Designing
Resilient Regenerative
Systems

MAS ETH in Regenerative Systems MOOC Series

The DRRS learning system

MOOCs, CAS, MAS, community – become part of the DRRS tree, an analogy for the DRRS learning system. The tree’s crown is the large-scale, highly accessible and cost-free entry to DRRS, the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) series, available via the ETH Zurich channel on edX. The MOOCs will serve as standalone virtual course offers, and as entry to the tree trunk funnel into its root system, the DRRS professional program. 

CAS alumni get the chance to feedback their learnings into the continuously evolving MOOC – like nutrients taken up through the root system and transported back up toward the tree’s crown.

This DRRS program builds on and expands the qualities of excellence in disciplinary science, such as ecosystem functions, biogeophysical cycles, cell regeneration, bioengineering, artificial intelligence, agent-based modeling, life cycle analysis, social network analysis, circular economy, nature finance, social-ecological resilience (…). To adequately deal with emergent, unplannable, adaptive systems, DRRS adds the meta-perspective, epistemological plurality, cross-scale linking, worldviews, organizing ideas as narratives and personal inner development to our learning portfolio and cultures.

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Master of Advanced Studies ETH in Regenerative Systems

The new full executive degree program is now established: the Master of Advanced Studies MAS ETH in Regenerative Systems.

The new MAS in Regenerative Systems

With the greatest joy, we are announcing the official launch of the full Master of Advanced Studies ETH in Regenerative Systems (MAS ETH DRRS) and its upcoming next element, and stand-alone degree, Certificate of Advanced Studies CAS#2 Beyond Systems Thinking.

We are inviting you for a transformative journey of creating a positive impact in complex systems through three CAS and a MAS module comprising the total MAS ETH in DRRS. All modules build upon each other but can be taken in isolation and different order.

The entire MAS executive programme offers a learning-to-unlearn-to-relearn journey with your individual transformative design project, the QUEST, on how to navigate complexity for designing resilient regenerative systems. We deep-dive into regeneration on various systems types and nested governance scales; we embrace worldviews and learn to design as nature; we flourish mind through movement and practice circular design for resilience building in living systems labs. We provide reflected access to quantitative methods and to understanding their relational value with qualitative methods, designerly iteration, AI, embodied practice, and inner development.

Living systems, non-linearity, emergence, interbeing – the upcoming second CAS module “Beyond systems thinking” deep-dives into complexity and develops a critical understanding of systems. You will learn what systems thinking entails, and how it can become a helpful habit. The program’s field design trip to Norway will take you to exciting real-world practices in Nordic culture and the midnight sun. Through physical embodiment, you will connect with place, with community and your inner self.

Application to CAS#2 starting in May ’24

The 2nd element of the full MAS, CAS#2, and its learning journey application process is about to start, so save the dates: 01.03.-07.04.2024. The CAS is a hybrid program with a virtual course part from May until September ’24, and a physical field design trip to Norway June 8-16th ’24. MOOC#1 and #2 have to be taken or at least advanced as a precondition to this CAS. More info on CAS#2 here.

Further information

The MAS info pages can be accessed here. We offered a first virtual information event on March 4th 8pm CET (Zurich time) via Zoom; the recording can be accessed here. The visual presentation on Miro can be accessed here.

The DRRS program is about creating positive impact in complex systems as part of learning communities. Participants find different entry points to connect with this DRRS program: deep philosophical discourse, insights into the latest state of science on sustainability and resilience, designerly practice, hybrid methods, concrete design principles, real-world illustrations, inner personal development, and a motivating community.

Initially included exciting real-world, living illustrations take participants to partnering real-world labs and bio-regional learning centers, i.e. Ostana Italy, Hemsedal Norway, Annecy France, Mallorca Spain, and Venice Italy – embodying complex systems from governance scales of material supply chains to products, buildings, communities and their services, to landscapes, bio-regions, and transnational cooperation. This offers a relational understanding of communities and regions undergoing sustainability transitions across different contexts, cultures, climates and geographies.

