SCOOCS: The Virtual Space for CONNECTING IDS Experiences

A core element of this initiative is the potential to expand beyond the walls of the classroom in Amsterdam. With SCOOCS, CONNECTING IDS Experiences joined scholars and students from nine different countries in a customized and dedicated space; designed to foster engagement, interaction, and connections. Although the initiative is at a very early start, the show-up rate, engagement score, and networking success enabled by SCOOCS suggest positive signs of a growing digital community of worldwide development scholars and students.

Engagement, discussion, and networking are some of main goals of this new-born initiative. With SCOOCS, we leveraged powerful features such as complete participant profiles, 1-to-1 matching and networking tables. With such different and interesting profiles, the opportunity to independently connect in a virtual space, create discussion spaces, and quickly join a video room really empowered participants to share and to connect.

Having an organized and easily accessible shared space to access different course syllabus, scientific papers, and research projects is crucial to foster more connections are the scholar, student, and classroom level. The Event Hub was the perfect solution for an organized resource library to which participants can always refer to when planning a co-created session, seeking a different angle on a topic, or looking for a field research collaboration or contact point.