About
Discover our mission and explore how the Transition Makers Toolbox builds on the Inner Development Guide. Get inspired, start integrating the tools into your education and help spread the word!
In a rapidly changing world shaped by major societal transitions, education plays a crucial role in preparing students to navigate complexity, lead change and create a sustainable future.
Our mission is to support higher education professionals with concrete methods and tools to foster essential affective and collaborative skills — empowering students to engage with global challenges thoughtfully and resiliently.
Affective learning helps students build vital skills and attitudes: the ability to collaborate and reflect, connect perspectives, bridge differences, experiment, challenge the status quo, and stay resilient under pressure.
Collaborating for Transformative Education
The Transition Makers Toolbox is a collaborative initiative of the Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies (IIS) at the University of Amsterdam and the alliance of Technical University Eindhoven, Wageningen University & Research, Utrecht University and University Medical Centre Utrecht (EWUU), supported by the Teaching & Learning Centre of the University of Amsterdam and Liberal Arts and Sciences and University College Utrecht at Utrecht University.
Together with educators across higher education institutions in the Netherlands, we have developed practical tools for teachers to implement affective and transdisciplinary learning into their classrooms. These tools aim to equip students with the cognitive, affective and collaborative abilities to drive meaningful societal change.
The Inner Development Guide
The Inner Development Guide 2.0 identifies 25 essential skills and qualities across five dimensions — Being, Thinking, Relating, Collaborating and Acting — that support the personal and collective growth needed to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. It emphasizes how human capabilities are deeply interconnected within evolving societal systems.
The Transition Makers Toolbox translates these key skills into intended learning outcomes and hands-on learning activities paired with assessment, tailored for higher education. The Toolbox offers educators step-by-step guidance to embed affective and transdisciplinary learning into their teaching, helping students prepare for meaningful societal impact through innovative, future-oriented education.
The first version of the Transition Makers Toolbox built on the Inner Development Framework, which was published in 2022 and identified 23 skills and qualities. In September 2025, the new version of the IDG framework was published: the IDG 2.0 (version 7.2). The Transition Makers Toolbox was updated to align with the IDG 2.0 in February 2026.
Differences between the Inner Development Framework 2022 and IDG 2.0
The IDG 2.0 moved away from calling it a ‘framework’ and calling it a ‘guide’, as “the word doesn’t reflect […] openness and willingness to be flexible, to learn and to grow” (The New Division, 2025). Moreover, the descriptions of the five dimensions (and most subtitles) have been revised. The framework has expanded from 23 to 25 skills: five skills were updated or replaced, and two new skills were added. The skill descriptions have also been rewritten.
After publication of the IDG 2.0, the Transition Maker Toolbox Team evaluated the changes in the framework and the consequences for the tools in the Transition Makers Toolbox. The IDG 2.0 was found fitting to the current outline of the Toolbox and some small changes were implemented: descriptions were updated, several learning goals were reformulated as a consequence, new IDGs were added and tools were reorganized to fit with the current IDGs.
