ERNIST |
Spring
Day Focus |
| ERNIST PROJECT WINS eLEARNING
AWARDS ERNIST Schoolportraits won the European eLearning award (eureleA) in the category 'Journalism and Reporting' at the prize-giving ceremony on 14 February 2005 in Karlsruhe. ERNIST is an eLearning Programme project coordinated by European Schoolnet, that has brought together researchers and education inspectorates from The Netherlands, the UK, Finland, Austria and Switzerland to investigate and exchange effectively their insights into the use of ICT in schools. The final report of the ERNIST project was presented to the European Commission on 7 February 2005. » Read more |
COMMISSIONER
FIGEL' VISITS EUROPEAN SCHOOLNET Commissioner Ján Figel' responsible for education, training, culture and
multilingualism visited the EUN Office on 10 February to chat with schools all
over Europe. The chat was organised as part of Spring Day in Europe and followed a similar chat on 31 January 2005 involving the Research Commissioner Janez Potočnik. » Read more |
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eTwinning news |
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| eTWINNING PORTAL FOSTERS SCHOOL
PARTNERSHIPS The eTwinning portal was launched on 14 January 2005 with partner finding and registration facilities to help schools in Europe to etwin with each other. As this newsletter is sent out, more than 2,000 schools in Europe have registered for eTwinning and close to 150 eTwinning partnerships have already been set up. The eTwinning portal is the European hub for eTwinning action of the EU’s eLearning programme. For this action, European Schoolnet has been granted the role of Central Support Service (CSS). » Read more |
EUROPEAN TEACHERS
MEET AT eTWINNING LAUNCH The European launch of the eTwinning action took place on 14-16 January 2005 in Brussels during a conference which gathered more than 300 teachers, national and European education authorities. During the eTwinning launch conference European Education Commissioner Ján Figel’ highlighted the potential of eTwinning to increase pupils' ICT and language skills as they are given the opportunity to communicate across borders. » Read more |
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Project News |
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| VALNET - SUCCESFUL VALIDATION
OF SCHOOL OF TOMORROW PROJECTS The final report for Valnet was published at the end of January. It summarises the result of this unique and ambitious scheme, funded by IST, to validate five IST School of Tomorrow (SoT) projects in 200 schools in 16 countries and integrate them with findings for the other seven SoT projects. » Read more |
EPICC - LOOKING INTO ePORTFOLIOS EPICC project consortium had a project meeting in the EUN office on 27-28 January 2005. A beta version of the eportfolio demonstration platform by Giunti Interactive Labs was reviewed and the work on eportfolio scenario building was discussed. » Read more |
| EUROPEAN SCHOOLNET STARTS
THREE NEW PROJECTS In early 2005, kick-off meetings for three new EU projects involving EUN took place. eColours kicked off on 1 February, it is an eContent feasibility study projects focused on co-production and localisation of digital learning resources (Read more). On the same day, the interoperability project LIFE (Learning Interoperability Framework for Europe) had its first meeting. This project is funded under the eLearning Programme (Website link). The 19 partners of the science education project PENCIL (coordinated by the ECSITE - the European organisation for Science Centres) met in the EUN Office on 26 January to plan their three years of work. (Read more). |
INSAFE LAUNCHES SAFERINTERNET
PORTAL The portal was launched on 8 February 2005 as part of the Safer Internet Day organised for the second year, and this time with European Schoolnet in a very active role. The new portal has been set up by EUN as part of the Insafe project, for which the contract with the Commission was signed just before Christmas. The project makes European Schoolnet the coordinator of the Commission's new network of European Internet Safety Awareness nodes and the Saferinternet portal is the main vehicle for this network. » Read more |
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Spring Day in Europe |
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| MORE THAN 5,000 SCHOOLS REGISTERED
FOR SPRING DAY 2005 For the third year European Schoolnet organises Spring Day in Europe. This year the focus is on the new European constitution and by 10 February 2005 more than 5,000 schools had registered. Close to 50 MEPs and other European personalities have already committed to go back to school on 17 March 2005 when Spring Day is celebrated to discuss the Constitution and other European issues. » Read more |
SPRING DAY NATIONAL LIAISONS
MEET IN AUSTRIA This year, a group of representatives from most European Ministries of Education complements the work done by the 31 Spring Day pedagogical advisors. This group met for the first time during the EMINENT conference in Prague to receive thorough information about the project they would help to promote and disseminate in their own countries. The second meeting took place in Vienna - Austria on 7 January 2005 and was followed by a general Spring Day teachers meeting. » Read more |
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Competitions |
People |
| GREEK SCHOOLS ARE WINNERS
IN EARTH AND SPACE COMPETITION For the Earth and Space Week organised by the European Commission on 12-20 February 2005, European Schoolnet has organised a competition in which schools were invited to design a flag with the theme 'Celebrating our planet while reaching for the stars'. The prize-giving ceremony took place at Autoworld in Brussels on 11 February 2005. » Website link |
ODILE DE CHALENDAR
- NEW CHAIRPERSON OF EUROPEAN SCHOOLNET At the meeting in Prague on 17 November 2004, the Steering Committee elected Odile de Chalendar of the French Ministry of Education and Research as its new chair replacing Lilla Voss, Denmark. Vanessa Pittard, UK, Jan de Craemer, Belgium, Jerzy Dalek, Poland and Zdenek Svoboda, Czech Republic were elected as Vice-Chairs and form the EUN Presidium together with the Chairperson. » Read more |
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EUN ORGANISES GREEN WEEK COMPETITION Climate change is the theme, and through the website set up by EUN, pupils
can register their contributions in all 20 EU languages. The competition is part
of the annual Green Week conference and exhibition, which will take place from
31 May to 3 June 2005 in Brussels. |
NEW FACES IN EUN
OFFICE Evita Tasiopoulou and Paul Gerhard are new staffs in the EUN Office. Evita takes care of the web mastering for the eTwinning portal, and will be doing the same for the European Science Education portal, to be launched by European Schoolnet. Paul's responsibilities include this newsletter and the new corporate portal
for European Schoolnet but his main task will be gathering news for the Insight
portal. |
| Upcoming
EUN meetings: 21 February: Presidium and Board of Directors (Brussels) 10-11 March: Education Portals Committee (Brussels) 18 April Steering Committee (Brussels) 23-24 April Spring Day national liaisons and teachers meeting 18 May Policy and Innovation Committee (PIC) |
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| EUN Office - Rue
de Trèves, 61 - B-1040 Brussels Tel: +32 2/790 75.75 | Fax: +32 2/790 75.85 Website: http://www.eun.org | Web editor: Paul Gerhard |
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