< BACK TO
Past Programme

UNESCO-NUS-SEU Nanjing Field School

UNESCO-NUS-SEU Field School_Poster

Cultural Heritage & Climate Change in Asia—Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation

The UNESCO–NUS–SEU Field School, titled Cultural Heritage and Climate Change in Asia: Impacts, Adaptation, and
Mitigation, that was held from 20 to 28 September 2025 across Nanjing, Suzhou, and Yangzhou, China. Organized by the National University of Singapore (NUS) and co-organized and hosted by Southeast University (SEU), the program was supported by UNESCO and the Ng Teng Fong Charitable Foundation. The field school served as an immersive and interdisciplinary platform for knowledge exchange and collaborative inquiry into how climate change affects cultural heritage in Asia.

The program convened twenty-nine students representing seven universities across Southeast and East Asia, alongside twenty-one local and international experts, and academic staff. The universities involved were:

    • Korean National University of Heritage, Republic of Korea
    • National University of Singapore, Singapore
    • Ritsumeikan University, Japan
    • Silpakorn University, Thailand
    • Southeast University, China
    • Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia
    • University of Malaya, Malaysia
Students representing seven universities across Southeast and East Asia, and local and international experts.
Students representing seven universities across Southeast and East Asia, and local and international experts.

Participants engaged in intensive field studies, workshops, and site analyses that combined theoretical reflection with on-site fieldwork. Through guided visits to UNESCO Asia-Pacific Award-winning sites in Nanjing and Yangzhou, the field school provided participants with insights into heritage conservation practices, assessment methodologies, and the complexities of cultural sustainability.

As part of the final presentation, to conclude the week-long field school, each team presented their outputs through three carefully prepared A1 printed sheets and an accompanying video. The printed boards constituted their site analyses, documentation through sketches, maps, and photographic surveys, values-based assessments, and design strategies. The videos provided an additional medium to present their findings,
synthesizing field observations with creative interpretations.

These presentations integrated results from the disaster imagination exercise and the values-based assessment workshops conducted earlier in the week, where students worked on butter sheets to identify risks, vulnerabilities, safe zones, and to assess the heritage significance of the selected sites.

At the conclusion of all presentations, resource persons and mentors offered their closing remarks. They commended the analytical depth, creativity, and the integration of conservation principles with disaster planning and community-based value assessment. Their reflections also emphasized the importance of sustaining international and interdisciplinary collaboration in heritage education.

Resource Persons

  • Barbara Minguez Garcia
    Disaster Risk Management Specialist Consultant, GFDRR, USA.
    Senior Associate, Cultural Heritage Resilience, McAllister & Craig Disaster Management Inc., Canada.
  • Bao Li
    Professor & Director of the Sino-Italian Joint Research Center for Urban Renewal, School of Architecture, Southeast University, China.
  • Dai Shibing
    Professor & Director, Architecture Conservation Laboratory, Tongji University, China.
  • Dong Wei
    Professor, Urban Planning, School of Architecture, Southeast University, UNESCO Chair in Cultural Resource Management.
  • Elizabeth Yang Jun Min
    Research Associate, National University of Singapore, Singapore.
  • Hossein Rezai-Jorabi
    Global Design Director for Buildings, Ramboll.
    Professor (Practice Track), Department of Architecture, National University of Singapore, Singapore.
  • Jiang Hong
    Vice Dean & Associate Professor, School of Architecture, Southeast University, China.
    Associate Director, Key Laboratory of Urban and Architectural Heritage Conservation, Southeast University, China.
  • Kim Dowon
    Associate Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,
    UNESCO Co-Chair, Institute of Disaster Mitigation for Urban Cultural Heritage (R-DMUCH), Ritsumeikan University, Japan.
  • Kim Young-Jae
    Dean, Graduate School of Korea Heritage, Korea National University of Heritage, Republic of Korea.
    UNESCO Chairholder in Capacity-Building for the Preservation and Restoration of the Asia-Pacific Cultural Heritage.
  • Laretna Trisnantari Adishakti
    Lecturer & Coordinator, Center for Heritage Conservation, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia.
  • Li Min
    Senior Researcher, Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto, Japan.
  • Li Xinjian
    Professor & Associate Director, Key Laboratory of Urban and Architectural Heritage Conservation, Southeast University, China.
  • Montira Horayangura Unakul
    Professor of Practice, Landscape Architecture, University of Hong Kong, China.
  • Nikhil Joshi
    Senior Lecturer & Associate Director, Graduate Programmes in Architectural Conservation, National University of Singapore, Singapore.
  • Sharmila Ashokan Sankaran
    Cultural Heritage Consultant, India/Singapore.
  • Wan Tingting
    Lecturer, Key Laboratory of Urban and Architectural Heritage Conservation, Southeast University, China.