Some of the prominent methods participants will learn are systemic design and systems-oriented design, social network analysis, resilience assessment, life cycle and footprint analysis, circularity mapping, visual dialogue, cross-scale design, “View from Above” perspectives, design as nature, transdisciplinary research, real-world elaboration, personal inner development, and more. A main innovation is that such diverse methods, practices, tools, cultures, are taught and learnt in synergies, in relation, challenge based, to form new cultures of “dancing with systems”, of dealing with complexity, science-based and designerly with direct practical impact.



The innovative Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) hybridizes sustainability science, systemic design and transformative action. It provides you with worldviews, tools, illustrations and transformative networks to build your capacities and engage in systemic innovation of complex systems.

This 4 Module MOOC series is about creating positive impact in complex systems in times of nested crises. Participants are invited on a learning journey that includes emphasis on concepts like regeneration and resilience, befriending complexity and uncertainty, methods and hybrid practices of science and design, connecting more with our inner self, and becoming bio-regional weavers within communities of transformational learning and praxis.

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MAS in Regenerative Systems

The DRRS programme is about creating positive impact in complex systems as part of learning communities. Participants find different entry points to connect with this DRRS programme: insights and updates into the latest state of science on sustainability and resilience, research by design, designerly practice, deep philosophical discourse, artificial intelligence, real-world illustrations, inner personal development, and motivating community.

Exciting real-world, living illustrations take participants to partnering real-world weaving labs: the MonViso Institute (Ostana, Italy), Hemsedal (Norway), Annecy (France), Mallorca (Spain), and Venice (Italy) – embodying complex systems from governance scales of green chemistry to material supply chains to products, buildings, communities, and their services, to landscapes, bio-regions, and transnational cooperation. This offers a relational understanding of communities and regions undergoing sustainability transitions across different contexts, cultures, climates, and geographies.

We learn to navigate challenges within different scientific and designerly methods and practices, which we call systemic design. We get access to quantitative methods and understand their relational value with qualitative methods, AI, embodiment, and personal development, i.e.:

  • social network analysis and resilience assessment,
  • life cycle and footprint analysis,
  • GIS and CAD tools,
  • cross-scale design and circularity mapping,
  • design as nature,
  • transdisciplinary research and real-world elaboration,
  • participatory modelling and serious games, (…).

The main innovation is that such diverse methods, practices, tools, and cultures, are taught and learnt in synergies, in relation, challenge-based, to form new cultures of “dancing with systems”, of dealing with complexity, science-based and designerly with direct practical impact.

CAS ETH: Sustainability to regeneration

Opening to unlearn and to different worldviews
Field design trip to MonViso Institute, Italy 
In this first CAS:

  • we are introduced to current globally relevant nested crises, and how local action relates to such,
  • we become conscious of the existence and dominance of current and alternative worldviews,
  • we learn the roots of sustainability and pathways to regeneration,
  • we acquire tools to reframe complexity and befriend uncertainty, while studying different ways of knowing and reasoning, from science to warm data,
  • we learn to reconnect with nature and to design as nature,
  • we gain new awareness through practices of physical and mental activation via self-compassion techniques and flow experiences in nature.
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CAS ETH: Beyond systems thinking

Deep-dive into complexity
Field design trip to Hemsedal “Hatchery”, Norway
In the second CAS:

  • we develop a critical understanding of living systems, what systems thinking entails, and how it can become a helpful habit (the view from above contains techniques to deal with complexity, to zoom out of a system for zooming in on what matters most),
  • we learn some basics of social network analysis and how to measure and interpret structures in networks, such as for resilience,
  • we acquire an applicable toolset on i.e. the transformative potential of resilience, which leads over to an extended look into circularity, from a circular economy to five types of circular flows,

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CAS ETH: Systemic design

Methods: quantitative, qualitative, designerly, embodied
Field design trip to Balearic Islands, Spain
In the third CAS:

  • we learn to navigate challenge-based within different scientific and designerly methods and practices, which we call systemic design,
  • we get access to quantitative methods and understand what they are needed for, i.e. social network analysis, resilience assessment, LCA, carbon footprint analysis, circularity mapping, GIS, drone images to point clouds to terrain models to topographical maps with high resolution, CAD, agent based modelling,
  • we learn about relevant qualitative methods, i.e. participative modeling, scenario planning, serious games, surveys,
  • we use AI and learn to prompt while asking when AI can be regenerative,
  • finally, we learn about real-world laboratories and their transformative weaving capacities.

