The Development of eServices in an Enlarged EU: eLearning in Estonia

In 2005, IPTS launched a project which aimed to assess the developments in eGoverment, eHealth and eLearning in the 10 New Member States at national, and at cross-country level. At that time, the 10 New Member States were Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia. A report for each country was produced, describing its educational system and the role played by eLearning within both the formal education system and other aspects of lifelong learning. Each report then analyzes, on the basis of desk research and expert interviews, the major achievements, shortcomings, drivers and barriers in the development of eLearning in one of the countries in question. This analysis provides the basis for the identification and discussion of national policy options to address the major challenges and to suggest R&D issues relevant to the needs of each country,¿ in this case, Estonia.JRC.J.4-Information Societ

Cyberinfrastructure for Classical Philology

No humanists have moved more aggressively in the digital world than students of the Greco-Roman world but the first generation of digital classics has seen relatively superficial methods to address the problems of print culture. We are now beginning to see new intellectual practices for which new terms, eWissenschaft and eClassics, and a new cyberinfrastructure are emerging

Informatikaoktatás a gazdálkodástani felsőoktatásban = Teaching Information Technology in Economics and Business Administration Training Programs

Évtizedes oktatási tapasztalatom során gyakran szembesültem azzal a problémával, hogy az oktatott tárgyak tartalma az oktató kollégákkal folytatott viták alapján bővült, szűkült, változott, de hiányzott a cél meghatározása és így ezek a viták parttalanok voltak. A tananyagok nagyjából az alapján alakultak ki, hogy mi oktatók mit szerettünk volna megtanítani. Ezt a dolgozatot az a törekvés inspirálta, hogy a közgazdasági és üzleti felsőoktatásban (gazdaságtani képzési terület) az alapozó informatika oktatás valóban azokra a kulcskompetenciákra terjedjen ki, amit ez a szakterület megkíván

Building and Using Digital Libraries for ETDs

Despite the high value of electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs), the global collection has seen limited use. To extend such use, a new approach to building digital libraries (DLs) is needed. Fortunately, recent decades have seen that a vast amount of “gray literature” has become available through a diverse set of institutional repositories as well as regional and national libraries and archives. Most of the works in those collections include ETDs and are often freely available in keeping with the open-access movement, but such access is limited by the services of supporting information systems. As explained through a set of scenarios, ETDs can better meet the needs of diverse stakeholders if customer discovery methods are used to identify personas and user roles as well as their goals and tasks. Hence, DLs, with a rich collection of services, as well as newer, more advanced ones, can be organized so that those services, and expanded workflows building on them, can be adapted to meet personalized goals as well as traditional ones, such as discovery and exploration

Romanian public management reform: theoretical and empirical studies: vol. 2, civil service

