Towards a sustainable smart cities integration in teaching and research

Abstract

The urban population growth and rapid urbanization are the key issues many of the European cities are currently dealing with. Vienna, as the one of the leading cities, embodies the smart cities goals and values. The new Smart City Wien Framework Strategy is more than a technological approach, furthermore, it emphasises importance of the social innovation. Nevertheless, the strategy lacks concrete goals for academic research and smart cities integration into educational programs. Little to no academic research discusses smart cities oriented study programs. This paper aims to close existing gap and proposes exemplary practical approach to integrate smart cities concepts at the academic level. Starting with the basic evaluation of the existing smart cities relevant study programs in the European area, we elaborate three interacting tracks for implementation: educational Web platform, postgraduate program and cross-departmental study programs including student projects. A practical, professional field-oriented and diversity-fair approach is chosen. The paper describes the status quo of the implementation process and in particular a cross-departmental study program. This exemplary implementation concept of smart cities may serve as a basis for universities with practice-oriented education to utilize own smart cities related studies.