Engaged UniBE – Transdisciplinary Projects for Sustainable Development

Funding for transdisciplinary climate protection projects in the Bern region

 
Requirements The project must involve both a societal player and a university member. It may not be part of an existing project and must start on 1 July 2025.
Eligibility Researchers, lecturers and/or students at the ÅÝܽ¶ÌÊÓƵ.
Funding amount
 Up to CHF 100,000 per year, for a maximum of 3 years.
Scope Salary, materials, and third-party services.
Deadline

30 April 2025: Submission of project idea
15 June 2025: Submission of final project application

There is one submission deadline per year.

The ÅÝܽ¶ÌÊÓƵ promotes transdisciplinary approaches as a contribution to researching and solving complex sustainability issues. This call seeks projects that apply transdisciplinary methods to advance sustainable development. Projects should align with the goals of the ÅÝܽ¶ÌÊÓƵ’s , currently in development, and work collaboratively with societal players to test and establish new formats and platforms.

– a sub-project of the Roadmap – aims to support societal transformation through innovative, forward-looking transdisciplinary formats. You can find out more about the objectives (in German).

Principles

The Vice-Rectorate Quality and Sustainable Development at the ÅÝܽ¶ÌÊÓƵ is calling for projects that are aligned with the Roadmap Climate 2030. Innovative projects that use transdisciplinary methods to promote climate protection and engage societal players in the Bern region in new and effective ways are sought.

Eligible projects include, among others:

  • Social innovations for sustainability transformations
  • Research-based implementation projects for greenhouse gas reduction
  • Climate impact projects or climate impact adaptation projects
  • Living labs or real-world experiments
  • Capacity development for early-career researchers
  • Development and implementation of transdisciplinary teaching formats
  • Innovative formats for dialog between politicians and civil society

Projects with a duration of at least 1 and a maximum of 3 years can be funded. The maximum funding amount per project and year is CHF 100,000.

Application

Submission deadline for project ideas: 30 April 2025

Provision of a binding commitment (subject to the recommendations of the evaluation panel being implemented by 15 June 2025): 20 May 2025

Submission deadline for final project applications: 15 June 2025

Project start: 1 July 2025

Please complete the form below and submit it online or by email.

Evaluation

Details on the evaluation process and the evaluation criteria can be found in the call document (see "Principles" tab). Please note that the criteria are weighted slightly differently for student projects.

The evaluation committee of the Engaged UniBE call consists of people with expertise in the field of climate protection and transdisciplinarity.

  • Prof. Dr. Heike Mayer (Vice-Rectorate Quality and Sustainable Development, UniBE; Chair)
  • Ms. Simone Rieder (Office for Sustainable Development, UniBE)
  • Dr. (scaling4good)
  • Prof. Dr. (Institute of Political Science and President of the Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research, UniBE)