Overview
The AREA Discovery Tool supports staff in exploring digital, AI and sustainability competences through a structured self-assessment based on the AREA Competency Framework. AREA focuses on four key pillars: Awareness, Responsibility, Empowerment and Action.
This framework highlights key digital and sustainability competences that can be embedded into teaching, learning and programme design, supporting the development of students’ skills for an evolving digital and sustainable world.
Informed by international frameworks such as UNESCO’s Education for Sustainable Development and the European GreenComp framework, the tool includes a sustainability component focused on Being Green, Thinking Green and Acting Green, alongside digital and AI literacy.
The self-assessment takes approximately 20 minutes to complete.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this course, you will be able to:
- Understand the AREA Competency Framework and its application in teaching and learning contexts
- Recognise key digital, AI and sustainability competences, including their relevance to curriculum design
- Reflect on your own skills and practices in relation to digital and sustainability competencies
- Identify opportunities to embed these competences within programmes and modules to support student development
Course Developers
The AREA Discovery Tool was developed by the ATU Teaching and Learning Centre in collaboration with the ATU Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Academy.
The AREA framework was developed as part of the N-TUTORR Transforming Learning Programme (Student Empowerment work stream), led by Dr Carina Ginty (ATU) and Dr Moira Maguire (DKIT), in collaboration with partners across the technological university sector.
The N-TUTORR programme is funded by the European Union under the NextGenerationEU initiative, as part of Ireland’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP).
