“One of those exhausting, exhilarating experiences that restores your trust in humanity and the resilience of young people.”
Dr Alex Grech, Commonwealth Centre for Connected Learning
From 24 – 26 April 2020, the European Commission, led by the European Innovation Council and in close collaboration with the EU member states, hosted a pan-European hackathon to connect civil society, innovators, partners and investors across Europe in order to develop innovative solutions for coronavirus-related challenges.
DEL4ALL member and digital education expert Dr Alex Grech from the Commonwealth Centre for Connected Learning served as mentor during the hackathon and helped teams with challenges related to blockchain, education, advocacy and remote working within the context of social and political cohesion.
Over 23,000 people were involved in the hackathon and it was an extraordinary and truly volunteer-driven event according to Dr Grech. While waiting for mentor teams to be allocated, Hackathon participants just mobilised and started working on the challenges. Dr Grech reached out to a couple of projects within his area of expertise and the discussions started. Sometimes they were intense, often 30 minutes at a stretch. Hence, the weekend became a schedule of Zoom calls with people from a wide range of backgrounds – educators, health professionals, serial entrepreneurs, software developers, creative types (from musicians to people developing games).
The consensus during all of these discussions was that education has been seriously disrupted for the next couple of years, and that change has to be driven from the ground up – by young people operating the field; by innovative educators – and not necessarily by policymakers. The EU, at this difficult juncture in its existence, needs to be responsive to these voices.
DEL4ALL aims to transform current European research and innovation initiatives in the area of digital enhanced learning into an increasingly cohesive, dynamic, participatory and sustainable ecosystem, capable of effectively stimulating collaboration among all key players in an inclusive and impactful way. We are here to support the digital enhanced learning community in these difficult times.
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