    More details coming soon


MAS design thesis

MAS module on methods at ETH Zurich

The MAS module is the time to synthesize the learnings of the previous MOOCs and CAS’, to finish the Master design thesis, the QUEST. Participants can choose from a set of hybrid block courses to fulfill their remaining ECTS. We finally gather for some intense learning days at ETH Zurich.

More details coming soon


The cost-free MOOC series is, from its second iteration on, a purely virtual program with pre-recorded content, student paced, without live sessions, but backed up by the DRRS online community with rich dialogues and a help forum.

The costly professional program offers in-depth personal, live, physical teaching and learning, live discourse, extended content, practicing methods in application, individual QUEST project coaching, personal access to teachers and further leading experts in the field, curation of physical peer-learning, and the field design trips as main learning element with direct practical real-world experiences.

The DRRS community is our learning and support network, and market place in the virtual world, as well as in the physical, in person world. You benefit and contribute to the growth of this rich professional network.

Weaving relations and participating in a joint journey towards co-creation for resilience and regeneration as part of learning communities is at the core of DRRS program participation benefits. Each participant already comes with their own rich network. With DRRS, you connect your network with those of your fellow students, of alumni, and with the DRRS virtual community with more than 1600 members.

Enter the DRRS network

Electives

A selection of the DRRS free-choice courses to complement the MAS module designed and offered by MonViso Institute – living systems lab, the official ETH executive programme partner. The courses, each credited to the MAS with 4ECTS, deepen the practical relevance of the programme. The participants can choose one of three courses on the following topics:

  • Living Systems Labs design (start 05-07/24)
  • Systemic Cycles guide training (start 05/24
  • Rewild yourself: contemporary survival, inner resilience and leadership (start 10/24)

More details coming soon.

Enter the DRRS network
“One is of course, we all were educated in one specific what we call thought-style, in one specific way, looking scientifically at the topic, at an issue. And you need to bridge that, you need to understand the perspective of a physicist, you need to understand the perspective of an architect, and they are fundamentally different. And you need somehow to find some common ground. And the second challenge is more like I would call it personality related, because for that, to make it happen so that it works, you need to be open, you need to be flexible. You need to be able to listen. It’s much more listening than actually talking.“
Prof. Dr. Michael Stauffacher
Transdisciplinarity Lab, ETH Zurich
“So creating not only communities for the sake of sustainability, but also learning communities, for the sake of sharing our experience. And this dancing with complexity, as you say, is much easier if it is done in a community sharing the same values and sharing similar experiences. Because what happens is that as we explore conceptual relationships, which is largely what systems thinking is all about, as we do that in a community, we simultaneously experience human relationships, which means that the conceptual relationships get invested with an emotional dimension of the human relationships.“
Fritjof Capra, PhD
author of “The Systems View of Life” 
“For me, the entire shift towards a regenerative way of working on sustainability is very aligned with this because at the core of the notion of regeneration is basically the evolutionary dynamic of a complex nested system, evolving as a whole, not as species and individuals competing against each other. This dynamic whole is not an additive whole, where all the parts are put together to make the whole. That’s the reductionist mechanistic framing. But we are speaking about the participatory involvement in dynamic nested complexity. The whole process we emerge from is in constant dynamic motion. And that changes the proposition of science from prediction and control to appropriate participation in the face of uncertainty.”
Daniel Christian Wahl, PhD
author of “Designing Regenerative Cultures”