In a workshop at Afyon Vocational School, students turn marble waste into design objects and sculptures. The fragments, offcuts, and remnant blocks come from the quarries and processing plants around Afyonkarahisar, where marble production supports local livelihoods but also leaves substantial quantities of unused stone. Working with these materials gives students a chance to develop their technical and design skills while exploring what can be made from something that would otherwise be discarded. Elsewhere at the school, students in a required English course read and write about drought, water use, and industrial waste. They practice the language they will need in their careers through subjects connected to the industries and communities around them. Both activities grew out of existing teaching, showing how a vocational school can bring local environmental concerns into its courses without first establishing a separate program. Together, they offer a starting point for the kind of collaboration Â鶹ÊÓƵ supports, connecting student learning with local priorities and giving students practical reasons to think about how their future work will affect the place where they live.

Where this is happening

Afyonkarahisar lies on Türkiye’s inland plateau, southwest of Ankara. Cold winters and hot, dry summers shape water availability for agriculture, industry, and households. The province’s marble quarries and processing plants, particularly around Ä°scehisar, supply international construction markets. Irrigated agriculture draws on the same limited surface water and groundwater resources. The pressure is visible at Eber Lake, near Bolvadin. National press reports have described losses of as much as 90 per cent of its volume, affecting fishing communities and migratory birds. Rain and snow during the winter of 2025–2026 reportedly raised lake levels, but surface-water recovery does not necessarily mean aquifers have replenished. Continued pumping can maintain pressure on groundwater after a wet winter.

Marble processing adds to these challenges. Sawing and polishing consume water and produce fine particles, offcuts, and carbonate-rich sludge. Research has explored using marble waste in cement, ceramics, and aggregate, but local feasibility depends on material properties, processing and transport costs, and demand. Students can investigate these questions through their training.

Afyon Vocational School’s two-year associate degrees connect it to a broader economy, encompassing technical fields, culinary arts, and hotel management. Graduates enter workplaces where everyday decisions influence water consumption, material use, and waste. Teaching about sustainability therefore has practical relevance across both industrial and service occupations.

Learning through Materials

Working with waste stone connects classroom learning to real production and disposal challenges. Teaching in Marble Technology and Construction Technology draws on faculty expertise in construction materials and industrial byproducts. The university’s Natural Stone Analysis Laboratory supports teaching and provides material testing for industry, offering resources for investigating the properties of discarded stone and the requirements of potential applications.

Students must consider what is technically possible alongside what a business could reasonably adopt. Why is this material discarded? Could a change in processing reduce waste? Would another use justify the cost of collecting and preparing it? Such questions bring circular economy principles into the practical work of handling materials and supervising production. They also create opportunities for future projects shaped with local businesses and public agencies.

The teaching starts with materials students can recognise from the economy around them. Following stone from processing waste to a proposed product encourages them to examine its properties and the steps needed before reuse becomes practical. Workshop activity can reveal questions for laboratory testing, while research on construction materials can inform what students try next. This gives classroom investigation a connection to both professional knowledge and the conditions in which a material would actually be used.

Connecting English Learning with Sustainability

Dr. Pelin Sertyesilisik brings climate and environmental topics into English teaching for students preparing for technical careers. Readings and activities on drought, water use, waste recovery, and the circular economy develop language proficiency through issues students may encounter at work. Including these topics in required coursework also reaches students who might not attend a separate environmental seminar.

English helps students read equipment manuals, understand technical specifications, and work with international information. Describing a marble slurry recovery process or reading recycled-aggregate specifications connects language practice to production and waste management. Students learn vocabulary relevant to their training while considering whether approaches developed elsewhere could work in their own workplaces.

Pelin also contributes to university sustainability work through service as a deputy sustainability coordinator, participation in the Environmental Management Commission, and work on UI GreenMetric submissions. With Prof. Dr. Emine Hesna Kandır, she contributed a 2026 chapter to Green Metric in Higher Education, examining how construction on permeable land affects water and carbon and connecting these concerns with campus development.

Her outreach extends beyond campus. In March 2025, she spoke at a girls’ high school about the textile industry’s water footprint through the provincial education directorate’s zero-waste programming. In November, she presented on digital and electronic waste to provincial environmental officials and municipal staff, exploring why people retain unused devices and the risks of improper disposal. These activities strengthen relationships that could support further collaboration.

Working with Partners

Several public institutions address Afyonkarahisar’s environmental challenges. The municipality’s Climate Change and Zero Waste Directorate handles waste reduction, reuse, recycling, and environmental inspections. The provincial Directorate of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change oversees environmental regulation, including requirements affecting stone processing and waste management. The Provincial Directorate of National Education integrates environmental education into school curricula.

