Repubblica Digitale project is a national strategic initiative promoted by the Department for Digital Transformation of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers to «combat the cultural digital in the Italian population, to support digital inclusion and promote education on the technologies of the future, accompanying the process of the digital transformation of the country».

The aim of Repubblica Digitale is to create an «alliance» of public and private entities, which has as its reference point the Manifesto of Repubblica Digitale and which operates as a community of co-design, sharing and collaboration. In order to adhere to the Manifesto, the proposed initiatives must relate to three areas:

1. basic digital literacy and overcoming the digital cultural divide;
2. development of digital skills for work; and
3. education in emerging technologies and the dissemination of digital culture.

Repubblica Digitale proposes the idea that supporting the digital transformation of the country with educational and cultural actions is a common civic duty for the State, businesses and individuals. For this reason, all members of society, starting from the media, schools and families, can contribute in a decisive way to overcome the gaps that currently divide the country.

STEAMonEdu has been listed among valuable Italian and European initiatives proposed by public and private entities that will help Repubblica Digitale in reaching the objectives foreseen by the Manifesto.

On 30 April, at the IEEE EDUCON2020 Conference, Natalia Spyropoulou and Achilles Kameas, members of the STEAMonEdu project team of Computer Technology Institute and Press “Diophantus” (CTI), presented the scientific paper “STEM Educator challenges and professional development needs: the educators’ views”.

The IEEE EDUCON2020 conference was the eleventh in a series of conferences that rotate among central locations in IEEE Region 8 (Europe, Middle East and North Africa). This year, the conference focused on «Engineering Education for the Future in a Multicultural and Smart World» and took place online, due to the pandemic. EDUCON is the flagship conference of the IEEE Education Society.

The paper summarized preliminary results regarding the challenges and professional development needs of STEM Educators based on a survey that was conducted using an online questionnaire. The data was collected across 19 different cities/regions of Greece, including remote islands and included 59 respondents (26 women), who at the time of the study had implemented STE(A)M-related courses through formal and non-formal education in preschool, primary and secondary education.

The preliminary results show that educators need support with appropriate equipment, infrastructure and resources alongside with a reform of the education system in order to support STE(A)M education. In addition, professional development of educators is considered necessary, however, there is a need to understand in-depth the skills and competences that a STE(A)M educator should possess.

The presentation led to a fruitful exchange of ideas during the discussion that followed, also causing strong interest of the participants for the activities and future actions related to STEAMonEdu project.

STEAMonEdu Project was presented on 22 May 2020 at the scientific webinar entitled “Integrating Computational Thinking-Computing and the Epistemology of STEM through the model of Computational Pedagogy”. It was a successful webinar and extraordinary in terms of participation –  it hosted 110 participants in the virtual room plus 340 participants on youtube livestreaming.

Dr. Achilleas Kameas and Dr. Spyridon Papadakis from DAISSy Research Group – CTI, coordinator of STEAMonEdu project, provided the participants with all the necessary information on the ways a teacher, an educator, or a researcher can get actively involved in the STEAMonEdu European Community. They also outlined the benefits and opportunities of being an active member of the STEAMonEdu online platform, which has been recently launched.

The Regional Educational Center of the Regional Directorate of Primary and Secondary Education of Western Greece, as an official public educational training provider of the Greek Educational System helped the participants – educators of different disciplines (humanitarian scientists as well as natural sciences and new technologies scientists) to familiarize with good practices in the field of Computational Thinking and STEM or even STE(A)M education. The discussion around STEM and STEAM oriented good practices shifted the focus to the need of supporting the STEAMonEdu European Community through the online STEAMonEdu platform for further interaction and dialogue.

Scientix is a community for teaching and learning science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). It promotes and supports a Europe-wide collaboration among STEM teachers, education researchers, policymakers and other STEM education professionals. Each of these groups can benefit from Scientix activities and events.

Scientix also collects and promotes best practices in science teaching and learning in Europe, and organises training and workshops for STEM teachers. To this end, it offers a repository of European or national projects about STEM education.

You can check our project description in the Scientix library here!

First, Achilles Kameas of CTI presented our STEAMonEdu project and emphasised the importance and potential of collaboration and synergies among our three projects.

CHOICE project was presented by Chiara Venturella of the co-ordinating organisation CESIE. CHOICE, which has the same timeframe as our STEAMonEDU for 2020-2021, aims to promote and improve STEM education at schools by designing innovative Open Educational Resources (OERs) collected in a MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) that will increase the professional competences of teachers by equipping them with a STE(A)M approach of teaching.

