Learning-to-be-Green: Focus on sustainability and digital transformation

Can green entrepreneurship be learnt more effectively with the help of chatbots? What do innovative, digital teaching and learning scenarios and modern learning materials look like today, and how do you create a sustainable learning environment?

The research project “Learning-to-be-Green” (L2BGreen for short), funded by the European Commission, aims to find the right answers to these and other questions relating to digital transformation. As part of a consortium with ten participating organisations, led by the University of Twente (Netherlands), the Institute of Digital Technology Management IDTM at BFH Business is developing an innovative digital teaching and learning platform that will use artificial intelligence (e.g. a dialogue-based chatbot) to raise awareness and impart skills for sustainable and green entrepreneurship to a broad audience.

The L2BGreen consortium (see Figure 1) is a collaboration of universities, companies and other education providers from the vocational training sector, thus promoting interdisciplinary cooperation across different areas.

Figure 1: Overview of the L2BGreen consortium

Capitalising on the twin transition

Most European economies are currently in the midst of a so-called “twin transition”, which is having a major impact on the economic, societal and social lives of citizens (Joint Research Centre, 2022). The twin transition refers to the parallel development of sustainability and digitalisation, whereby both transformations can reinforce and promote each other. This concept plays a central role in shaping a sustainable economy and society. A typical example of the twin transition is the embedding of digital technologies in analogue products, which enables a wide range of data-based services, e.g. to promote sustainable energy management or optimised resource consumption (Raff et.al, 2020). The L2BGreen project sees this transition as an opportunity to better anchor both strands (i.e. sustainability and digitalisation) in social life and thus contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) of the United Nations. The activities associated with L2BGreen directly support SDG 4 (quality education) and also contribute to SDG 12 (responsible consumption and production), SDG 9 (industry, innovation and infrastructure) and other goals.

Promoting the sustainability transformation

In order to promote a better integration of green entrepreneurship especially in the EU economic framework, the consortium of seven different countries is developing a digital, multilingual learning platform to enable professionals and students in Europe to train their knowledge and skills in the field of environmental and economic sustainability and digital affinity. This will significantly facilitate broad access to up-to-date knowledge and practical skills in the interplay of sustainability and entrepreneurship, especially for first-time founders. The project thus not only promotes sustainability transformation through training in green entrepreneurship, participants also learn to analyse existing business models in terms of their environmental impact and to develop more sustainable solutions.

AI-supported learning

The project aims to develop innovative and scalable approaches to make the learning process efficient and interactive. As a core element, an online course is to be developed in which a dialogue-based agent (aka chatbot) interactively guides learners through the processing of a learning module and at the same time provides helpful feedback in the individual learning process (more information on dialogue-based pedagogical agents in Weber et al. 2021). This (digital) learning process is in turn crucial for the successful promotion of sustainability transformation.

In order to make the chatbot adaptive, a Large Language Model (LLM) such as OpenAI’s GPT4 is trained with suitable information and learning content and precisely aligned with so-called “prompt engineering” to provide the various learners with precise answers and a learning-promoting environment.

The didactic design of the AI-supported chatbot is crucial for the success of the learning platform (Wambsganss et al. 2024). The chatbot can take on various roles in the learning process, such as (i) as a tutor (here the bot offers direct support and answers learners’ questions, as in Wambsganss et al. 2021), (ii) as a discussion partner (here it encourages critical reflection through controversial topics) or (iii) as a feedback provider (a bot that gives learners feedback on their learning progress). An example of the dialogue process is shown in Figure 2.

Figure 2: Outlined dialogue structure of the L2BGreen chatbot

Green Entrepreneurship

The development of the learning content used in the online course and chatbot is the key task of the team at Bern University of Applied Sciences. The focus is on learning skills for sustainable business. Existing and widely used EU frameworks such as GreenComp and EntreComp will be integrated for this purpose. GreenComp provides a comprehensive framework for competences in the field of sustainability, while EntreComp focuses on entrepreneurial skills. Examples of overlap between the two approaches include sustainable business strategies and entrepreneurial and systemic thinking.

The project will integrate the results of completed EU projects on green entrepreneurship, such as the Green Entrepreneurship Training – Get Up project. Get Up aimed to provide a comprehensive understanding of the green economy as a system and to introduce participants to the basics of green entrepreneurship. The learning objectives developed (see list) flow directly into the development of our learning materials.

1. Understanding the green economy: To provide a systematic understanding of the green economy.
2. Introduction to Green Entrepreneurship: Fundamentals and principles of green business practices.
3. Creativity and innovation: Fostering creative and innovative solutions in an environmental context.
4. Personal Entrepreneurial Skills: Development of skills and behaviours, including SWOT analyses and opportunity identification.
5. Identification of business opportunities: Recognising and convincingly presenting new business opportunities in the green sector.
6. Marketing awareness: Raising awareness of the importance of appropriate marketing to raise the profile of green businesses.
7. Financial management: Understanding funding sources, grants and investment opportunities.
8. Leadership and management: Sustainable business leadership and effective management of employees in green businesses.

In order to provide a meaningful learning experience for participants with a practical orientation, the content of the online course will be organised on a case-based basis, i.e. the learning materials will be based on real or simulated business models that are linked to sustainability concepts. One of the key questions for learners is: How can you make the activities at company XY more sustainable? In addition to applied factual knowledge, attitudes and behaviour should also be developed. Attitudes are discussed through controversial discussions with the chatbot, while behavioural changes are addressed through self-reflection. Here too, the didactic design of the chatbot contributes directly to the learning success.

Project status: Learning material and interaction design are being developed at BFH

L2BGreen is funded by the European Commission and has a project duration from April 2024 to March 2027. The research consortium is led by the University of Twente (Netherlands) and spans various European countries such as Estonia, Germany, Austria and Greece.

BFH and Saarland University are currently working intensively on the design of the interaction of chatbots with learners. At the same time, BFH is collecting learning materials on the topic of green entrepreneurship.

The innovative methods are supported by the expertise of the Institute for Digital Technology Management at BFH, which has extensive skills in the areas of digital responsibility and AI-based learning, specifically represented by the Digital Responsibility and Human-Centered AI-Based Learning Lab specialist groups.

We are always open to enquiries, suggestions and input, whether general to the project or specific to green entrepreneurship and AI in education. Collaboration to promote additional practical relevance would be of particular interest. Further details on the project can be found on the BFH or L2BGreen websites.

References

1. Joint Research Centre (2022). The twin green & digital transition: How sustainable digital technologies could enable a carbon-neutral EU by 2050. available at: https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/jrc-news-and-updates/twin-green-digital-transition-how-sustainable-digital-technologies-could-enable-carbon-neutral-eu-2022-06-29_en
2. Raff, S., Wentzel, D., & Obwegeser, N. (2020). Smart products: conceptual review, synthesis, and research directions. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 37(5), 379-404.
3. Wambsganss, T., Kueng, T., Soellner, M., & Leimeister, J. M. (2021). ArgueTutor: An adaptive dialogue-based learning system for argumentation skills. In Proceedings of the 2021 CHI conference on human factors in computing systems (pp. 1-13).
4. Wambsganss, T., Janson, A., Söllner, M., Koedinger, K., & Leimeister, J. M. (2024). Improving Students’ Argumentation Skills Using Dynamic Machine-Learning-Based Modelling. Information Systems Research.
5. Weber, F., Wambsganss, T., Rüttimann, D., & Söllner, M. (2021). Pedagogical Agents for Interactive Learning: A Taxonomy of Conversational Agents in Education. In Proceedings of International Conference on Information Systems, Austin, Texas.