By Heidi Singer
Five scholars from diverse fields across the University of Toronto will be the first to join a think tank focussed on “convergence research” to study the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
On April 16, they became Fellows in the SDGs Scholars Academy. The Academy is part of SDGs@UofT. This Institutional Strategic Initiative brings together faculty, students and staff whose research interests are focused on the intersections of the 17 goals that serve as a blueprint for peace and prosperity.
Prof. Simon Darnell studies the SDGs through the lens of athletics, asking how sport can help to advance development and peace. Over the years, he has come to realize that working exclusively within one field limits his ability to develop policy frameworks for advancing the SDGs through sport -- and making sport more sustainable. He hopes to collaborate with sustainability experts from fields such as Environmental Sciences or Information Technology.
“Convergence research to me means research that is greater than the sum of its parts,” says Darnell, who is Director of the Centre for Sport Policy Studies in the Faculty of Kinesiology and Physical Education. “The SDGs and the sustainability issues facing humanity are so complex and also synthetic that it’s nearly impossible for any one person or discipline to make a serious incursion.”
“Connecting Darnell with researchers from different corners of the University to create novel frameworks is exactly the vision,” says Prof. Erica Di Ruggiero, a global health expert who serves as research director of SDGs@UofT.
“The world’s most wicked problems aren’t going to be solved by people working alone on one or two goals within one or two disciplines,” adds Di Ruggiero, who directs the Centre for Global Health at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health. “When you bring together a diversity of experts with deep discipline knowledge, suddenly you can go broad – addressing four or five of the SDGs at once and learning so much from this nexus.”
Di Ruggiero points out that not every academic researcher is committed to advancing the current SDGs. Most experts now agree that countries will not meet the 2030 deadline for achieving the targets, which means there is room to improve upon the first set of goals in the next iteration.
Among those Fellows looking toward the future is Prof. Elizabeth Buckner, who studies how global trends affect higher education policies and practices.
“I’m hoping to advance conversations on the SDGs that don’t accept the 17 goals as a static framework or one that is set in stone – but rather ones that also critique the agenda and push it forward,” says Buckner, an OISE faculty member and Canada Research Chair in Higher Education for Sustainable Global Development. “I think one of our jobs as academics is to think about in what ways the SDGs both advance global development and also may limit other possibilities.”
Buckner was drawn to the Scholars Academy out of a desire to translate academic knowledge into practical change. Coming from a multi-disciplinary field such as education, she has seen that individual disciplines are effective at advancing particular theories and methods. “But when we actually want to explain multi-faceted and real-world phenomena, we often find that multiple disciplines and perspectives are needed,” she says.
The Scholars Academy is necessary, Buckner says, because convergence doesn’t happen organically in academia.
“The way professors are trained in graduate schools, the way we are incentivized in our careers, and the way we are judged by our peers inside and outside the academy all emphasize niche specialization,” she says. “Scholars in two different faculties may be studying the exact same topic from two different disciplinary perspectives, and have no incentive or reason to read each other’s work – much less collaborate.”
Prof. Matt Ratto’s interest in barrier-breaking research developed during years of fieldwork helping to create medical prosthetics in countries such as Uganda, Tanzania, and Cambodia. Although his mission was highly technical – providing software and hardware for the digital fabrication of orthotics such as limbs – Ratto came to realize that social, cultural, and environmental contexts were critical to the project’s success.
“SDGs in their intersectionality provide a lens for thinking through productive social change, not simply as ‘technical’ or ‘policy’ intervention, but from a more holistic lens,” says Ratto, the associate dean of research at the Faculty of Information (iSchool).
“The launch of the SDGs Scholars Academy reaffirms our commitment to advancing sustainable development and addressing global challenges”, says Prof. Linda Johnston, acting vice-president and principal of U of T Scarborough. “This initiative aligns closely with our strategic priorities, emphasizing convergence and research excellence. The Academy will play a crucial role in fostering innovative solutions and expanding the horizons of knowledge. We are proud to support this endeavour and we look forward to the meaningful contributions our scholars will make in shaping a more sustainable future for all.”
The Academy is guided by four objectives:
- Conduct convergence research that creates evidence to advance the SDGs and inform future global goals
- Empower trainees to conduct convergence research
- Engage with the public through sustainable collaborations and partnerships to advance SDG research
- Mobilize convergence research to inform policy and practice
The first cohort of members also features Asst. Prof. Kaja Jasinska, a developmental cognitive neuroscientist focussing on childhood literacy in OISE’s Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development.
“There are fantastic scholars at U of T whose research on the SDGs leverage different disciplinary perspectives and methods,” says Jasinska. “Joining the Scholars Academy means we can pool our ideas and approaches in a way that isn’t possible in disciplinary silos.”
And it includes Prof. Laura Tozer from U of T Scarborough’s Department of Physical and Environmental Sciences. Tozer’s research seeks to understand how to accelerate action to address the climate crisis by transitioning to renewable energy.
“Solving the sustainability challenges that we face requires that we not only work across disciplines, but that we take community based and policy-engaged approaches,” says Tozer, who has interdisciplinary training in environmental science, geography and environmental studies. “We have to think about ecosystems and poverty and justice alongside climate action or we won’t really solve anything. And we have to be trying to make the change while we study the change.”
Tozer, like other Fellows, was chosen for her demonstrated interest in facilitating convergence research. But there are other ways to get involved with SDGs@UofT. Anyone at the University can apply to become an Affiliate or a member of the Student Advisory Committee.