Informatics Europe Bulletin - March 2020

Dear Members,

We are happy to send you the latest Informatics Europe bulletin, our bi-monthly newsletter for members.

In this issue:

Call for the 2020 Best Practices in Education Award

The Best Practices in Education Award recognizes outstanding European educational initiatives that improve the quality of Informatics teaching and the attractiveness of the discipline. The 2020 Award is devoted to lifelong education in Informatics as a mean to reduce the talent gap. The Award is sponsored by Microsoft and carries a prize of EUR 5,000. Proposals should be submitted electronically, before 1 June 2020.

For more details visit the Best Practices in Education Award page.

Call for the 2020 Minerva Informatics Equality Award

The 2020 Minerva Informatics Equality Award is devoted to gender equality initiatives and policies supporting the transition of female PhD and postdoctoral researchers into faculty positions. The Award seeks to celebrate successful initiatives that have had a measurable impact on the careers of women within the institution. Such initiatives can serve as exemplars of best practices within the community, with the potential to be widely adopted by other institutions. Submissions will need to demonstrate the impact that has been achieved. The Award is sponsored by Google and carries a prize of EUR 5,000. Proposals should be submitted electronically, before 1 June 2020.
 
For more details visit the Minerva Informatics Equality Award page.

Informatics for All 2020 Workshop Webinar

Following the successful Informatics for All Workshop that took place in Brussels in 2019, the Informatics for All Coalition hosted a second Workshop on 17 March 2020. The event was scheduled to take place in Brussels, however, due to COVID-19 crisis, a webinar took place instead. The event included presentations about the progress and status of the activities of the Coalition and the update of the Digital Education Action Plan by the European Commission, followed by a Q&A section with the webinar attendees. Despite the online medium, the discussion has been very effective and the community was able to reinforce the message of how crucial it is for the future of Europe that Informatics becomes part of the curricula of schools across Europe as a foundation discipline from early years.

Academic Leadership Course: Postponed

We regret to inform that unfortunately, due to the current COVID-19 crisis, our intensive 3-day residential Academic Leadership Course, which would have taken place in Vienna on 16-19 June, is postponed until further notice. We will confirm the new dates as soon as possible and are sorry if we caused any inconvenience to those who have already registered. Everyone will be contacted individually by our office to arrange for the return of the reservation fee.

Ethics4EU Multiplier Event: Postponed

We regret to inform that unfortunately, due to the current COVID-19 crisis, the Ethics4EU Multiplier Event, part of the Ethics4EU Erasmus+ project, which would have taken place in Zurich on 7 May, is postponed until further notice. We will confirm the new dates as soon as possible and are sorry if we caused any inconvenience to those who have already planned to attend the event.

Association News

COVID-19 Pandemic Crisis - How it Affects Our Work

The current COVID-19 crisis has affected a number of our planned events and activities, as you have read above. Besides that, this is how Informatics Europe activities have been affected:

• As of March 2020, all our face to face Board and Executive Committee meetings will be held remotely. The meetings in June, which were planned to be face to face in Amsterdam, will be confirmed by mid-May.
• Since 17 March, Switzerland is in a declared state of emergency. Our office staff are in home-office and all meetings are being held remotely. Our offices at the University of Zurich remain accessible (as of 19 March) but only to urgent matters that cannot be solved online. Apart from cancelling our public events, we don’t expect a major impact on our office and Board activities, as our work by essence has always been carried on virtually.

We hope all members and colleagues are in good health and that the crisis will not strongly affect your work.

Board Meetings

• Wednesday, 25 March, 9:30-16:30, Skype (Executive Committee Only)
• Friday, 27 March, 16:00-17:00, Skype
• Friday, 24 April, 16:00-17:00, Skype
• Friday, 4 June*, 9:30-16:30, Amsterdam (Executive Committee Only)
• Friday, 5 June*, 9:30-16:30, Amsterdam 

* To be confirmed if face to face or virtual meeting
 
Don’t forget: as a member representative, you can submit agenda topics and participate as an observer in Board meetings. Let us know in case you are interested in this offer!

New Informatics Europe Members

We are very pleased to welcome the following new member:

• University of Cyprus, Department of Computer Science

Members News

• Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary

We are pleased to inform you about the EIT Digital Summer School on “Machine Learning for Financial Data” in Budapest, Hungary between 12-25 July 2020. The summer school will provide an introduction to the benefits and best practices of machine learning and deep learning in the financial sector. Participants will work on business assignments for innovative use of machine learning in cooperation with companies and start-ups in the Budapest region. The two-week event is open to researchers, industry professionals, Master and PhD students and others who want to deep dive into emerging technologies and learn how to apply them in business situations. A limited number of stipends (scholarships) are available.

• TU Wien, Austria

The 2020 Vienna Workshop on Digital Humanism will take place on 14-15 May and is the follow up of the successful Workshop in April 2019, with the resulting Vienna Manifesto on Digital Humanism. The 2019 workshop was a first gathering and positioning, creating also an international community, the second one in 2020 will focus on realizing Digital Humanism. Digital Humanism is a broad concept dealing with the entire relationship of humans and machines, of informatics and society. This you can see in the topics discussed. We will have sufficient time for discussion, also on how to proceed.

Important note: in the light of the current COVID-19 crisis, the workshop is going to take place either in the normal format with physical presence or online only. This decision will be made before Easter.

New Jobs @ Informatics Europe Job Platform

There are 29 new job openings on the Informatics Europe Job Platform!

Extend your search to attract the best and advertise open positions on the Informatics Europe job platform free of charge!