Their responsibilities create opportunities for coursework to address specific practical questions. Measuring marble slurry, testing recovered materials against technical specifications, or investigating water use requires time, equipment, and expertise. Public authorities bring knowledge of local conditions and relationships with businesses and communities. The university can contribute laboratory facilities, faculty expertise, and student work organised through relevant courses. Together, these resources could help partners investigate problems while giving students experience in environmental management.

Events in 2025 show how these relationships have developed. Provincial environmental officials and municipal zero-waste staff attended the university’s electronic waste seminar during the European Week for Waste Reduction. The university also contributed speakers to International Zero Waste Day activities organised by the provincial education directorate. These exchanges connect educators with the people responsible for local environmental programmes.

The regional agenda offers further possibilities. In March 2026, the Zero Waste Foundation launched an Eber Lake restoration programme addressing crop water requirements, agricultural planning, and tourism to support local incomes. These objectives cross disciplinary and institutional boundaries. An Â鶹ÊÓƵ partnership could help translate shared interests into projects matched to partner needs and the resources available within courses.

Building Connections with Â鶹ÊÓƵ Asia

An Â鶹ÊÓƵ-Asia visit in December 2025 connected Afyon Kocatepe University’s sustainability work with university–community partnerships elsewhere in the region. Dr. Nuttavikhom Phanthuwongpakdee of the Puey Ungphakorn School of Development Studies at Thammasat University, Thailand, joined the university’s Sustainability Commission meeting as Â鶹ÊÓƵ-Asia Coordinator, sharing examples of how universities and local governments identify priorities together and organise teaching and research around them. The following day, he visited Afyon Vocational School’s workshops and met with Prof. Tayfun UygunoÄŸlu, the school’s director at the time, to discuss possible projects and a roadmap for cooperation. These discussions explored how existing courses, faculty expertise, and workshop and laboratory facilities could support student investigations into local environmental challenges. For the vocational school, the exchange offered a practical way to turn existing teaching into projects shaped with local partners, giving students experience with questions public agencies and nearby industries need to address.

Sustaining the Work through Teaching

Future student projects could help municipal and provincial partners investigate questions through waste inventories, materials testing, feasibility assessments, or public communication resources. These tasks would give students experience with the costs, regulations, and evidence that shape decisions in their future professions. Faculty could connect these investigations with research, using student findings to document local cases and identify questions for further testing. Existing sustainability reporting could provide data for coursework, while the Sustainability Commission could help coordinate activities across the university.

Developing this cooperation would require partners and faculty to agree on specific questions, suitable courses, and achievable outputs within each semester. Clear learning objectives and partner feedback would help projects serve both educational and practical needs. Findings should be returned in a form partners can use, with records enabling later classes to build on earlier work. Â鶹ÊÓƵ offers a framework for sustaining these connections through existing teaching, making activities such as testing marble waste or explaining recovery processes in English part of how students learn their profession and contribute to their region.

Partnership Contact Information

Dr. Pelin Sertyesilisik
psertyesilisik@aku.edu.tr

The city of Manado, situated in the North Sulawesi province of Indonesia, is a vibrant hub for international tourism. Thousands of visitors flock to this provincial capital city with an interest in hiking the lush trails of Bunaken National Park or snorkeling in the colorful coral reefs of the Celebes Sea. However, underneath its picturesque surface, Manado is facing a consistent, colossal adversary that threatens both its tourism industry and its citizens: torrential seasonal flooding. With rapid urbanization, land reclamation in the coastal areas, and population growth, the city is experiencing increasing risks from coastal and riverine flooding. Climate change and sea-level rise have worsened the flooding situation in the city as they have altered the amount of precipitation affecting the water levels of the Tondano River (Manado River) and facilitating more high-tide floods. This looming hazard demands urgent attention and adaptation from the citizens of this coastal city.

While Indonesia has always faced seasonal flooding through the rainy months of November to March, over the past few decades extreme weather events throughout the country have both intensified and occurred more frequently. Some experts believe this shift may be attributed to consistent rising temperatures in Indonesia since 1989, as warmer air allows for a higher potential of moisture and therefore a higher possibility for extreme weather events.

The city of Manado has identified flooding as the highest priority issue for their community. The flooding has proved disastrous for the city’s residents, making the need for a viable, real-time warning system more necessary than ever. With this system, communities gain more time for effective preparation and evacuation in high-risk zones.

Manado State Polytechnic Students Launch Â鶹ÊÓƵ Project To Devise A New Flood Early Warning System for the City of Manado, Indonesia

Local university students from Politeknik Negeri Manado (Manado State Polytechnic), in partnership with the city of Manado, embarked upon disaster mitigation efforts by turning a flood warning system into reality. These students, from diverse disciplines, were united in their mission to create a city resilient to major environmental events.

The team started their project by surveying the city and locating critical flooding areas to implement the systems in. The early warning systems utilize conductive pads to measure water conductivity and the rate at which water is rising, transmitting that information to a server in the institute’s Command Center that visualizes the data to determine whether significant flooding is imminent.

