Aalborg University is a Danish University with campuses in Aalborg, Esbjerg and Copenhagen. The university conducts interdisciplinary research in the fields of humanities, engineering, math and physics, with almost 20.000 full time students and a community of more than 800 PhD students. Aalborg University is an ODECO beneficiary and hosts ESRs Malena Elena Lopez Reyes and Alejandra Celis Vargas, who are doing research on maximizing availability and use of local government open data and open data usage in elementary schools, respectively.

ESR Davide Di Staso from Delft University of Technology was hosted at the department of Communication and Psychology for a three month secondment, from April 4th to July 4th. During the secondment the ESR conducted a systematic literature review on “issue articulation”. To articulate social issues means to express them and make their problematic nature evident. Issue articulation can be related to homelessness, sustainability, urban degradation, and others. Open datasets can be used as a design material, to inquire into societal issues and express their problematic nature. The review included 40 papers, mostly from design literature, and Prof. Birger Larsen offered his contribution in supervising the work and regularly meeting with Davide while he was in Denmark. Additionally, during the secondment, Davide attended the 2023 Nordic Game Jam at Aalborg University in Copenhagen, and hosted a small tutorial on the use of game-making tools. Game-making workshops are being explored as a design tactic to engage non-specialist in issue articulation and the re-use of open data. The idea being explored is to express societal issues through game-making, and use open data to understand a social issue and make it evident to others.

After concluding the secondment, Davide returned to Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands where he will continue his research. As part of the research, a further secondment at the City of Rotterdam is expected in early 2024.