Purpose

The Summer Academy is designed to bring PhD students together with senior United Nations University and Munich Re Foundation scientists, international experts, and renown academic professors to facilitate the mutual exchange of research and scholarship on climate change and social vulnerability. The 2012 program will invite a group of outstanding students from graduate programs around the world to participate with experts in measuring progress towards disaster risk management. The 2012 Summer Academy will address some of the methodological challenges in measuring social vulnerability and resilience. Because hazards and disasters are place-specific, it will focus on the hazards of places and examine a number of empirically based approaches for measuring disaster risk (hazard exposure, losses, and social vulnerability) and disaster resilience. Many of these approaches use geographic information systems (GIS) methodologies as the integrating tool, so the Academy will include tutorials on GIS and its use in hazard vulnerability assessments. The development of indicators and benchmarks are a means for assessing achievement and monitoring progress towards disaster risk reduction; goals and actions outlined in the Hyogo Framework for Action.

For more on the Munich Re Foundation Chair on Social Vulnerability see http://www.ehs.unu.edu/article/read/munich-refoundation