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Project Title: Innovative Competence in Online Higher Education

Project acronym: InCompEdu
Project code: 2020-1-PL01-KA226-HE-096278
Web page: https://erasmus-plus.ec.europa.eu/projects/search/details/2020-1-PL01-KA226-HE-096278

Project Coordinator: University of Gdansk, Poland
Partner institutions:
- University of Turku, Finland
- Univesity of Primorska, Slovenia
- Tor Vergata University of Rome, Italy
- University of Rijeka, Croatia
- University of Alba Iulia, Romania

Participating member of the University of Primorska: University of Primorska, Faculty of mathematics, Natural Sciences and Information Technologies, Slovenia
Project manager at the University of Primorska: Dr. Bužan Elena

Funding:  Erasmus+ Programme
Key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Duration: 1. 4. 2021–31. 3. 2023
Overall budget: 245.284 €

Description:
The InCompEdu project tackles the common challenges in the sudden switch to online teaching at the HEI in the EU, due to COVID-19, by identifying and sharing the good practices, knowledge and experience gained at the partner universities and beyond. The challenges include both mastering of new digital skills and the methodologies of creating and conducting online courses. The project consortium involves 6 academic partners from 6 different countries, that is, Croatia, Finland, Italy, Poland, Romania and Slovenia, led by the University of Gdansk, Poland.

The target groups to be addressed are the community of academic teachers and HEI Authorities responsible for study programmes. These groups have been forced to make rapid changes in course programs and teaching methods. The project’s activities will focus on two aspects, that is, digital competence of academic teachers, and the development of new competences in creation and implementation of online/hybrid courses and innovative curricula.

Regarding the target group of academic teachers, the project will support building their digital competencies in using the IT tools in online higher education through the knowledge gathered and shared by the academic community and experts. The technical possibilities of a variety of platforms will be examined, and the use of individual tools will be demonstrated in practise. Support will be provided in developing of more effective and inspirational curricula for online courses. Regarding the target group of HEI authorities, the project will allow them to gain understanding of the wide range of challenges in online education, concerning not only the technical aspects but also the online classes methodology. Furthermore, the project will promote to exchange of views and building common understanding among those who are responsible for the transition programs on the education system level and those who are responsible for activities and development at the university level. Such initiatives may exist at the university level, but the project activities will strengthen cooperation at the European level.

The outputs of the project include identification of challenges and good practices with transferring to online mode. This output will produce two deliverables, that is, a Report on identified challenges and problems that occurred during the transition to online teaching mode in the Covid-19 pandemic period, and Inspiring good practices - a booklet of educator stories. The Report and Booklet will be based on questionnaires and interviews with academic teachers/experts presenting their success stories in transferring to online education.

Outputs of the project also include "Building the digital competences in the academic community of tomorrow", which focusses on analyzing and finding open educational platforms that can easily be adapted and modified to work within a specific university to meet the needs of remote learning. The key technical problems in remote learning will be identified and appropriate learning management systems examined to fit the needs in various fields of higher education. This output will produce two deliverables, the first of which is a Technical Platforms booklet, presenting IT platforms that are considered to meet most of the expectations for online learning. Those will be chosen by using a Delphi analysis method, which enables reliable and creative examination of ideas and actions with involvement of a wide range of experts. Another deliverable is Filmoteque: the training videos for academic teachers on how to teach using IT systems at various levels of the curriculum. and will cover multiple fields.

The third project's output will be "Reimagining on-line courses for the future of high education" that will develop innovative concepts of effective online classes as well as innovative tools/methods of learning and working in online group stimulating creativity and teamwork. The methodology applied in this output will be Design thinking, which involves teamwork in diverse, interdisciplinary groups, allowing developing of unconventional ideas. In the InCompEdu project, the solutions developed during the DT sessions will be tested during the model online classes. This intellectual output will produce one deliverable - a booklet "Towards effective courses" presenting the results of the workshops conducted in accordance with the DT methodology and tested during model lectures/classes.

Innovativeness of the project lies in benchmarking and exchange of best practices with other European universities. InCompEdu project is expected to provide deeper and wider understanding of practices at the European level and push to have a critical look of the choices made and search for points of improvement. Before all, the project is expected to support peer learning and exchange of experiences and end up with new jointly developed methodologies and inspiration from colleagues at the European level.