Jost F, Newell R, Dale A
Royal Roads University, School of Environment and Sustainability, Centre for Environmental Science and International Partnership (CESIP), 2005 Sooke Road, V9B 5Y2 Victoria, BC, Canada.
University of the Fraser Valley, Food and Agriculture Institute, 33844 King Road, V2S 7M8 Abbotsford, BC, Canada.
Heliyon. 2021 Feb 3;7(2):e05997. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e05997. eCollection 2021 Feb.
Currently, the need for transdisciplinary approaches and collaboration, to reduce the gap between science and practice, is continuously rising along with the need for sustainable development. An increase in knowledge transfer, meetings and overall communication among researchers and practitioners is a logical consequence of the previous. However, the resulting higher transaction costs, mainly related to transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions (and additional financial costs) involved in face-to-face meetings, are in direct conflict with the urgent need to reduce our carbon footprint. This research explored the development of an online platform, "CoLabS", specifically designed as a virtual meeting and learning space to support collaboration within and between communities to accelerate sustainable community development efforts. While the move towards online collaboration in virtual environments has steadily increased in the past decade, it has now become essential due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Based on the feedback provided by focus groups, the platform's design and usability as well as the technical aspects and its functionality are discussed in this paper.
目前，随着可持续发展需求的不断增长，为缩小科学与实践之间的差距，跨学科方法和合作的需求也在持续上升。研究人员与从业者之间知识转移、会议及整体交流的增加是上述情况的必然结果。然而，由此产生的更高交易成本，主要与面对面会议中涉及的交通相关温室气体排放（以及额外的财务成本）有关，这与减少我们碳足迹的迫切需求直接冲突。本研究探索了一个在线平台“CoLabS”的开发，该平台专门设计为一个虚拟会议和学习空间，以支持社区内部及社区之间的合作，加速可持续社区发展努力。虽然在过去十年中，向虚拟环境中的在线协作的转变稳步增加，但由于新冠疫情，现在它已变得至关重要。基于焦点小组提供的反馈，本文讨论了该平台的设计与可用性以及技术方面及其功能。
