A university supporting a wide range of courses and research

Universitat Pompeu Fabra is Catalonia's fourth publicly funded university. It is a young university, yet it already has its own little slice of history: it was founded in 1990 with 316 students taking two degree courses, and today it has 9,000 students, fourteen degree courses and an expanding campus in the heart of Barcelona. The Interactive Technology group (GTI) will participate in this project. GTI focuses on interactive multimedia and networks, and its current work includes cooperative environments, intelligent web portals, educational telematics, geographical information systems

The GTI leads UPF participation in UNFOLD, and is coordinator of the project. UNFOLD is funded by the European Commission to support the adoption of eLearning specifications supporting multiple learners and flexible pedagogies, and is focusing on IMS-LD. GTI also led the SCOPE project, which developed a prototype on-line course for in service training of medical specialists.The group is also a core member of SIGOSSEE, which supports a Special Interest Group on open source software in education, and provides access to publications, discussions and collaborative activities. The large number of seminaries, meetings and workshops in which the Group is involved, and the collaboration in many publications, forum and web sites gives it a high capacity to disseminate and valorise the project results.

UPF are lead partners/co-ordinators of the project with a special interest in IMS Learn Design. It is also undertaking technical development and assistance to support the production of IMS-LD Units of Learning by other partners (in particular ÀGORA).

Vienna University of Technology (Technische Universität Wien - TU Wien) is the biggest technical university in Austria with about 2,000 employees and 20,000 students. TU Wien has a big pedagogical, scientific and research potential which covers also the expert areas of the proposed project. The TU Wien has co-ordinated and participated in many projects that can be used as a basis for the current proposal, both at the national and international level. At different departments of TU Wien, a wide range of eLearning offers based on a variety of systems and methods has been implemented. The Vienna University of Technology offers many continuing education courses since more than 20 years and has developed expertise in applying eLearning to these vocational training offers. With support by the European Commission, it deals with the development of the best methods for applying eLearning in vocational educational training. TU Wien is a member of several international networks (e.g. SEFI, IACEE, EUCEN, EDEN) and co-operates intensively with regional associations (e.g. Economic Chamber).

TU Wien's role in the project is as a VET provider; it will be producing some IMS-Learning-Design Units of Learning during the project.

Köln University is the largest university in Germany with around 65.000 students enrolled. Experience in e-Learning dates back to the middle-90ies when the first projects in supporting teaching and learning with information technology were launched. VIRTUS, 1997, launched and managed by the "Research Institute for European Questions and Political Sciences", was an intra-university project of the department of Economics, Business Administration and Social Sciences with more than 30 professor involved. The focus of VIRTUS was not principally on IT, but on models for organising and maintaining content production at reasonable prices. Also managed and led by the Insitute is another important German e-Learning project, PolitikON. This brought together all institutes and Chairs for Political Sciences in Germany on a common platform. A third project of national and international relevance run from the Institute is the "ILIAS open source" Learning Management System. Experience in content production and project management on international level has been gained in the cooperation of European management schools within the CEMS framework and in EU-funded projects.

The Institute's role in the project is to provide an academic perspective on VET activities undertaken in the project, and in particular will lead evaluation and quality assurance. They will also contribute their strengths in content production and links and carry out some demonstration work.

OU Miksike is an "open source" organisation in educational publishing and online support, working with regular schools, vocational training insitutions and life-long learning communities. It distributes more than 20000 free worksheets in HTML- called eWorksheets and offering a set of collaborative learning services. Miksike has beem awarded several international and national awards and recognitions including the winner of the Stockholm Challenge Award 2000, Sweden; Best Practices in Education, USA; Conexiones, Colombia 2000, nominated to the World Summit Award 2003. In 2002 Miksike was awarded European Language Label for successful language learning practices. In recent years Miksike has organized years nearly a hundred online learning collaborative events/activities in Estonia and also internationally. Bigger international projects organized by Miksike are: in 1998 The Dino contest, 1999/2002 Environment and in 2002 Adjective contest and TQ Quiz Cup and MentalMath e-Xcitement 2003. Participants from more then 70 countries have participated in these activities. The organisation started 1994 in the non-profit organization “Miks ja Millepärast”, which works successfully till today with projects with small rural schools and Russian speaking minorities in the Baltics. Miksike now has 11 project managers and approx 1000 volunteering contributors online (pupils, teachers, parents). It is used each day by more then 20,000 learners (teachers/pupils).

