What is the SPACE Centre?

Under the leadership of the Latvian Academy of Culture (LAC), the Societal Partnerships and Cultural Engagement Centre (SPACE Centre) is one of the ACE²-EU joint operational units. It is designed to foster collaboration with external stakeholders, promote inclusivity, human rights and EU values, as well as to strengthen European identity through cultural awareness and exchange.
In addition to LAC and CUAS, the SPACE Centre Management Board comprises the other two co-leads: the Polytechnic University of Santarem (IPS) and University Francisco de Vitoria (UFV).

The SPACE Centre is “a place where partnership builds future literacy”. Its goal is to drive sustainable societal transformation and act as a bridge between all member universities and the wider community/society.

All activities that will be created within the SPACE Centre are targeting socio-economic aspects, in particular inclusion, multiculturalism/interculturalism, respect and dignity, and gender equality. They will include knowledge creation team workshops, a Change Maker Ambassador programme, volunteering and joint learning opportunities, cultural training, awareness-raising campaigns and, last but not least, an annual Kaleidoscope Culture Festival.

“The key to realizing the goals of the SPACE Centre and the shared vision of the ACE²-EU Alliance lies in the people we bring together—a dedicated team that not only believes in our mission but actively engages and collaborates toward our collective success. The SPACE Centre team embodies this spirit—visionary, highly motivated, and committed to innovation. Through our co-creation, we will tackle the challenges of tomorrow, ensuring that we remain at the forefront of positive societal impact” - Ieva Zemīte, leader of the SPACE Centre

What is planned for this year?

2025 will mostly be dedicated to building the SPACE Centre’s structures, strengthen the efficiency of the trans-national collaboration and plan the future activities and opportunities thanks to a solid conceptual and operational basis. While the Management Board is elaborating the SPACE Centre’s Operational Plan, describing its implementation, functioning and work plan, each university that is part of the co-leading team is taking charge of a sub-strand guiding the activities for the whole year. Hence, the four sub-strands are concerned with:

• the Kaleidoscope Festival, led by LAC: tasked with organising the first Kaleidoscope Culture Festival, which will take place in October 2025 at the Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt (THI)
• the Culture Hub ​& Social Impactors Volunteer Programmes, led by IPS: will deliver the Volunteer Programmes Handbook, due in October 2025
• the Culture Traineeship Programme for Staff, led by UFV: responsible for the Culture Traineeship Programme Handbook, also due in October 2025
• and the Social Impactors, led by CUAS: entrusted with the implementation of four Social Impactors by January 2026

What are the Social Impactors?

The ACE²-EU Social Impactors will be forums, platforms gathering experts and interested parties on pre-determined topics connected to current socio-economic issues, functioning similarly to think tanks. Based on a quadruple-helix model of innovation, they will involve stakeholders from academia (staff & students), business, local/regional government and civil society (NGOs, associations, citizens) in a multi-level approach, where the micro (university), meso (region) and macro (alliance) levels interact continually.

Once the Social Impactors are set up, with experts and stakeholders onboarded and connected, they will start performing a research and advocacy mission, providing information, ideas and advice on their designated topics. With this knowledge-based approach, they will additionally develop service-to-society activities aimed at collectively tackling social challenges and make a positive impact on our society.

Four Social Impactors are planned to be created by January 2026 on the following topics:

• Inclusion & Multiculturalism
• Social Well-Being
• Respect & Dignity
• Gender Equality

Who is behind the Social Impactors at CUAS?

Dr. Marika Gruber, senior researcher and lecturer in the School of Management, is the conceptual lead of the Social Impactors sub-strand, ensuring that their implementation follows a sound logic and is based on a solid theoretical framework. An expert on diverse societies and inclusion, specializing in intercultural governance and migration, and with strong empirical and participatory research experience, she is uniquely qualified to lead this highly inter- and trans-disciplinary endeavour and to guide the partners from all nine universities and external stakeholders through the implementation of Social Impactors.

“As the name indicates, social impactors should not only develop impacts in science and academic life, but also in society. The involvement of as many university (internal) and societal (external) stakeholders as possible is therefore very important. Working on the implementation of social impactors makes it possible to innovate science-to-society cooperation and to make universities and ultimately science, which is often perceived as too theoretical and detached from everyday problems, more open and accessible to societal actors.” - Marika Gruber, Societal Impactors sub-strand conceptual lead

She is supported by Mélissa Pebayle, Internationalisation Commissioner in the School of Management, taking the operational lead and assisting on the content creation. With an academic background in social & political sciences, international relations and criminology, including a gendered perspective, she supports Marika in the implementation of the Social Impactors, both in logistics and in content, takes care of the communication with all members of the sub-strand and is involved in the activities planning. She is currently in charge of drafting the preliminary definition of the Social Impactors’ key concepts.

Progress so far: what is coming next?

At the moment, a first draft of all key concepts for the four Social Impactors has been elaborated and discussed within the sub-strand, which includes representatives from all nine universities. The next step on this aspect is to identify and integrate all experts and other interested parties in each university, gather their input on the key concept definitions before agreeing on a common basis on the alliance-level. The sub-strand team has also agreed on a basis for the conceptual framework, which will continue to be refined in the coming weeks. The next important phase of the implementation is a thorough stakeholder mapping, helping to identify both internal (within each university) and external (societal partners) actors that could or should be included in the establishment of the Social Impactors.

During the Social Impactors’ implementation phase, several activities will be organised, such as a pilot Flavour School in Summer Semester 2025 between CUAS School of Management and LAC, in the English-speaking project management course. In addition, a group of CUAS students will be able to attend the Kaleidoscope Culture Festival in October in Ingolstadt, present their own project(s) on “The Voices of Europe” and attend panel discussions, workshops and performances from other ACE²-EU students.

How to get involved?

• CUAS academic, research and administrative staff will be contacted to inquire about their involvement and expertise on the Social Impactors’ topics, as well as students at a later point. 
• External stakeholders will be contacted by each university directly during the stakeholder mapping process, but they can also manifest their interest by contacting their local ACE representatives/university partners. 
• An alliance-wide call for student proposals will be published shortly to get ideas from students on project/performance and other suggestions for the Kaleidoscope Culture Festival.

For any follow-up questions on the SPACE Centre or this article, please contact the CUAS team:

• SPACE Centre coordination: Svetlana Buko, Vice-Dean for Internationalization and Intercultural Management Co-Director, s.buko[at]fh-kaernten[dot]at
• Kaleidoscope Culture Festival: Colin Heller, Intercultural Management Co-Director and linguist focused on multilingualism and language learning, c.heller[at]fh-kaernten[dot]at
• Social Impactors conceptual leadership: Marika Gruber, Senior Researcher and Lecturer, m.gruber[at]fh-kaernten[dot]at
• Social Impactors operational leadership & SPACE Centre coordination support: Mélissa Pebayle, Internationalization Commissioner, m.pebayle[at]fh-kaernten[dot]at