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Dear Colleague,
This month we celebrate the two proposals recently adopted by the European Commission for a Council Recommendation on enabling informatics education at school and improving digital skills training. We are delighted to see our years of effort on fostering informatics education pays off. Change takes time and commitment, and we want you to spend them right! Mark your calendar to join ECSS 2023, our annual summit devoted to the discussion of common strategic and policy issues in informatics shared across Europe. Read on to find out how we can make a bigger impact together!
In this issue:
EC Calls for Massive Boost in Enabling Informatics Education at School and Enhancing Digital Skills Training
In April, the European Commission (EC) adopted two proposals for a Council Recommendation in the context of the European Year of Skills on enabling digital education and improving digital skills training.
One of them proposes for a “Council Recommendation on improving the provision of digital skills in education and training”, which calls on Member States to start early by providing digital skills in a coherent way through all levels of education and training. It also calls on Member States:
- to support high quality informatics in schools from the start of compulsory education to ensure all students have the opportunity to develop their digital skills through exposure to the core elements of informatics,
- to mainstream the development of digital skills for adults, and
- to address shortages in information technology professions by adopting inclusive strategies.
Another proposes for a “Council Recommendation on the key enabling factors for successful digital education and training” which calls on all Member States to ensure universal access to inclusive and high-quality digital education and training, to address the digital divide, which has become even more apparent during the pandemic, according to the EC’s press release.
Since 2012, IE has been actively advocating for the inclusion of informatics in schools across Europe, including the publication of two reports with ACM Europe: “Informatics Education: Europe cannot afford to miss the boat” and “Informatics Education in Europe: Are We All in the Same Boat?”. In April last year, IE President Enrico Nardelli and then Board Member Michael E. Caspersen were invited to present the Informatics for All publication “Informatics Reference Framework for School” to the EC at a stakeholder consultation meeting in Brussels. Later last year, a Eurydice report on Informatics Education at School in Europe was also published with our President Enrico Nardelli contributing as the report’s Scientific Expert. The report has been referenced for three times in the current EC proposal.
As a core member of the Informatics for All coalition since 2018, IE is thrilled to see our years of efforts – to have informatics recognized as an essential foundational discipline for education – have proven to be constructive, and result in the latest two proposals where the EC pushes for a more uniform approach in providing and improving informatics education across Europe. We look forward to continuing our mission in fostering quality of education in informatics through collaborations with our member institutions and informatics communities, as well as our work at the Informatics for All coalition. With Michael E. Caspersen newly elected as the coalition’s independent Steering Committee Chair, Ángel Velázquez from SCIE, one of our member National Informatics Associations in Spain, will join our President Enrico Nardelli as the current IE representatives at the coalition. Visit our webpage to learn more about our vision and efforts on informatics education.
Oct 23-25: ECSS 2023 in Edinburgh – Save the Date!
Save the date: ECSS 2023 will take place between 23 and 25 October in Edinburgh (UK), co-organised with our member institute the School of Informatics of the University of Edinburgh, who celebrates 60 years of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Computer Science research.
Devoted to crucial and timely strategic issues and trends regarding all aspects of informatics, ECSS continues to be the unique opportunity where we gather for knowledge exchange, networking and strategy-setting activities in informatics and related disciplines. We call for the participation of the community at ECSS 2023, in particular of informatics research and education leaders and decision-makers at all levels. Here are the highlights of this year’s exciting program joined by leading experts across Europe:
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Leaders Workshop: “Diversity and Inclusion in a Multicultural World”
As informatics leaders, how can you bring out the best of your colleagues with various backgrounds and experiences, and accommodate the diversity in a fair and inclusive way? Join us in this session, co-organized with EUGAIN Cost Action and IE’s Diversity and Inclusion Working Group, to share your own experiences and gain insights from others to develop strategies to lead inclusively.
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Professional Development Workshop for Early Career Researchers
Dedicated to PhD students and post-doctorates, this session invites you to reflect on your vision and leadership qualities, devise your research career plan, and complement it with feedback from established researchers. Join also the ECSS poster session to share your research with all ECSS participants to broaden your professional network.
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Main Theme Session: “Informatics: Shaping the Future”
Informatics advances have a profound impact on our way of living, placing great responsibility on us as leaders and researchers in informatics. In this session, we will discuss some of the hot topics, such as quantum computing, health or languages models, and how to leverage our knowledge and talent in shaping our dream future through informatics.
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Two Academia-Industry Sessions
With speaker talks and panel discussions, this session will bring the academic as well as the industrial viewpoints on topics highlighting the needs and challenges around highly topical issues such as life-long learning of informatics professionals and commercialization of research. Don’t miss this unique opportunity to discuss how to jointly tackle these issues as a community.
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AI and the Future of Informatics Education
Co-organised with our member National Informatics Associations and open to all participants, the workshop will focus on the impact on the practice of software engineering education, as well as the broader impacts on the informatics curriculum and educational practices. The progress of the Open Science working group initiatives, discussed at last year’s ECSS, will also be reviewed.
The above program will be complemented by a number of socializing sessions as well as additional sessions by the IE’s Working Groups, presenting their latest results and activities, with discussion on the strategic direction of various IE collaborative platforms for the benefit of the overall informatics community. The full preliminary program is available here. Registration will be open around early June, so keep in touch via our Summit website, LinkedIn and Twitter!
Call for Response: The IE’s Ethics Working Group Survey on Teaching Ethics in Informatics
IE's Ethics Working Group has launched a survey aiming to find out the needs and requirements of informatics lecturers in terms of teaching ethics in informatics and computer science.