OU Miksike's role in the project is as a VET provider; it will be producing some IMS-Learning-Design Units of Learning during the project.

ÀGORA is a non-profit making association of adults who do not hold academic degrees. Many people have been excluded for many spheres of social participation because they lack these qualifications. To solve this situation, on 1986 the Association of current participants AGORA was established with the main aim of promoting the managing ability and initiative of people.

On one hand, AGORA provides support for all kind of activities for women and men without academic degrees. On the other, it offers a wide range of cultural activities for those sectors of the community which lack them. Through these actions, people not only obtain an educational training which gives them access to the labour market but also enables them to participate more widely in society. AGORA is based on democratic participation. Everyone who participates in Agora does so on equal terms, and has the opportunity to participate in the decision spaces without exclusion.

AGORA has wide experience in the ICT sector, and since 1999 a computer lab has been in use. This is used both for learning ICT and studying other areas using ICT. Both of are addressed to people with low levels of education and/or ICT skills, as well as in high risk social situations (women, immigrants, cultural minorities, etc.) The ABE-Campus project, coordinated by AGORA, is creating a Virtual Campus with plentiful educational resources for adults in Basic levels of Education.

AGORA's role in the project is as a VET provider; it will be producing some IMS-Learning-Design Units of Learning during the project.

The Distance Education Centre - was established at Kaunas University of Technology in 1996 in the framework of PHARE project “Multi-Country Co-Operation in Distance Education". Its mission is to promote and develop higher and further education system supported by information communication technologies. The Centre cooperates with industry and the business sector, with formal and non formal educational institutions, and with governmental and non governmental organisations. The Distance Education Centre is a member of National Distance Education Association (NDEA), Lithuanian Association of Adult Education (LAAE), Nordic-Baltic Countries Distance Education Association (BOLDIC), Distance Education Collaboration Network in the Baltic Sea Region (DECNET). Among the centres principal activities are

• Development of Distance Education methodology for authors, tutors and administrators
• Tutors training
• Preparation and delivery of Distance Education courses
• Accumulation of Distance Education library
• Research in Distance Education (needs, methodologies, technologies etc.)
• Co-ordination of video conference network
• Formation and support of virtual learning environments

The Distance Education Centre's role in the project is as a VET provider; it will be producing some IMS-Learning-Design Units of Learning during the project. It will also make use of its geographic position and connections to evaluate and promote the use of the OpenDock system in the new member states.

ICT Software Company

RayCom BV, Netherlands - is a Dutch software research and development company. Founded in 1997, RayCom has a growing reputation in the field of web based applications for knowledge-sharing, knowledge development solutions and business intelligence solutions. RayCom has a particular expertise in database design and server side programming. RayCom developed MindNotes, a new knowledge-sharing tool, built in Open Source, which is now in beta-testing. RayCom also developed Discuss, a discussion-platform for knowledge sharing on the Internet, which is developed to start discussions, keep discussions going and evaluate them in a structuralized manner.

Over the first half of 2004 RayCom has developed a Self-Evaluation Tool for community development projects in Ireland, which is currently being used by 170 projects. RayCom is experienced in the development of Internet and Intranet-applications and environments for SMEs in the Netherlands particularly in the pharmaceutical industry. On an international level, RayCom has been working on innovative ideas in ICT development with a growing interest and confidence in using and developing Open Source Software.

RayCom's role in the project is as technology developer; it will be producing, documenting and supporting the repository software during the project.

KnowNet is a small software, research and web services company located in Wales. It was founded in 2000 to research and develop new architectures, ideas and internet software for collaborative knowledge development and learning. Since 2003 it has been particularly active in developing open-source solutions within the Zope and Plone frameworks, and in promoting open-source, open standards and component architectures for creating better online learning and collaboration environments.

KnowNet is responsible for the project's public website (the site you are curently looking at), and for producing several process documents promised as part of the project's development planning.