We have been the initiator of a number of successful sustainable initiatives transforming research and pilot projects into long-term oriented ventures. In the field of e-learning quality, we have contributed to the creation of EFQUEL, the European Foundation for Quality in e-learning, a stable and broad network active as a forum for research and exchange of practices and visions in the field of learning quality. To support long-term cooperation between European and Latin American stakeholders in fields related to the Information Society, MENON has created the VIT@LIS network , counting with more than 400 members all over the two regions and active in exchanging experiences and solutions in the fields of e-learning, e-health, e-government, e-inclusion, etc. In the field of innovation in learning, MENON has been the initiator of the Learnovation Roundtable , an aggregation of the main European networks active in the field of ICT and innovation in Education and Training systems.

We pursue the approach of network-based sustainability. This concept is grounded on the idea that, in typical international collaboration process and even more in knowledge-intensive processes, sustainability cannot be based on individual results or on individual institutions, but must rely on the capacity to link with dynamic structures (the networks) that establish continuity of action in a given field of activity. This allows avoiding some typical problems of sustainability and exploitation activities, such as the tendency of treating research results and services as “own products” and of “marketing” them, therefore losing credibility among stakeholders, or the practice of relying on a single actor to make the results of a specific project sustainable, whether within the project – typically the project coordinator, or outside the project, typically a possible funding agency.