PRINCIPLE 10: LEARNING AND INNOVATION

TCWNN IS PROMOTES QUALITY EDUCATION, LEARNS, ADAPTS, AND INNOVATES.

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1. TCWNN is able to meet new dynamics and not afraid to explore, discuss and implement alternative scenarios for the future provided that these scenarios are bound by the common principle of equity. It values its heritage and learns from the wisdom of past generations.

2. TCWNN creates collaborative learning and discovery opportunities to revisit and redefine urban paradigms and social contracts for sustainable futures. It values community-based/grassroots innovations and solutions, and supports them to scale

3. TCWNN recognizes that cities are continuously changing, which calls for continuous learning and reflection and more flexible planning and decision making. This includes new and innovative approaches to social, economic and environmental governance. It also calls for new and innovative approaches to municipal administration and fiscal and financial management.

4. TCWNN is not afraid to open itself to new ideas, experiments and innovations, engaging all stakeholder groups and working in close collaboration with other cities and communities.

5. TCWNN harnesses the full potential of technologies to improve efficiency and effectiveness in its operations and to reduce its carbon footprint. These technologies and digital systems introduce new channels of communication, new forms of work and new business models and enterprises. They multiply the means by which all inhabitants can participate in and interact with planning, decision-making and project implementation.

6. TCWNN recognizes the importance of democratizing digital space and so reduce the digital divide by increasing access to network and communication facilities and enables all inhabitants to take advantage of the city as an open platform and a collaborative space. This openness contributes to improved understanding and trust among inhabitants, policy makers and the private sector. It allows both inhabitants and government entities access to information across sectors and traditional silos to develop new models and paradigms for managing water, waste, energy, mobility and food.

7. TCWNN uses systems thinking to understand urban complexity and the sources of unintended policy and/or resource consequences. It experiments with new approaches to science and the production of evidence, including action-based research, crowd-sourced data-gathering and analysis, inter-active policy dialogue and studies, and collaborative research involving trans-disciplinary engagement with stakeholders.

8. TCWNN promotes quality education where students are not only closer to institutions of higher learning such as universities and colleges, but they are also more exposed to a richer curriculum and a wide range of co-curricular activities.

9. TCWNN understands the disruptive effect of new technology on existing socio-economic structures. It ensures that new technology and innovations act as enablers and partners with, and not replacement of human efforts, specially the work done by marginalized groups. TCWNN also rejects the practice of trying out in marginalized communities urban innovations and experiments. When such experiments and innovations do not work out they hurt the communities that can least afford it.