International Area

Smart cities: the implementation of urban innovation through public - private collaboration

Milton Keynes is one of the fastest growing cities in the UK with a great economic success story. Milton Keynes, the last of the "new towns" in the United Kingdom founded in 1967 to become "the city of dreams", is located about 30 minutes by train from London and is currently the city with the highest population and economic growth rate in the country, and stands out for being at the forefront in the implementation of innovation policies that combine both technological experimentation and the active involvement of others players in the area, from the business sector to research centers.

For instance, MK:Smart is a large collaborative initiative, partly funded by HEFCE (the Higher Education Funding Council for England) and led by The Open University, which is developing innovative solutions to support economic growth in Milton Keynes.

Central to the project is the creation of a state-of-the-art "MK Data Hub" which supports the acquisition and management of vast amounts of data relevant to city systems from a variety of data sources.

These include data about energy and water consumption, transport data, data acquired through satellite technology, social and economic datasets, and crowdsourced data from social media or specialized apps.

One of the major challenges for the administration of Milton Keynes is to balance Smart City solutions with a widespread and low-density urbanization area, as prevalent also in the Veneto Region

In-depth Materials

• Milton Keynes - How we made our city smarter
• Rebuilding economy together
• The Smart City concept in the 21century
• Digital Vision for Mobility

Study visit 2020!

Veneto in Azione still promotes the realization of study visits abroad to encourage the dialogue, the exchange of knowledge and good practices of other international realities, contributing to shape of a community of practice that develops beyond regional borders, generating virtuous processes of growth and development.

The new program of the study visits scheduled for the first semester 2020 is listed below with approximate indication of the development period.

Download the study visit program for 2020

Strengthening of urban business centres through regeneration and social innovation

The study visit was designed to ensure a rapid immersion in the peculiarities of the context, through the discovery of ongoing best practices, the investigation of past initiatives and a direct comparison with actors who are planning future ones.

Barcelona is a city with its unique characteristics considered as one of the smartest. Like all smart cities transform urban spaces through technological innovation, improve quality of life of citizens, and generate business opportunities, increasing possibilities for collaboration, education, recreation.

The initiative has combined different perspectives, sewing together interests for public partners, the economic private and third sector. The experiences analyzed represent cases of strategic value in which new balances and strategies have been tested to create a mutually reinforcing system between private, public and social interests.

It was an opportunity to learn the results of a ten-year course of research, experimentation and continuous innovation, characterized by peculiar features but also by fundamental elements of context, largely comparable to those of the territory with greater urbanization in the Veneto region.

In-depth Materials

• 22@Barcelona's Innovation District
• Poblenou superblock
• Poblenou superblock 2
• Poblenou superblock 3
• Understanding infrastructure interdependencies in cities
• Innovation Barcelona
• Carbon neutrality guidance

The analysis of BIDs as asset of land development and trade

The study visit examined some episodes of importance, integrating with privileged witnesses and creating networks and relationships with local actors.

In particular, the "Business Improvement District" (BIDs), private coordination structures between the owners of properties in certain districts, which act according to entrepreneurial and democratic rules to implement development plans and management of collective assets, have been taken as a reference to enhance the value of the properties and the revenues generated by local businesses.

During the visit, the role of public institutions in the relationship between commercial and urban fabric was analyzed. Furthermore, grassroots projects by local companies and cases of aggregation between operators in the sector were also addressed.

In-depth Materials

• London BIDs handbook
• Evolution of London's BIDs
• BID Guide
• Cross River Partnerships Fortnightly
• Baseline Agreement

Public-private governance models: co-production and co-creation for a new vision of public services and the territory

The study visit is fully integrated into the path of innovation and strengthening of the institutional capacity of public and private stakeholders of Veneto region, since it intends to develop knowledge and skills on innovation in collaborative relationships between the Public Administration, the Third Sector and citizens, through a process of comparison and analysis on the field with some good practices on new models of governance, co-creation of shared value, co-planning, social impact assessment.

The Scotland Community Planning Partnership brings key public, private, community and voluntary representatives together with the aim of delivering better, more joined-up public services in the city.

The Local Government in Scotland Act 2003 sets out guidance to local authorities to facilitate the creation of Community Planning Partnerships in their areas. Community Planning is a process that brings together the public, private, voluntary and third sectors for the benefit of the community, ensuring that the public services are delivered in the most effective way possible.

Communities play a key role in taking forward the Community Planning agenda, both at the local level and across Partnerships as a whole.

In-depth Materials

• Edinburgh partnership community plan 2018-2028
• Community Empowerment Scotland Act
• Poverty in Scotland_2019
• Scotland Social Innovation

The #AugmentedClass

A proposal born from the need to provide teachers with innovative tools for developing student skills. In particular, the student is placed at the center of the educational action in all its aspects and, in this perspective, the proposed activity has developed through a Writing and Reading workshop.

