February 28 – 4 March was SDG Action and Awareness Week, a campaign hosted by the United Nations Academic Impact organisation. As part of this week, the University presented a talk: The power of partnership: SDG 17 and university partnerships to achieve the goals.

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are the world’s call to action on the most pressing challenges and opportunities facing humanity and the natural world. Universities around the world play a key role in developing partnerships to address the SDGs. The University of Manchester currently leads the world for impact on the SDGs. Like other universities we have significant local, national and global partnerships and we would like to use these to prompt conversation about how university partnerships help our sector to tackle global development challenges.

We started this by hosting a discussion on partnership. The event featured:

• a local partnership from our pioneering BeeWell project featuring Professor Neil Humphrey
• a national partnership from The Productivity Institute featuring Nicola Pike
• a global partnership discussing our work with the Association of Commonwealth Universities featuring our Queen Elizabeth Scholar, Bright Amanful.

We finished with an open invitation for organisations around the world to partner with us in addressing the SDGs through our University Living Labs initiative, featuring its originator Jennifer O’Brien PFHEA.

On Thursday 3 March we also invited everyone to join our social media campaign, tagging partnerships that have helped address the global goals. You can continue get involved in the social media campaign, here.

• Watch the recording of our event, here.

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are the world’s call to action on the most pressing challenges and opportunities facing humanity and the natural world. 28 February – 4 March is SDG Action and Awareness Week, a campaign hosted by the United Nations Academic Impact organisation. As part of this week, we will be delivering a talk: The power of partnership: SDG 17 and university partnerships to achieve the goals, which will take place on Friday 4 March at 11am-12pm (GMT).

The talk – open to anyone interested in the SDGs, higher education, or even just partnerships more generally – will be available to watch live on YouTube.

Universities around the world play a key role in developing partnerships to address all of the SDGs. The University of Manchester currently leads the world for impact on the SDGs. Like other universities we have significant local, national and global partnerships and through this event we intend use these to prompt conversation about how university partnerships help our sector to tackle global development challenges.

The event will feature a local partnership from our pioneering BeeWell project; a national partnership from our UK Productivity Institute; and a global partnership discussing our work with the Association of Commonwealth Universities. We will then finish with an open invitation for organisations around the world to partner with us in addressing the SDGs through our University Living Labs initiative.

On Thursday 3 March we are also inviting everyone to join our social media campaign, tagging partnerships that have helped you/your organisation to address the global goals.

• Follow @socialresponuom on Twitter to get involved in our social media campaign.
• Watch the event live on Friday 4 March 11am or view any time after at your own convenience, here.