The purpose of the Survey is to understand the landscape with respect to the teaching of ethics in computer science and informatics at higher-level education institutes across Europe. The Working Group would like to elicit knowledge to compare with the findings from our Eramus+ Ethics4EU project in 2019, but also to gain an understanding of how other issues (Covid-19, AI regulations, new AI tools, new legislation) have impacted the status quo. Survey results will be used to produce a report and paper to allow a better understanding of the needs and requirements of computer Science lecturers in terms of teaching ethics in computer science and informatics.
The survey is open until 20 June: https://www.informatics-europe.org/survey/index.php/561146. It will take around 15-20 minutes to complete. Regardless of whether your institution teaches ethics in computer science programmes or not, it is important for us to get your feedback on this highly important topic for the community. Thank you for your contribution!
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Informatics Europe partnership contributes to the success of European funded projects such as Ethics4EU. Looking for a pan-European networking partner to strengthen and support your research or education projects? Reach out to us: administration@informatics-europe.org.
First Students Awarded for Joining our CV Repository: Showcase Yourself in Our Talent Hub!
We congratulate two lucky students from our member institutes Université catholique de Louvain and University of Bucharest, who each won a EUR 100 cash prize for being among the first 100 applicants to upload their profiles to our CV Repository. Students and recent graduates of our member institutes still have the chance to be the lucky winners of our two remaining EUR 100 cash prizes, to be drawn among those uploading their profiles by 31 May 2023!
Recruiters interested in accessing the platform as of June are welcome to contact our office for more information. The service is free for our industrial members. Sponsors can gain customized access to our CV Repository by subscribing to one of our sponsorship plans.
We thank once again our members in promoting our CV Repository to their students and networks, which greatly support this strategically relevant service for IE and further advocate collaborations between our new generation of talents with the informatics employers!
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The CV Repository, with platform development sponsored by our industrial member Bending Spoons, is IE’s new career service committed to connecting early career professionals from our member institutions and employers in informatics and related disciplines across Europe.
Association News
Board Meetings
- 26 May (Fri), 09:30-16:30, Zurich
- 30 June (Fri), 16:00-17:00, Zoom
Don’t forget: As a member representative, you can submit agenda topics and participate as an observer in board meetings. Let us know if you’d like to join us!
Executive Committee Meetings
- 25 May (Thu), 09:30-16:30, Zurich
New Informatics Europe Member
We are very pleased to welcome Higher Technical School of Computer Engineering from Universidad Rey Juan Carlos (Spain) as our latest member. The School joined a growing IE membership of over 170 institutions, associations and industry members from over 30 countries. Check out our current members list.
Don’t Miss These IE Activities
- Nominate best practices and best dissertations for this year’s Informatics Europe awards:
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Best Dissertation Award: support young researchers by disseminating their excellent research to the Informatics Europe community and beyond.
The Award carries a prize of EUR 3,000 sponsored by Springer, with an invitation to publish the awarded thesis in a dedicated Springer series. Apply until 15 June 2023.
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Minerva Informatics Equality Award: celebrate successful initiatives that have had a measurable impact on the careers of women at all stages.
The Award carries a prize of EUR 5,000 sponsored by Google. Apply until 30 June 2023.
- The renewed “Gender Equality in Informatics” webinar series continues, featuring award-winning speakers across Europe:
All webinars are free and open to all. Register and review previous webinar materials here.
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Visit our Open Activities webpage to get an overview of how you can contribute and benefit from our activities! Members News
Politecnico di Milano
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Artificial Intelligence: 12 DEIB Professors in the AI 2000 Ranking
12 professors of the Department of Electronics, Information and Bioengineering of the Politecnico di Milano are among the top 2,000 academics in their fields according to the AI 2000 ranking, drawn up by the Chinese Association for Artificial Intelligence (CAAI) and Tsinghua University for the year 2023.
The ranking distinguishes around 20 scientific domains related to artificial intelligence and analyzes indicators using international sources. The considered indicators include publications in the most prestigious international journals and conferences in the field of artificial intelligence and citations in these publication venues. In drawing up the ranking, over 200,000 AI scholars from around the world who have published and presented scientific contributions in the last 10 years (from 2013 to 2022) were examined.
Prof. Stefano Ceri, who inaugurated IE’s scientific webinar series in 2021, is among one of the DEIB professors to be included in the ranking. Read here for the full story.
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5A - Autonomies for Autism: Project Results Presented
The final presentation event of project 5A - Autonomy for Autism Across virtual reality, Augmented reality and Conversational Agents, took place on Friday, March 31.
The project involves the use of interactive applications usable anywhere and anytime via smartphones, tablets and wearable headsets, which integrate Immersive Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality and Conversational Agents and, by creating a continuum between training in the virtual world and experiences in the real world, help people with ASDs to understand the environmental and socio-organisational characteristics of everyday environments and to correctly perform the related activities. Benefits include not only improved abilities, but also emotional-psychological reinforcement and general well-being.
The 5A project was carried out with the contribution of Fondazione TIM (Research call 'Free to communicate. Smart Technologies and Innovation for Autism') and the NRRP project MUSA (Multilayered Urban Sustainability Action/Spoke6 - Innovation for Sustainable and Inclusive Societies). Read here to learn more about the project.
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Would you like to reach out to other IE members? Simply email our Communication Specialist Kit Wan Chui with the relevant news from your institute to get featured in our Bulletin, LinkedIn and Twitter. New Jobs @ Informatics Europe Job Platform
There are 14 new job ads on the Informatics Europe Job Platform.
As members, you can advertise and extend your search to attract the best candidates for your open positions on the IE job platform free of charge!
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