The main outputs of CHOICE include:

• State of the Art study, Reflective practice case-study compendium, Framework for reforming STEM curricula & Comparative Piloting Analysis.

• Working guidelines “Non-formal education for promoting co-production of educational resources”, OERs & MOOC.

• Good practice tool CHOICE@SCHOOL, Policy recommendations.

Then Evita Tasiopoulou of European SchoolNet, coordinating organisation of the STE(A(M) IT, talked about their project, which started a bit earlier than the other two – in November 2019 and which already has had first results and is preparing to launch their MOOC.

STE(A)M IT project aims to strengthen the educational landscape by promoting innovative and cross-disciplinary approaches to STE(A)M teaching in education. The outcomes to promote innovative integrated STE(A)M practices at school level include:

So what do we have in common and what differentiates the three projects?

STEAMIT and STEAMonEdu both strive to define the competences of STE(A)M educators by investigating and engaging educators of formal and non-formal education. CHOICE differentiates by taking into account the needs of the students in STEM and STE(A)M Education and actively involves them along with educators in Creative Leadership Teams keeping them close to the labour market and STEM/STE(A)M career oriented approaches during the implementation of the project. Many common elements were also identified under our common goal, and partners discussed how the three projects complement each other. For example, all the three projects will create MOOCs, however, STEAMIT MOOC is aimed at  educators and starts in October of 2020, STEAMonEdu’s MOOC for educators is planned for 2021, and CHOICE MOOC will address students, so all interested  participants will be able to follow all of them.

We discussed the outcomes of our projects so far, our very first impressions regarding the future of policy reform in STE(A)M education, and our common findings regarding the continuously arising interest of all education professionals and policy makers across Europe.

We also had an extensive conversation on possible future synergies, potential collaboration, and how our projects complement each other something that unites us under the main common goal – to boost STEAM education!

We look forward to working together! Our highly regarded researchers’ team strongly believes that Team Work makes the Dream Work.

Jump with us,

                 let’s make this community larger,

                                       enroll to our platform,

                                                             join our vision!

You have a CHOICE to STEAMIT with STEAMonEdu!!!

Stay tuned – a lot of interesting things are being planned for the near future!

By RDWG and ALL DIGITAL

On 22 June, at the European Distance and e-Learning Network (EDEN) Conference, Natalia Spyropoulou and Achilles Kameas, members of the STEAMonEdu project team of Computer Technology Institute and Press “Diophantus” (CTI), presented the scientific paper “Methodology for the Development of a Competence Framework for STE(A)M Educators”.

The EDEN2020 is an annual conference organized by European Distance and e-Learning Network and aims to maximise the potential to exchange academic and professional experience, to promote effective navigation in the field, and improve the quality and depth of information available to the sectors concerned. This year, the conference focused on “Inspiring digital education for the next STE(A)M student generation” and took place online, due to the pandemic.

The STEAMonEdu project aims to increase the adoption and impact of STE(A)M education by investing in the community of stakeholders and the professional development of educators. Focusing on the professional development of educators, it aims firstly to compile a competence framework for STE(A)M educators and then design appropriate training offers.

Τhe presented paper outlines a brief overview concerning the competency-based perspective, in order at first, to identify the challenges and the current research within this topic for STE(A)M education and then to provide the methodology for the development of the Competence Framework for STE(A)M Educators, based on a modified Delphi technique where educators take part during the development phases.

The presentation was followed by a fruitful discussion, where attendees asked more information about the activities and future actions related to the STEAMonEdu project.

On July 17, at the IISA2020 Conference, Natalia Spyropoulou and Achilles Kameas, members of the STEAMonEdu project team of Computer Technology Institute and Press “Diophantus” (CTI), presented the scientific paper “Investigating the role of STE(A)M Educators: a case study in Greece”.

The IISA (Information, Intelligence, Systems and Applications) Conference was the eleventh in a series of international conferences, which offers a forum for the constructive interaction and prolific exchange of ideas among scientists and practitioners from different research fields – such as computers, mathematics, physics, biology, education, chemistry, experimental psychology, social sciences, linguistics, and engineering.

The presented paper summarized a study that compares the outcomes of previous research with the results of a survey of 59 Greek educators, who have implemented STE(A)M-related courses. Based on the responses through the specially designed close-ended questionnaire, the educators’ perceptions were identified and analyzed. Based on these, the authors assessed the importance of different traits and competences that a STE(A)M educator should have. Furthermore, the research showed evidence that there are some differences in educators’ perceptions depending on their academic background, mostly on teaching and professional development aspects.

