RE-DWELL Summer School 3 (Reading)

Three, five-day international summer schools have been planned to take place in Nicosia
(November 2021), Valencia (July 2022) and Reading (July 2023) as part of the RE-DWELL project.
The last of these summer schools, organized by the University of Reading (UREAD), has been
carried out in Reading, from July 3- 7th, 2023. This report focuses on the results of this summer
school.
The theme of the summer school, “Innovations in Affordable and Sustainable Housing,” was
thus addressed from multiple perspectives through presentations from invited speakers from
professional practice, and academia.

The programme of activities of the Reading summer school aimed at fostering the exchange of
knowledge across early-stage researchers (ESRs), supervisors and non-academic organisations,
on addressing the challenges and opportunities of the design process in meeting needs for
affordable and sustainable housing. It is noteworthy that this meeting has a strong presence of
partner organisations, with five participating in the event—two from the UK and three from
other countries.

The programme included workshops to support the development of ESR’s research through
training activities related to two ongoing structured courses: RMT3 “Transferring research
findings to community stakeholders” and TS3 “Communication and dissemination; Engagement
and impact”. Following the blended-learning approach the activities of the courses began
online, to be continued in-person during the event.

In addition to the activities at the University of Reading, there were lectures held in London at
the premises of Clarion Housing Association, a partner organisation, and at Pollard Thomas
Edwards architectural office, a firm conducting research on affordable housing. Additionally,
there was a site visit to a new "build-to-rent" housing development in Reading town centre.