The Week of Geospatial Information (GI)-Education for the Future

The enhancement of digital skills and competences nowadays is high on the agenda of the European Commission and many member states. Among these digital skills also are the many skills required to work with geospatial data and technologies. Higher education institutions in Europe have been teaching and developing these geographic information (GI) skills for many decades, continuously updating their curricula and implementing innovative teaching methods. The Week of GI-Education for the Future aims to bring together teachers, experts, practitioners and students to present and discuss recent advances in GI-education and think about GI-education for the future.

The Week of GI-Education for the Future will highlight the challenges and opportunities of GI-education in preparing the workforce of the future. Actors and organizations involved or interested in GI-education are invited to participate in this event to learn more about innovative practices, collaborative efforts and anticipating future skills needs, and to share their own experiences and thoughts on GI-education for the future.

Agenda of the week

The Week of GI-Education for the Future is a virtual event, consisting of daily sessions in the week of 25 – 29 January 2021. These sessions will feature several live presentations by experts and key stakeholders in the field of GI and geomatics, demonstrations of innovative tools and practices, and interactive discussions. Each session will focus on a particular topic.

Session 1: Challenges and approaches for bringing higher education closer to market needs (Monday 25 January, 15:00 – 17:00)

Link: Click here to join the Day 1 meeting

Speakers:           

• Maria Vittoria D’Inzeo (European Commission – DG Defence Industry and Space)
• Milva Carbonaro (GISIG – EO4GEO Project Coordinator)
• Željko Bačić (University of Zagreb – GEOBIZ Project Coordinator)
• Jan Schulze Althoff (Bochum University of Applied Sciences – SPIDER Project Coordinator)
• Glenn Vancauwenberghe (KU Leuven – SEED4NA Project Coordinator)
• Sven Casteleyn (Universidad Jaume I)

Session 2: New and innovative forms of business-academia cooperation in GI-education: a problem-based learning approach (Tuesday 26 January, 15:00 – 17:00)

Link: Click here to join the Day 2 meeting

Speakers: 

• Branko Bozic (University of Belgrade)
• Danny Vandenbroucke (KU Leuven)
• Ander Östman (Novogit)
• Mirza Ponjavić and Almir Karabegović (GAUSS)
• Andreas Wytzisk (Bochum University of Applied Sciences)

Session 3: Innovative and open methods in teaching and learning on GI and Spatial Data Infrastructures: from curriculum design to classroom implementation  (Wednesday 27 January, 15:00-17:00)

Link: Click here to join the Day 3 meeting

Speakers:            

• Glenn Vancauwenberghe (KU Leuven)
• Hrvoje Tomić (University of Zagreb)
• Barbara Hofer (University of Salzburg)
• Tomáš Řezník (Masaryk University)
• Frederika Welle Donker (TU Delft)
• Niina Käyhkö (University of Turku)

Session 4: Innovative GI-education through collaboration in and between different parts of the world (Thursday 28 January, 15:00-17:00)

Link: Click here to join the Day 4 meeting

Speakers:            

• Joep Crompvoets and Markéta Potůčková (EuroSDR)
• Carlos Granell Canut (Universitat Jaume I)
• Mejdi Kaddour and Noureddine Aribi (University of Oran 1)
• Serena Coetzee (University of Pretoria)
• Ann Johnson and Nicole Ernst (GeoTech Center)
• Ali Mansourian (Lund University)

Organizers

The Week of GI-Education for the Future is organized within the framework of four Erasmus+ projects in the geospatial domain.

• EO4GEO – Towards an innovative strategy for skills development and capacity building in the space geoinformation sector (http://www.eo4geo.eu)
• GEOBIZ – Business driven problem-based learning for academic excellence in geoinformatics (http://geobiz.eu)
• SEED4NA – SDI and EO Education and Training for North Africa (http://seed4na.eu)
• SPIDER – Open Spatial Data Infrastructure Education Network (https://sdispider.eu)