The mission of the Faculty of Business and Economics includes the strong international orientation of our educational and research activities. The course 'International Week on Sustainability' or I-Week was introduced in 2014 to embed international exposure into the curriculum of the Bachelor of Applied Economics: Business Economics and has since grown into a faculty-wide course, being incorporated in the curricula of our Bachelor of Economic Policy, Bachelor of Business Engineering, Bachelor of Business Engineering: Management Information Systems and the English Bachelor of Social-Economic Sciences.

During the I-week, students:

• interact with academics and professionals about international views and perspectives on corporate sustainability, social and environmental reporting, and business strategy for sustainability;
• take part in an on campus Sustainability Fair and an international 'cultural mix-and-max';
• listen to a debate on sustainability, held by CEOs from national and international companies;
• work in multicultural groups to make a paper and presentation analysing a current sustainability issue in a particular international organisation;
  

The course consists of 5 intense days of presentations, discussions and workshops during which students are exposed to international academics, sustainability experts and CEOs. To get the most out of the I-week, 3 preparatory sessions are organized online in the weeks before the I-week. The I-Week takes place in a hybrid learning environment: it can be followed online, in class or both.

The first hybrid edition in 2022 made it possible to become even more international than before, with speakers and students with over 30 different nationalities from 5 different continents. For this edition, we had the honour of working together with 11 partner universities, a number which increases for the 2023 edition to 15 partner universities!

This year, speakers include Jan Jonker, Wayne Visser, Ian Williamson, Philippe Weiler, Shawn Theunissen, Pedro Wickbold, Kavita Miadaira Hamza, Pri Notowidigdo, Orsolya Diofasi, Antoine Lebrun, Peter Verhezen, Luc Van Liedekerke, and many more.

The I-week is an innovative way to embed international perspectives and a focus on sustainability into the students' curriculum.