Shape The World Summit 2020 - Global Education 4.0 for Inclusion and Sustainability

A 2-day creative summit in Kaohsiung from 19-20 June to gather leaders and educators to rethink the methods of education, to innovate and redesign our education systems in order to build a more inclusive and sustainable world.

As the fourth industrial revolution threatens to blur the lines between the biological, digital, and physical aspects of the world around us, the new generation of leaders need to be prepared with a whole new set of skills and competencies. But more importantly, they need to be nurtured to become “proponents of the common good, creative and responsible leaders in social and civil life, with a proper vision of the person and the world” as quoted from Pope Francis. There is an urgent need to reshape our education systems, to ideate and innovate new approaches that will ensure a generation of future leaders with the vision of shaping the world inclusively and sustainably.

This is where design thinking as an approach can be used to redesign our current systems. What started as an approach to shape better user experiences, has in recent times proven an effective tool for social innovation and creating systemic changes. As a method that is human-centered, with strong emphasis on developing an empathetic understanding of people, as well as the interrelated dynamics and relationships surrounding an issue, design thinking has the potential to push boundaries and unite stakeholders in creating solutions that can systematically build a more inclusive and sustainable future.

In this context, the Shape the World Summit 2020 will convene over 300 diverse stakeholders at the Wenzao Ursuline University of Languages from 19-20th June in Kaohsiung. Jointly organized by Consulus and Wenzao Ursuline University of Languages, it will bring together a diverse group of stakeholders from business leaders, politicians, civil servants, religious leaders, educators to youths and students. Participants will come from 17 countries, including the US, Italy, Brazil, Singapore, Vietnam and Sri Lanka. The summit will use a design thinking approach to uncover the current challenges, issues and problems in today’s education approaches and to discover new methods of education that will help shape a more inclusive economic system and sustainable future.

The two-day summit will adopt the 4-frames method (Frame, Condition, Engagement, Takeaway). The morning plenary sessions will identify issues, user-needs, identify conditions for new ways of intervention, and what should be the ideal takeaway for leaders who will shape the future.

Then afternoon sessions will consist of design labs to engage participants in the design thinking process to define the possible approaches on the issues discussed in the morning.