Cross Sectoral dialogue about SDGs

June 2024 Bangkok Track Partner - the University of Newcastle

The University of Newcastle actively initiates and engages in cross-sectoral dialogue on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) at multiple levels across the Hunter region, throughout NSW and increasingly across the world with growing international impact.

Locally, in 2024, we launched with the Hunter Regional Taskforce a regional Dashboard, maintaining our strong collaboration with the Hunter Region SDG Task Force to foster cross-sectoral regional partnerships that monitor and report on local and regional progress towards the SDGs. This Dashboard is used by local government to inform policy and service provision.

Nationally, we hosted the 2024 Times Higher Education (THE) Campus Live ANZ event bringing together stakeholders from academia, government, and industry to focus on embedding the SDGs into the Australian higher education landscape.

Internationally, we led the "Education, Gender and Inequality" track at the THE Global Sustainable Development Congress 2024 in Bangkok, a role that saw us initiating, engaging in and supporting global conversations across both local and national government and NGO sectors on critical SDG challenges worldwide. University of Newcastle's Professor Penny Jane Burke (UNESCO chair) delivered the keynote speech.

Consistent with our strong institutional commitment to gender equality, we were proud to participate in – and support – the 2024 Women in Research Engineering Network (WREN) Symposium under the theme ‘Collaborating Towards the Sustainable Development Goals,’ emphasising interdisciplinary cooperation. Held in hybrid format to minimise its carbon footprint, the symposium welcomed contributions from diverse fields, with a particular focus on STEM and gender inclusion, addressing SDGs such as:

  • SDG 4: Quality Education
  • SDG 5: Gender Equality
  • SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy
  • SDG 9: Industry, Innovation & Infrastructure
  • SDG 11: Sustainable Cities & Communities
  • SDG 13: Climate Action

These initiatives demonstrate our commitment to fostering inclusive, cross-sectoral dialogue to advance the SDGs.

Director Penny Jane Burke for June 2024 Keynote Address
2024 WREN Symposium
Transformative equity

Transformative equity

The UNESCO Chair in Equity, Social Justice and Higher Education, led by our Professor Penny Jane Burke, aims to effect transformative equity by mobilising higher education as a vehicle for social justice, addressing and challenging the conditions that undermine progress toward reducing inequalities, gender equality and quality education for all.

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FLP Highlights 2:40

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