Throwback to the Spark Social Programme Experience With Four Students From Universitat Rovira i Virgili

Last spring, four students from Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV) travelled to Reykjavik, Iceland, to co-create solutions to global challenges related to educational innovation and digital sustainability. 

From left to right: Natalia Rodríguez, Laia Daura, Mireia Mei and Ruth Prats, during their visit to Reykjavík, Iceland

Promoting Transdisciplinarity Within The Spark Social Programme

Every year, the University of Iceland organises Spark Social, an Erasmus+ Blended Intensive Programme (BIP), offered to students from Aurora universities across Europe. The objective of this blended programme is to gather Masters to third-year Bachelor students under one roof, to co-create social entrepreneurship projects that respond to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Four students were selected from URV to be part of the programme:

• Mireia Mei, student in the Interuniversity Master’s Degree in Health Data Science
• Ruth Prats, student of the Bachelor’s Degree in Advertising and Public Relations
• Laia Daura, student of the Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology
• Natalia Rodríguez, student of the Bachelor’s Degree in Audiovisual Communication and Bachelor’s Degree in Advertising and Public Relations.

A Blended Programme Fostering Creative Solutions

After several virtual sessions between January and April 2025, the programme culminated in a five-day stay in Reykjavik, Iceland, where the teams worked to define and test solutions to real challenges. The methodology used was a combination of transitional thinking and design thinking, which fosters creative solutions to complex societal problems, social innovation through empathy, collaboration and prototyping, and in this case, international and interdisciplinary teamwork.  

GEN NEXT: Education for a new generation of active citizenship 

Natalia Rodríguez and Ruth Prats were part of the team that created GEN NEXT, an educational project focused on motivating adolescents between the ages of 12 and 15 through critical thinking to become active in the local community. Using a card game called A Can of Worms, young people explore different issues such as the environment, health and urban culture, and propose actions to improve their city. The project is completed with field research, urban observation and participation in municipal budgets, all fostering a culture of responsibility and real civic engagement. 

aqua.ai: Making visible the invisible impact of AI 

For their part, Mireia Mei and Laia Daura worked on the aqua.ai project, a proposal that addresses the environmental impact of technology. Focusing on the hidden water consumption of artificial intelligence systems, the project aims to develop an environmental awareness-raising package for governments, schools and institutions. This includes a browser extension that quantifies the water impact of digital queries, as well as educational materials on the subject. The objective of the project is to inform citizens and encourage change in the design of sustainable digital public policies to ensure that technological innovation does not work against the planet.