Open call for course mobility proposals

Purpose

The goal of training is to raise competence in staff and end users which leads to more effective and productive work by the staff and end users. The benefits include more efficient operations and use of resources and an improved capability for the researchers in conducting research.

NeIC’s interest in training is focused on e-Science and e-Infrastructure skills among scientists and e-Infrastructure personnel in the Nordic region, for the purpose of raising the quality of the scientific output. Also continuously improvement of courses will be secured through regular evaluations, for the benefit of the students’ competences and for faculty to choose the best learning abilities.

Approach

The Ratatosk Nordic mobility enhancement programme efforts are directed to increasing the opportunities for trainees in two ways:

• First is the student mobility part (travel grants) enabling trainees to travel to attend Nordic training courses which are not available locally.

• The second, the course mobility part of the programme, is by supporting training courses as movable modules that can bring the training closer to the trainees.

This open call for proposals focuses on the course mobility part of the programme. The goal is to bring the courses closer to the participants by contributing to the creation of transferable courses, or updating existing courses and making them more transferable.

Scope

The open call for course mobility proposals (as well as the travel grants) offered within the NeIC Ratatosk Travel Mobility Enhancement Programme is relevant only to Nordic training efforts. Nordic training efforts are defined to include all of the training events that are available on the NeIC training calendar. The NeIC training policy is to be considered specifically for these training events but may also provide useful guidelines for national training programs.

All intellectual property in the course should be treated appropriately during conduct of the course as well as afterwards if it can remain available for later use. It is desirable that the courses include webinars, be available through streaming for remote access, and be recorded for offline access. When possible, the course content should be maintained in a repository, e.g. GitHub, and be freely available under an open access or open source license. When permissible, links to the available course content should be included with the event in the training calendar and showed at NeIC’s training page. Also some part (e.g. 5-10%) of the seats should be reserved in advance for Nordic participants and could then be released again to local participants a certain time (typically two weeks) before the event starts to allow for travel arrangements.

Ongoing evaluations

It is very important to us to collect the students’ feedback about general course content and practical implementation. Evaluations strengthens teaching and learning, ultimately improving the courses offered. The tool may be a questionnaire or multiple choice, though there’s room for comments as well. NeIC will propose a set of questions that might be added to such a questionnaire. The more specific a student can be about an observation or opinion, the more helpful their response in improving the course content and the teacher’s presentation of it.

Proposals

Blended or e-Learning based courses, if providers are willing to do so: One of our goals should be to exploit the potential of e-Learning by promoting innovation in teaching methods with a view to improving the quality of the learning process and fostering the autonomy of learners. The action promotes best practice, products and services in digital learning activities. Courses may be offered 100% e-Learning based or as blended learning.

Conditions

The Nordic training modules part of the Ratatosk mobility enhancement programme is a framework for transferring courses, extend and/or supplement national training efforts (even across national borders) in a Nordic context and will not duplicate current national training efforts. The process is expected to involve multiple Nordic countries in updating the course and making it available for Nordic re-use, dissemination and presentation of domestic trainings offered by sharing current or new training modules. The courses must directly relate to current national and Nordic e-Infrastructure training needs. The resulting training events should primarily be open for Nordic participants. These modules should aim to become part of the regular training offers and sustained by the national providers or an interested community. This complements current training offerings with new training in areas where there is an identified need but no training currently on offer, with preference given to proposals that include a strong train-the-trainer component to kickstart the new course.

NeIC funded movable module courses have to be open to Nordic participants from the initial announcement until two weeks before the event starts.

Application and Review Process Description

The application process as described here is aiming to have cut-off dates four times a year. The cut-off dates are announced at NeIC’s training page. After the call closes, decisions will be made available within one month.

The proposals will be prioritised by the following:

• Impact of the proposal
• Nordic component
• Sustainability of the course material
• Train-the-Trainer component
• Interdisciplinarity

Review of each application is done by the steering group of the NeIC’s Ratatosk Mobility Enhancement Programme.

There is no application form, you are expected to write a proposal (typically 2-4 pages) including argumentation, budget and course description. In your application, please specify the content, minimum and intended number of participants as well as the total amount for funding you would like to receive from the Ratatosk Mobility Enhancement Programme, and if it is funded by other parts.

The reimbursement can only take place if above conditions are met including the minimum amount of participants and upon receipt of the questionnaire (additional survey questions will be provided) result plus a short report. The budget in connection with travel expenses includes relevant information about date and venue of the event. Specific information concerning the various budget items, being:

• Cheapest return tickets
• Transport to and from airport
• Hotel/accommodation
• Visa, if needed

Submission process

Please email and submit your application to ratatosk-application@neic.no

In case of any questions arising concerning this application, please don’t hesitate to contact the NeIC Ratatosk Training Programme Manager (Anne-Marie Bach) directly.