EU GRANT:

1 000 000,00 SEK

PROJECT SUMMARY

The EMDIAC project is about the digital transformation of societies in the Baltic Sea region. It will focus on cooperation between universities providing high quality education and research. 

EMDIAC stresses that the impact of digitalization is profound, affecting nearly all spheres of life. Yet, higher education has been slow in recognizing the scale of it. The project suggests that this is particularly true in the social sciences. It is also challenging that universities not only have to figure out how to teach topics related to digital transformation, but that they are themselves expected to function as modern and digital organizations. Moreover, EMDIAC notes that there are inherent digital divides, both within and between countries, and that digitalization might pose a threat to democratic societies through violation of human rights and interference in decision-making. 

The purpose of the project is to establish a long-term cooperation between the partners. The goal is to strengthen their capabilities to provide high quality education and research, and promote innovation in the context of digitalization. The activities include a round of online and onsite webinars, study visits and workshops. These activities will be based on carefully chosen topics of mutual interests.

OBJECTIVES

We wants to establish a long-term and strategic cooperation among Linköping University (Sweden), University of Tartu (Estonia) and Dnipro University of Technology (Ukraine), in order to strengthen the partners’ capabilities of designing and providing high quality education, conducting cutting-edge research and promoting innovation in higher education in the context of the digital transformation that affects all aspects of government, economy and society. 

In line with this purpose, the following objectives are proposed: 

• Building capacity of participating universities to provide high-quality Social Science education and research on topics related to the digital transformation of government, economy and society. 

• Exchanging ideas, experiences and best practices in the realm of curriculum reform designed to bring Social Science curricula ‘up to speed’ with the realities of digital state and society. 

• Improving online teaching and learning at the participating universities through exchange of experiences and best practices. 

• Promoting the modernization of universities as organizations by sharing best practices in the realm of digitalization of processes, workflows, infrastructures, information systems and services 

• Reducing digital gaps between universities and, in the longer term, between countries by sharing know-how and best practices, and modernizing higher education to ensure that graduates are prepared to cope and contribute in the increasingly digitalized world.