Charleston, Ill. — Warren Lavey, Leon Leibenberg, and Aleksandra Cavoski will discuss the importance of the Reimagine our Future undergraduate sustainability competition and how University of Birmingham students will be able to participate in the competition during a May 16 lecture.
The lecture titled, “Empowering Birmingham’s Brilliant Students Through UIUC’s Sustainability Competition,” will be from 11:20 a.m. to 12:05 p.m. inside Room 274 at the Medical Sciences Building located at 506 South Mathews Avenue, Urbana, Illinois.
It’s part of the BRIDGE Guest Lecture series hosted by Illinois International and the University of Birmingham.
Lavey and Leibenberg are professors at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign and are on the advisory committee for Reimagine our Future. Cavoski is the director of global engagement at the College of Arts and Law at the University of Birmingham Law School and was a former judge of the competition.
UIUC students Allison Garlin and Erin Kelley will also join the conversation to discuss their experience participating in the competition.
Garlin and Kelley each placed third in last year’s event.
Reimagine our Future aims to inspire and facilitate innovative and multidisciplinary solutions to address the sustainability challenges that interest participants.
The mission of the competition is for an individual or a team to develop a plan or solution that promotes one or more of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
To go into more detail, competitors last year had to seek advice from a specialist after registering for the competition, then they communicated their ideas in no more than a 1000-word high-impact fact sheet.
Those entries covered a wide spectrum, including engineering, chemistry, marine and land ecosystems, health sciences, food sciences, education, economics, earth sciences, and art and design.
After finalists were picked, they prepared a presentation explaining their idea that was judged using a point system based on five criteria. Finally, the awards ceremony was held after presentations and winners announced.
Reimagine our Future is entering its third year, and during the first two competitions hundreds of students participated from the University of Illinois System, the University of Pretoria, and Zhejiang University.
This year the competition is opening its doors to more universities and colleges not just in Illinois but internationally.
That includes the University of Birmingham.
The May 16 lecture will discuss the planning steps for Birmingham students to participate in Reimagine our Future. They will also dive into past projects and other plans.
Liebenberg is a teaching associate professor in the Department of Mechanical Science and
Engineering. Before coming to the USA in 2018, he was a professor at the University of Pretoria and later at the North-West University.
In 2021, he co-founded and coordinated Reimagine our Future.
Liebenberg teaches a variety of subjects, including Innovation; Statics; Dynamics; Thermodynamics; Fluid Dynamics; Automatic Control Systems; Design for Manufacturability; Mechanical Design; Energy Conversion Systems, Heat Transfer; Aerodynamics; Aeronautics; and Advanced Heat and Mass Transfer.
Lavey is an adjunct professor at UIUC in the College of Law, School of Earth, Society & Environment, and Carle Illinois College of Medicine.
His teaching focuses on legal frameworks for sustainability and health impacts of climate change. He serves on the campus Resilience and Environmental Justice advisory task forces as well as the Carle Illinois curriculum oversight committee.
Lavey is an adjunct professor at UIUC in the College of Law, School of Earth,
Society & Environment, and Carle Illinois College of Medicine. His teaching focuses on legal frameworks for sustainability and health impacts of climate change.
He serves on the campus Resilience and Environmental Justice advisory task forces as well as the Carle Illinois curriculum oversight committee.
Cavoski joined the Birmingham Law School in September 2012.
Her research interests are in the field of environmental law and EU law, including certain aspects of public international law. Her research agenda is inter-disciplinary and explores the intersection of law and other disciplines, in particular politics, science, public policy, and language.
Cavoski is also a part of the Birmingham Plastics Network, an interdisciplinary team of more
than 40 academics working together to shape the fate and sustainable future of plastics.
All three lectures are also available on Zoom. To register for the lecture, and to find the Zoom information, follow this link: https://go.illinois.edu/BRIDGEguestlectures
Analicia Haynes is the storyteller and social media specialist for Illinois International. She can be reached at ahayn2@illinois.edu.