The presentation led to a fruitful exchange of ideas during the discussion that followed, also causing strong interest of the participants for the activities and future actions of STEAMonEdu project related to the development of the competence framework for STE(A)M educators and the training curriculum to support their professional development.

By CTI

The Panhellenic eTwinning Conference has now become an institution in the consciousness of the educational community and approximately 30,000 eTwinners teachers and educators. The 6th Panhellenic eTwinning Conference was scheduled to be held in Thessaloniki in March 2020, but due to the special circumstances of Covid-19 it took place online on 3-5 July 2020. Teacher enrollments exceeded 1,600.

STEAMonEdu was presented in one of the round tables of the conference entitled ‘Our experience from the Covid-19 era. The next day. Proposals ‘, coordinated by Nikos Tzimopoulos (member of EYY eTwinning) and with participants Panagiotis Anastasiadis (University of Crete), Charitonas Polatoglou (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki), Spyros Papadakis (Regional Directorate of Education of Western Greece RDEWG), Anastasios Barbas (IKY).

Dr Spiros Papadakis, member of our STEAMonEdu researchers and Head Researcher of the RDEWG’s STEAMonEdu team shared with the participants the expected results of the project, the online platform and the multiple benefits of being a member of the STEAMonEdu European Community.

The Conference was honoured by the presence of the General Secretary of Primary Education, Secondary Education and Special Education Ms. Anastasia Gika of the Greek Ministry of Education who in her closing remarks stressed out the high quality and attractiveness of the 57 lectures and scientific presentations, the 13 workshops and the 2 round tables. Also Irene Pateraki, Pedagogical and Monitoring Manager of European SchoolNet, congratulated all presenters and participants for their enthusiasm and devotion in upscaling the educational procedure in Europe.

By RDEWG

On 7-8 October 2020,  our project partner ALL DIGITAL, a pan-European association working in the field of digital inclusion and empowerment, will organise its 13^th annual summit ONLINE. The event is run in collaboration with ALL DIGITAL German members Helliwood – also a STEAMonEdu partner, JOBLINGE, and Digital Opportunities Foundation. It brings together representatives of networks and organisations working to enhance digital skills of European citizens.

ALL DIGITAL Summit 2020 is supported by the Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy of the Federal Government of Germany, which has the Presidency of the European Union from 1 July to 31 December 2020. The German Government has made digital learning one of the key priorities for education and training during their EU Presidency.

The theme of the Summit is “Competences for the Future”, and keynotes, panels, lightning talks and workshops will be organised around these four topics:

• Towards a version 2.2 of DigComp > DIGCOMP
• The future of digital competence centres > FUTURE
• Recognition of digital competence certificates in Europe > CERTIFICATION
• Lessons learned during Covid-19 > LESSONS

Check the PROGRAMME to learn more about the sessions.

STEAMonEdu Project at the Summit

Our STEAMonEdu partnership will run a workshop «STE(A)M Education practices and competences» on 8 October. The aim of the workshop is to discuss the characteristics of STE(A)M Education good practices and the competences of STE(A)M educators. During the workshop,

• STEAMonEdu partners will give an overview of STE(A)M education and introduce characteristics of a STE(A)M education good practice;
• STE(A)M educators will share good practices that they have developed and used in the classroom; and
• for the first time the consortium will present the STE(A)M education competence framework.
• Participants will have the opportunity to discuss the presented STE(A)M education practice evaluation framework and the STE(A)M education competence framework.

How to participate?

Registration for the event is mandatory, please fill in the REGISTRATION FORM by 1 October 2020.

Summit website: summit.all-digital.org

Are you an Educator? A school principal? A VET provider? An educational policy maker? Or are you just curious, eh?

This workshop is for YOU!

Here is why:

STE(A)M education grew out of STEM education, where the “A” is a term that represents fields such as liberal arts, language arts, social studies, physical arts, fine arts etc. and its aim is to apply creative thinking to STEM projects, igniting students’ imagination and creativity through the arts. Although it is commonly accepted that basic STEM competences are critical for succeeding in most of the technical, engineering and even managerial jobs, several studies have shown that the without the “Αrts” it is impossible for students to reach their full potential!

The workshop «STE(A)M Education practices and competences» will be organised by the STEAMonEdu project consortium on 8 October at 10:00-11:30 CET as part of the ALL DIGITAL Summit.You need to register for the Summit to be able to join the workshop.