The workshop is intended and structured in a Renaissance sense: students become artisans of writing and are treated as apprentices-writers. The teacher acquires skills to model and bring out practices and behaviors by offering method, strategies and advice to students to make them grow as student-apprentices

In-depth Materials

• Minilessons: writing workshop fundamentals
• Overview of a day's reading or writing workshop
• Structure: writing workshop fundamentals

Relationships for organizations of the future

National Laboratory on Research and Innovation Policies, Business matching, Open Innovation, Diverse Innovative Training

SMAU Milano is the event dedicated to open innovation of reference for all businesses and public and private professionals interested in research and development of products and processes, with more than 250 free workshops on the latest digital trends.

Participants with Veneto in Action heard the best speakers and testimonies on cutting-edge internationalization processes, thus fostering networking actions with innovators and technology pioneers.

The initiative was a precious source of models from which to take inspiration and input and, of partners, associations, suppliers, institutions and stakeholders of the territory with which to face the challenge of change together, as well as providing the opportunity to be key actors in the intersection between demand and supply.

During the experience participants were also conducted in innovative audiovisual virtual reality experience into the heart of Renaissance Milan tracing Leonardo Da Vinci’s steps .

In-depth Materials

• New world. New skills. Upskilling for the digital world: PwC
• VIDEO : Where good ideas come from?
• VIDEO - The Era of Open Innovation
• To make change happen at your organization, here’s the first step to take
• VIDEO : The first 20 hours - how to learn anything | Josh Kaufman | TEDxCSU

The Italian excellence of training in Milan

Innovation in dialogue with Diversity

The study visit focused on offering a knowledge and networking opportunity with the national realities that distinguished themselves in the course of 2018-2019 for highly innovative training models within their organizations.

The day included a meeting with companies that compete for the prestigious Olivetti Prize. In a 15-minute pitch, each company will talk about the training processes has carried out, contributing to innovation and the evolution of skills.

Participants of the study visit had a chance to understand what are the opportunities that education can offer to the development and enhancement of their internal governance and with the relevant stakeholders’ relations.

In addition, they participated in outdoor training experience of "Dialogue in the Dark" with the Italian Blind Association on the theme of diversity and the development of different skills

In-depth Materials

• Diversity, equity and inclusion
• Dialogue in the dark methodology
• This Italian company pioneered innovative startup culture—in the 1930s
• How do you get from diversity to inclusion?

Public-private models of governance: co-production and co-creation for a new vision of public services and the territory

As part of a more general reflection on changes in the models of regulation and the provision of public services through shared management between public and private, thanks also to international testimonies, both theoretical and more practical aspects innovation challenges were addressed, increasingly necessary, in the offer of services that respond to the multiple and complex needs of the territories.

For this very reason, the work during the day focused on specific areas, although attention will also be given to multi-sectoral aspects, typically inherent in these innovative approaches.

In-depth Materials

• The Scottish Strategic Community Planning
• The role of public private partnership and the third sector

Writing and reading workshop for classrooms

In the writing and reading workshop teachers are provided with tools to develop methods and mindsets to learn writing and reading, as if they were professional writers and readers. This model refers to the training model developed by Lucy Calkins of Columbia University who is able to stimulate creativity through these techniques.

The path was both experiential and laboratory: the practice of writing and reading are fundamental in their transversality. Teachers were provided with work tools to bring back to the classroom to help students connect with their classmates and in the reading community

In-depth Materials

• Becoming a Teacher of Writing in Elementary Classrooms - Donna Kalmbach Phillips, Mindy Legard Larson
• Reading Assessment and Instruction for All Learners - Jeanne Shay Schumm
• https://www.educationnext.org/the-lucy-calkins-project/

• https://www.weareteachers.com/what-is-writing-workshop/

STUDY VISIT

“Veneto in Azione – Capitale Umano e Innovazione” promotes the realization of study visits abroad to encourage the dialogue, the exchange of knowledge and good practices of other international realities, contributing to shape of a community of practice that develops beyond regional borders, generating virtuous processes of growth and development.

The program of the study visits scheduled for 2019 is listed below with approximate indication of the development period.

Download the study visit program for 2019

Effective behaviors

Within the theme "Soft Skills essential for individuals and organizations", we propose a path entitled "Effective Behaviors", structured over three days of classroom and opened to all categories of recipients. The three modules of the training are:

• Managing Oneself
• Management of time and personal energy
• Development of negotiating skills

In-depth Materials

• Managing Oneself
• Manage your energy, not your time
• VIDEO: Inside Out - Riley argues with her parents