For the time being, public management reform represents the concern of most states, no matter their development level, geographical and strategic position, membership to various supranational structures or political and social organisation systems. This process represents the topic of several papers and publications of outstanding international scientists or specialized structures of international organizations, such as OECD. In the EU Member States or acceding states, an argument for public management reform consists also in the need to bring into line with the national and regional administrations and even European administration. In the reform process, the most visible actors are the public authorities and institutions as well as the academic environment, which at national, regional or European level has structured own levers and mechanisms for debate and action concerning the reform mentioned. In line with the above efforts, it is worth to mention the activity of the European Group for Public Administration (EGPA), the Network of Institutes and Schools of Public Administration in Central and Eastern Europe (NISPAcee), International Institute of Administrative Sciences (IIAS), European Public Law Organization (EPLO), European Institute of Public Administration (EIPA) etc. In this respect, I have oriented my own preoccupations of analysis and research, expressed in theoretical and empirical studies, accepted with interest in prestigious regional, European or Trans-Atlantic scientific events. In the actual context of developing administrative sciences in Romania, I consider that a synthesis of the main themes and outcomes is useful. They benefited of national and international recognition, being accepted at specialised events, being published or quoted. The contents of the current volumes focus on two important fields of research in administrative sciences: fundamental issues and developments of public administration and services, on one hand, and civil service, on the other hand. Within this broad topic, several chapters aim and present relevant, conceptual and empirical issues of the fundamental processes in national and European administration, i.e. decentralisation, setting up and asserting the European Administrative Space or regional cooperation. Romanian experiments and practices for representing the local interests in the governmental decision-making process, partnership and local governance or universal services are in line with the European trends for developing the public services. In fact, Europeanization of national public administrations represents the outcome and the engine of changes in Romanian public management in the context of the European integration. The first volume concludes with a broad comparative study concerning Romanian and Japanese public management. Result of a “Foreign Visiting Professor†programme at the National Institute of Multimedia Education, Japan, the study reveals the core values deriving from the culture and social organisation of two peoples with distinct history and development, that unify and separate the national public administration systems. The conclusions of the first volume are formulated in most studies. They are shaping Romanian public administration as a developing system, open and convergent towards the European values characterising the whole European integration process. The second volume focuses on civil servants’ career and training. The Europeanization process, the curricular harmonization of the content and organisation of higher education in the area of administrative sciences are analysed in view of the principles of European Higher Education Area. Basically, the studies describe a new for researching and method evaluating the contents of the Bachelor and Master programmes according to a set of principles, promoted by the European bodies, such as the European Association for Public Administration Accreditation (EAPAA). The studies represent an extension towards the pillars of a European dialogue concerning in-service training and the impact of new technologies in public organisations. Important experiences in management and training of Romanian civil service are approached in the context of promoting meritocratic criteria or developing the democratic mechanism, supporting the Romanian public management reform. Of course, only reading these lines, a concrete and detailed idea about the current paper could not be formulated. For those interested, it will be a major effort to cover all the topics presented. Every topic is subject to appreciations and critics, representing the pillar of new developments. In fact, it represents one of the aims for my approach. The other aims are focused on re-launching the professional and scientific dialogue in specialised academia on the coordinates of research in the field of public management, accepted at European level, ensuring an enhanced internal, national and European visibility for the contributions of the Romanian public management school

Romanian Public Management Reform. Theoretical and empirical studies. Volume 2 - Civil service

For the time being, public management reform represents the concern of most states, no matter their development level, geographical and strategic position, membership to various supranational structures or political and social organisation systems. This process represents the topic of several papers and publications of outstanding international scientists or specialized structures of international organizations, such as OECD. In the EU Member States or acceding states, an argument for public management reform consists also in the need to bring into line with the national and regional administrations and even European administration. In the reform process, the most visible actors are the public authorities and institutions as well as the academic environment, which at national, regional or European level has structured own levers and mechanisms for debate and action concerning the reform mentioned. In line with the above efforts, it is worth to mention the activity of the European Group for Public Administration (EGPA), the Network of Institutes and Schools of Public Administration in Central and Eastern Europe (NISPAcee), International Institute of Administrative Sciences (IIAS), European Public Law Organization (EPLO), European Institute of Public Administration (EIPA) etc. In this respect, I have oriented my own preoccupations of analysis and research, expressed in theoretical and empirical studies, accepted with interest in prestigious regional, European or Trans-Atlantic scientific events. In the actual context of developing administrative sciences in Romania, I consider that a synthesis of the main themes and outcomes is useful. They benefited of national and international recognition, being accepted at specialised events, being published or quoted. The contents of the current volumes focus on two important fields of research in administrative sciences: fundamental issues and developments of public administration and services, on one hand, and civil service, on the other hand. Within this broad topic, several chapters aim and present relevant, conceptual and empirical issues of the fundamental processes in national and European administration, i.e. decentralisation, setting up and asserting the European Administrative Space or regional cooperation. Romanian experiments and practices for representing the local interests in the governmental decision-making process, partnership and local governance or universal services are in line with the European trends for developing the public services. In fact, Europeanization of national public administrations represents the outcome and the engine of changes in Romanian public management in the context of the European integration. The first volume concludes with a broad comparative study concerning Romanian and Japanese public management. Result of a “Foreign Visiting Professor†programme at the National Institute of Multimedia Education, Japan, the study reveals the core values deriving from the culture and social organisation of two peoples with distinct history and development, that unify and separate the national public administration systems. The conclusions of the first volume are formulated in most studies. They are shaping Romanian public administration as a developing system, open and convergent towards the European values characterising the whole European integration process. The second volume focuses on civil servants’ career and training. The Europeanization process, the curricular harmonization of the content and organisation of higher education in the area of administrative sciences are analysed in view of the principles of European Higher Education Area. Basically, the studies describe a new for researching and method evaluating the contents of the Bachelor and Master programmes according to a set of principles, promoted by the European bodies, such as the European Association for Public Administration Accreditation (EAPAA). The studies represent an extension towards the pillars of a European dialogue concerning in-service training and the impact of new technologies in public organisations. Important experiences in management and training of Romanian civil service are approached in the context of promoting meritocratic criteria or developing the democratic mechanism, supporting the Romanian public management reform. Of course, only reading these lines, a concrete and detailed idea about the current paper could not be formulated. For those interested, it will be a major effort to cover all the topics presented. Every topic is subject to appreciations and critics, representing the pillar of new developments. In fact, it represents one of the aims for my approach. The other aims are focused on re-launching the professional and scientific dialogue in specialised academia on the coordinates of research in the field of public management, accepted at European level, ensuring an enhanced internal, national and European visibility for the contributions of the Romanian public management school.Romania; Public Management Reform; Theoretical and empirical studies; Administration and Public Services.

