Alive in smart countryside

Abstract

We suggest that the rapidly desolating Finnish countryside can become a creative zone for education and development where new ideas can be conceptualized, piloted, and tested, and new technologies developed more freely than in urban areas. We used design science as a research approach to develop the “Alive in Smart Countryside” concept and business development process involving user communities and SMEs not only as observed subjects but especially as co-designers. Faculty and students from the University of Turku created a Living Lab “Alive in Smart Countryside” to the rural municipalities Juuka and Kitee, located in North Karelia, Finland. Living Lab promoted disruptive innovation in order to design solutions toward smart countryside. In addition to analyzing and examining the design endeavor, we discuss the project as an informal learning initiative. Having a folk high school as the coordinator of the project brought in the pragmatic orientation of informal adult education and connected different actors in the region.