Nesterova: Overall, we look at cities as places of innovation, growth and opportunities, especially when we contrast them with rural areas. We look at fast growing cities which offer employment, educational opportunities, and so on. If we look at spatial inequalities within cities, most of the time, the focus is on slums as precarious places. However, what our research shows is that cities are hybrid structures and neighbourhoods themselves are very diverse. There are a myriad of opportunities in cities, but the availability of these opportunities depends on where you live. If you look at a city, the concentration or lack of opportunities, benefits, challenges or harms are different across one city.

Cities show extremes: slums and high-income neighbourhoods. But one finds a lot of categories between these two: There are middle income, lower middle-income, or upper middle-income neighbourhoods. There are mixed neighbourhoods with different clusters of income. Our research confirms that if you look at a slum, for example, the availability of services such as schools or health centres is often of poor quality if you compare them to other neighbourhoods. However, this is not the whole picture. We have also observed slums that have very good schools and, at the same time, in the same city, there are middle income neighbourhoods that may not have a good school. This is all very context specific. It is not only about availability or the access to a resource or a service, such as formal schooling. There are so many other factors that influence learning, health and well-being. Does a neighbourhood have electricity or clean water? Does it have good roads and transport? Are there opportunities for socializing? Other than libraries, does the neighbourhood have sports centres or playgrounds for kids or clubs for young people and adults.

In many ways, the neighbourhoods we reside in or are born into have become our destiny. They have a massive impact on what kind of life and what kind of future we all have. One of the major things that our consortium advocates for is promoting localized interventions, opportunities, partnerships, and especially research. We need to understand what is happening on the ground. The question however is: how effective are these various services and initiatives, especially in terms of their sustainability. As they depend on funding, they often stop once funding ends. There is also the question of quality which depends on existing regulations and coherence of services.

Dhruti: This is very interesting, and using your insights to set the scene, how do you think education and youth projects like the ASEF Summer University can contribute to SDG 11? And why are such non-formal projects important to compliment formal education and lifelong learning?

Professor Osborne: No single type of institution, whether it be universities or other services in the public or private sphere, can offer everything. One of the ideas that underpins the concept of a learning city is that all stakeholders have got something to provide, but they should do so in a coherent fashion. They need to understand the role and services of others and there should be as little duplication and as much complementarity as possible. To develop more sustainable cities through education means to have some structure in place. As far as I can see, the learning city structure is not a bad one. The idea of a learning city is very variable and in practice is very different from one place to another. However, there are some common principles: first, it is important to have some sort of governance structure and commitment at the highest level within cities; second, there should be effective bottom-up processes that allow community groups, youth groups, NGOs, etc. to play a role in making a contribution. At UNESCO’s 5th International Conference on Learning Cities in Yoensu, Korea, Yulia and I just presented a paper about the importance of bottom-up approaches and the opportunity for citizens to shape what happens in cities instead of things being imposed upon them.

Dr Nesterova: I have been working with young people on various projects for many years now. Through diverse initiatives they support economic development in their context, as well as social cohesion, peacebuilding, and so on. We need to create non-formal learning spaces for young people, which can help them with the skills, capacities and knowledge that they need. Creating networking and collaboration opportunities like the ASEFSU23 are crucial so that people can get together and learn from each other. Through this, they can contribute to addressing issues in their own context, building capacities to work with others, including authorities, and building partnerships.

Dhruti: And finally, I was curious if you had any key message that you would like to share with the participants of the ASEF Summer University?

Professor Osborne: Reflecting on what Yulia has just said, young people are the future. At the same time, I think intergenerational approaches are very important. It is a two-way process. I think that there are many people in later life who feel that they have a lot to offer, but they are somewhat detached. I don’t think we take enough opportunities to capitalize on that knowledge and skills base of older people. This can be done through formal ways such as skills exchanges, but of course also by creating environments where all generations can work collaboratively together.

Dr Nesterova: I agree with the message of building intergenerational learning environments and partnerships where people can work together and learn from each other. I would also add the context to action. Young people have lots of ideas and they want to implement them. But as a researcher, I want to stress the importance of rigorous research and how important it is to understand what is happening in a specific context. Along with intergenerational sharing, learning and partnerships, research is critical. And we should not disregard it because it takes a long time or because findings may go against what we believe.

Professor Osborne: I would like to add to this thought. Maintaining a critical capacity is becoming more and more important these days, where we are getting multiple sources of information. It is only too easy to believe what you might read on the internet. I beg people to think quite hard before they make decisions based on what they read and interrogate the sources. I still believe that academic research-led information is likely to be the best. I hope we have learnt that through the COVID-19 crisis. The same applies to climate change. COP26 took place last year in Glasgow, virtually behind my office, and crucial decisions had to be made the future. We do have to believe someone. And if you are to believe anyone, believe your professors.

Michael OSOBORNE is Professor of Adult and Lifelong Learning at the University of Glasgow, and Director of the Centre for Research and Development in Adult and Lifelong Learning within the School of Education. He is also the European Director of the PASCAL Observatory on Place Management, Social Capital and Lifelong Learning and one of the core members of the Lower to Middle Income Countries research group at the university. He is a Co-I within the ESRC funded Urban Big Data Centre within which he has worked projects concerned with education, place and disadvantage, and on learning city metrics. He has been PI of the British Academy GCRF funded Strengthening Urban Engagement of Universities in Africa and Asia project. He is also Co-I within the UKRI GCRF funded Global Centre for Sustainable, Healthy Learning Cities and Neighbourhoods.

Dr Yulia NESTEROVA is Research Fellow in Education and International Development at the University of Glasgow. Her research interests centre around inequalities and injustices in education and partnerships and community/youth engagement for quality education and learning, peace and justice. She is working on a large project investigating spatial inequalities in education and health in 14 cities in seven countries across Africa and Asia, led by the GCRF Centre for Sustainable, Healthy and Learning Cities and Neighbourhoods (SHLC). Dr Nesterova is also leading and co-leading a number of other international projects, including a project with UNESCO IIEP exploring how cities in the global south work towards achieving SDG4 and a British Academy-funded project on community-driven approaches to building peaceful societies. Prior to joining University of Glasgow, she worked as a consultant for UNESCO. She has conducted research in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Pacific

Ms Dhruti CHAKRAVARTHI has recently completed a Fellowship at Stanford University in effective altruism and applied compassion. She graduated from the University of Edinburgh with an MA (Hons) in Sustainable Development and Social Anthropology. With a keen interest in the intersections of international development and applied altruism, she recently worked with The Economist as a climate expert for their schools’ outreach programme leading up to COP 26 in Glasgow.

NOTE:
The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely by the author(s) and do not represent that of the Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF)​.
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