17 Rooms-X

Overview

Are you part of a community or organization looking to make a greater impact on sustainable development priorities? We are looking for action-oriented collaborators around the world who are interested in using the 17 Rooms methodology to advance their local priorities for advancing the world’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Selected communities and organizations may receive targeted resources that will support the implementation of the 17 Rooms-X methodology to your specific context. In-kind resources may include advice and consultation on how to adopt and adapt 17 Rooms-X and participation in a global community of global SDG leaders and practitioners.

Please complete the form below if your community or organization would like to be part of the next wave of 17 Rooms-X experimentation. It should take 15-20 minutes to complete.

Please contact 17Rooms@brookings.edu if you have any questions.

About 17 Rooms-X

17 Rooms is a novel approach to advancing the economic, social, and environmental priorities embedded in the world’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As a set of evolving methods, 17 Rooms-X helps communities identify bottom-up, next-step actions to advance the SDGs. This includes contexts where local priorities align with the SDGs but might not already use the jargon of the SDGs.

Three design principles help define 17 Rooms:

1. All SDGs get a seat at the table. Insights and priorities are valued equally across all the specialist communities focused on individual dimensions of the SDGs.
2. Take a next step, not the perfect step. Participants are encouraged to identify—and collaborate on—actions that are “big enough to make a difference, and small enough to get done”.
3. Conversations, not presentations. Discussions are structured around collaboration and peer-learning, aiming to focus on what’s best for an issue, not any individual organization

Cities, non-profits, and universities have already used 17 Rooms-X to advance local SDG action. George Mason University (Virginia, USA) adapted the methods to discover and coordinate SDG-related research activities and link these to the university’s community engagement. In East Central Florida (USA), 17 Rooms-X helped weave together and accelerate regional multi-stakeholder efforts for a multi-year resilience planning process. This year, Cepei (Colombia) is leading a regional policy engagement across over 10 countries in Latin America. Many others have experimented with 17 Rooms approaches across Canada, Iceland, Mexico, Nigeria, and Spain.

Explore 17 Rooms-X

Do you think 17 Rooms methods could help your community or organization connect for greater action toward the SDGs? We are keen to collaborate with more communities around the world and explore a growing “menu” of applications. 17 Rooms-X could potentially be helpful for aims ranging from strategic planning for an organization to staff engagement for large employers or policy alignment across diverse stakeholders.  If you are keen to explore this with us, please complete this form to be part of the next wave of 17 Rooms-X experimentation!