<< Background >>Climate change is increasingly perceived as the defining challenge of our time as it endangers life and livelihood on our planet. The project is designed to fit in the current context the Green Deal paved the way to, recognizing the central role of universities for a successful transition to becoming climate neutral by 2050. HEIs’ are asked to be protagonists of transition, but not all of them have the skills to do so, and need to be quickly empowered, as the time to act on the climate crisis is getting shorter. The project aims to contribute to boosting and valorizing the central role of HEIs in tackling the 2030 Agenda, the Green Deal objectives, and overall environmental priorities. That will be done at all levels of the academic community, from students, to teaching staff, and to the organizational, systemic level.At the students’ level, the project intends to respond to the need for awareness on the SDGs and Sustainability, and for skills development. Helping students gain leadership skills in sustainability is necessary to ensure proper youth involvement in the transition, and as a tool to empower their career path and opportunities in the rising green jobs area. At the teaching staff level, BRIGHTS responds to the need for new methodologies to help teachers upskill and reskill their didactic modalities, and to deliver content in new stimulating ways, facing a context where education on sustainability is growing higher, and the contents and research on the matter are rapidly evolving, In this sense, the project aims at responding to the necessity for competences in sustainability, developing green skills-oriented methodologies, to meet the needs of individuals. At a systemic and organizational level, BRIGHTS intends to meet the need highlighted by the Green Deal, to empower Universities in their capacity to address the green transition. On this side, it is fundamental that HEIs do get the support in the establishment of a sustainability centre, working as a catalyst of green opportunities and boosting the institutes’ capacity to be involved in sustainability. Fostering the adoption of sustainability criteria and practices at a systemic, centralized level, via the creation of dedicated offices, with a solid international and collaborative perspective, is pivotal to enabling HEIs in responding to the call for action raised by the Green Deal.<< Objectives >>The project aims to contribute to boosting and valorizing the central role of HEIs in tackling the 2030 Agenda, the Green Deal objectives, and overall environmental priorities.Through educational and training activities, the project intends to boost awareness and engagement at multiple levels: from students’ green skills and orientation to the green jobs’ market to systemic change in the participating organizations at all levels through the development of innovative learning and teaching practices.The project also aims to transversally promote students’ active citizenship (e.g. via youth environmental organizations, peers’ interaction, and share of good practices). A solid part of the training activity foreseen in the project (Sustainability Leadership sessions) is also devoted to the development of social and intercultural competences, critical thinking, promoting dialogue, and virtual exchange among partner HEIs’ students with different backgrounds. The training program will be instrumental in sharing, among young generations, the values the European Union is pursuing in the field of sustainability.<< Implementation >>The project foresees:- Five Transnational Project Meetings, hosted by the five partners, plus virtual meetings taking place every month;- A Learning, training and teaching activity: “International workshop on innovative methodologies for sustainability-related training”, a three-day workshop that will gather students, PhD, and teachers from all the partners with the goal of defining the fundamental basis, criteria, and needs for the most efficient delivery of teaching activities on sustainability. It will be hosted by the University of Pavia- A Learning, training, and teaching activity “Staff week for sustainability officers”, a three-day workshop addressed to the administrative staff of the partner organizations. It will be organized in sessions to tackle various perspectives related to the Sustainability Offices (exchange of good practices, improvement of the performance of the offices, and internationalization strategy) and hosted by the University of Cologne.- Six Multiplier Events for the dissemination of project results, of which three organized by the academic partners that are learning the three PRs (the University of Pavia, University of Cyprus, University of Cologne) and three organized by the non-academic partner garagErasmus, main responsible for the communication and dissemination activities<< Results >>The project aims at reaching three results:1. Realization of MOOCS to train students on the 2030 Agenda, and implementation of Sustainability Leadership sessions. The MOOCS (formal education) and related interactive activities (non-formal education), will enable behavioural changes for individual preferences, consumption habits, and lifestyles, as well as develop sustainability awareness and critical thinking, promoting learners’ leading attitude towards the active engagement in environmental sustainability.2. Development of innovative student-centred methodologies to deliver sustainability-related teachings. On the one hand, it will support teachers to upskill and reskill their teaching modalities and to deliver contents in new stimulating ways. On the other hand, it will support developing green skills-oriented methodologies, to meet the needs of individuals by realizing and testing innovative student-centred replicable practices. 3. Production of a handbook collecting and disseminating good practices related to the setting up of a Sustainability Centre (SC) in HEIs. will empower universities in their capacity to address the green transition by guiding them in setting up and strengthening the Sustainability Centres as catalysts of green opportunities. Fostering the adoption of sustainability criteria and practices at systemic, centralized level, via the creation of dedicated offices, with a solid international and collaborative perspective, is pivotal to enabling HEIs in responding to the call for action raised by the Green Deal.