e-Skills: The International dimension and the Impact of Globalisation - Final Report 2014

In today’s increasingly knowledge-based economies, new information and communication technologies are a key engine for growth fuelled by the innovative ideas of highly - skilled workers. However, obtaining adequate quantities of employees with the necessary e-skills is a challenge. This is a growing international problem with many countries having an insufficient numbers of workers with the right e-Skills. For example: Australia: “Even though there’s 10,000 jobs a year created in IT, there are only 4500 students studying IT at university, and not all of them graduate” (Talevski and Osman, 2013). Brazil: “Brazil’s ICT sector requires about 78,000 [new] people by 2014. But, according to Brasscom, there are only 33,000 youths studying ICT related courses in the country” (Ammachchi, 2012). Canada: “It is widely acknowledged that it is becoming inc reasingly difficult to recruit for a variety of critical ICT occupations –from entry level to seasoned” (Ticoll and Nordicity, 2012). Europe: It is estimated that there will be an e-skills gap within Europe of up to 900,000 (main forecast scenario) ICT pr actitioners by 2020” (Empirica, 2014). Japan: It is reported that 80% of IT and user companies report an e-skills shortage (IPA, IT HR White Paper, 2013) United States: “Unlike the fiscal cliff where we are still peering over the edge, we careened over the “IT Skills Cliff” some years ago as our economy digitalized, mobilized and further “technologized”, and our IT skilled labour supply failed to keep up” (Miano, 2013)

The Development of eServices in an Enlarged EU: eLearning in Latvia

In 2005, IPTS launched a project which aimed to assess the developments in eGoverment, eHealth and eLearning in the 10 New Member States at national, and at cross-country level. At that time, the 10 New Member States were Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia. A report for each country was produced, describing its educational system and the role played by eLearning within both the formal education system and other aspects of lifelong learning. Each report then analyzes, on the basis of desk research and expert interviews, the major achievements, shortcomings, drivers and barriers in the development of eLearning in one of the countries in question. This analysis provides the basis for the identification and discussion of national policy options to address the major challenges and to suggest R&D issues relevant to the needs of each country ¿ in this case, Latvia.JRC.J.4-Information Societ

The Development of eServices in an Enlarged EU: eLearning in Slovenia

In 2005, IPTS launched a project which aimed to assess the developments in eGoverment, eHealth and eLearning in the 10 New Member States at national, and at cross-country level. At that time, the 10 New Member States were Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia. A report for each country was produced, describing its educational system and the role played by eLearning within both the formal education system and other aspects of lifelong learning. Each report then analyzes, on the basis of desk research and expert interviews, the major achievements, shortcomings, drivers and barriers in the development of eLearning in one of the countries in question. This analysis provides the basis for the identification and discussion of national policy options to address the major challenges and to suggest R&D issues relevant to the needs of each country - in this case, Slovenia.JRC.J.4-Information Societ