The Ubiquitous Computing, Mobile Computing and the Internet of Things technologies (shortly UMI) represent the most recent attempt to move computer technology to education and to everyday life. Also, the European society should actively communicate and cooperate with the scientific community, working side by side for the establishment of more responsible scientific practices, so as to enable the structuring of citizen-centric policies. The quality of school education in science and mathematics has become even more important asset for the European society. This is our common concern because the number of students enrolling natural science studies across the Europe is declining. New talents should be recruited for science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) domains, to fertilize and further promote excellence, since the capital of the European science and technology system depends mostly on its capacity for talent and ideas. Thus, STEM should be made more attractive to young people, regardless of their gender. Society should be aware of scientific results and be engaged to innovation activities. The real driving for educational change is the teacher. Under this scope, UMI technologies emerge both as educational means but, most importantly, as support mechanism for developing powerful careers in domains such as STEM.
The broad aim of the UMI-Sci-Ed project is to investigate the introduction of UMI technologies in education, targeting in particular 14-16 aged youngsters in European countries. Especially, the project aims to offer novel educational services, implement innovative pedagogies and enhance students’ and teachers’ creativity, socialisation and scientific citizenship. We intend to put these state-of-the-art technologies in practice, so as to enhance the level of STEM education that youngsters
are receiving, and at the same time make attractive the prospect of pursuing a career in domains pervaded by UMI.
In order to realise the abovementioned aims, the project provides a tranquil environment for educational activities, where technology itself will not star but support the stakeholders of education, including, the educational community, the industry, career consultants and educational authorities and policy makers. To this end, communities of practice (CoP) will be formed dynamically around UMI projects implemented at schools, including representatives of all necessary stakeholders.
As core objectives, the project delivers:
-Novel educational services
- Career consultancy services
- Supporting software and hardware tools
- Dissemination of the project ideas and results.
