C5 TEF-UI

Selected under Topic 2: EIT-HEI-2025-BUILDING-SYNERGIES, TEF-UI supports the Ulysseus European University Alliance in becoming a stronger ecosystem for futures-ready STEM innovation and transformative entrepreneurship. The project addresses a specific gap in European higher education: STEM students, researchers, educators, and innovation practitioners are often trained to solve technical problems, but less systematically prepared to work with uncertainty, contested futures, systemic transitions, and long-term societal impact.

At the centre of TEF-UI is Futures Literacy. The project uses Futures Literacy as a foundational competence for transformative entrepreneurship, helping learners imagine alternative futures, question assumptions, anticipate systemic change, navigate value conflicts, and design more responsible innovation pathways. This is combined with entrepreneurship, IP management, sustainability, digital transformation, and venture development, creating a training model that goes beyond conventional start-up education.

TEF-UI will develop a STEM-specific Futures Literacy and transformative entrepreneurship training portfolio, supported by a train-the-trainer model that creates institutional multipliers across the Ulysseus alliance. Existing Ulysseus Innovation Hubs and entrepreneurship support structures will be used as learning, experimentation, and start-up support spaces. The project will also establish an alliance-level innovation observation mechanism, strengthen strategic cooperation with EIT Climate-KIC, EIT Health, and 28DIGITAL, and create open-access tools that can be reused beyond the alliance.