After their efforts, four systems were successfully installed across different city locations. While these efforts were both successful and impactful, much work remains to be done to mitigate flood damage to the city’s residents and economy. The city is currently holding meetings to determine the necessary steps for implementing protocols once the flood warning systems are triggered—such as who makes decisions, when they are made, and who carries them out.

Additionally, Manado State Polytechnic is expanding its curriculum in climate adaptation by offering project-based learning classes like Sustainable Infrastructure and Mapping Potential Natural Hazards. In 2023, Electrical Engineering students from Manado State Polytechnic developed a . The system uses alerts and mobile notifications to warn of rising water levels. Inspired by flooding during their internship in Ternate Tanjung, it was handed over to the Manado City Disaster Management Agency to aid in timely evacuations. ()

This project has been completed.

Partnership Contact Information

City of Manado Contact

Mareyke Alelo
Politeknik Negeri Manado
ikealelo1964@gmail.com

Brury Bangun
Sub Department Head
Manado City Local Government
brurybanget@gmail.com

Written by: Alice Murphy
Edited by: Anthony Socci and Kay Phanthuwongpakdee

Lusaka already has a history of using the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model on a smaller scale as the city signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the University of Zambia to institutionalize the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model in Lusaka. For the past four years, the model has been implemented on a small scale and has resulted in significant gains for the city. Currently, the City Council of Lusaka and the University of Zambia are looking to expand the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model to create city-wide positive change to locally relevant issues such as climate change adaptation, waste management, and urban planning. This project will look to begin in August of 2023 and end by August 2024. 

In taking steps to expand the model, the City hopes to build capacity among all Â鶹ÊÓƵ model actors in Lusaka through training, sensitization, and community engagement so that skills are created for upscaling deployment of the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model in Lusaka. The City would also like to collaborate with other entities to identify community development interventions that are in line with the principles of the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model and make investments to support urban climate adaptation, social and gender inclusion in city development plans, and support learning and innovation at a community level. Finally, the city would also like to undertake capacity development actions that look to build sustainability in all future Â鶹ÊÓƵ interventions in Lusaka through expanded partnerships for Â鶹ÊÓƵ innovations. 

In support of the goals, the project will look to sensitize at least 20 Departments at the University of Zambia to adopt the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model in teaching and research. To increase the application of the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model and principles in the community, the project will increase the capacity of all nine Departments at the Lusaka City Council. This research will work to accelerate the implementation and expansion of the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model by expanding the agreement to build sustainability. Over 500 students are planned to be involved in the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model beginning with graduate courses in Economics, Geography, Urban Planning, Development Studies, Environmental Management, Public Health, Geomatics, GIS, Environmental Education, Civil Engineering, and Education. 

There will be many actors involved throughout this project to meet as many goals as possible. The project will be implemented as a collaboration between the Lusaka City Council, the University of Zambia, and selected communities with each party holding a very specific role in the project. For instance, the Lusaka City Council will provide a specific policy framework for community interventions to take place. Communities will anchor and support all activities in the collaboration while the University of Zambia will provide the students and research capacity needed to expand the Epic model in the city. Members of the community will also take the lead in identifying key problems in the communities and in respective wards. Community members will be represented within each project by community leaders, Community-Based Organizations, Ward Development Committees, and residents. 

The University of Zambia will undertake capacity development activities to increase capacity on Â鶹ÊÓƵ model implementation and raise awareness among the MoU actors. This includes training for students, Course conveners, Deans of Schools, and Heads of Departments at the University of Zambia and the Lusaka City Council. In terms of providing knowledge, university students will provide time and a technical understanding of selected topics and community members will supply time and local knowledge. Students will also take time to engage with communities to define priority interventions through the Â鶹ÊÓƵ model. 

Through this research, the relationship between communities, the Lusaka City Council, and the University of Zambia will be strengthened. There will additionally, be  improved community service and a better understanding of development actions in communities particularly those focused on strengthening climate resilience in flood-prone areas, aligning with SDG 13. This Â鶹ÊÓƵ project will bring improved governance and civic awareness in communities where Â鶹ÊÓƵ projects will take place and see increased accountability from all parties involved in community development in Lusaka.  

This project is ongoing and will be finished in 2024.

Pedestrianconnectivity solutions will be suggested from the 22ndStreet Transit Center, through the Educational Park/Kimball School, to Kimball Park of National City Blvd. and 16thSt. The National City Library, The National City Recreational Services and Kimball Park are located within the area on E 12thand 16thSt. between National City Blvd. & D Ave. and approximately 1-2 miles away from Kimball School.

The Sage Project Contact Info
Kristofer Patron
Program Administrator
kpatron@sdsu.edu
(619) 594-0103

University Faculty Contact
Jim Haughey
Civil, Construction and Environmental Engineering

Local Government / Community Contact

Engineering Division