Across Alliance’s Post

Good news for those interested in reducing inequalities in education. And… We just got the first citation! In a review article titled “Bridging STEM and linguistic gaps: a review of multilingual teaching approaches in science education”

“Great discoveries and improvements invariably involve the cooperation of many minds” – so said Alexander Graham Bell Academic conferences have exactly those feels! 🌍 Reflecting on an enriching academic journey at the Annual Honoris United Universities Academic Summit in Tunis! 📚 I had the privilege to represent MANCOSA at the Academic Summit hosted at the Esprit School of Business, where the theme "Education Accelerated – Redefine education for a changing world highly impacted by AI" sparked intense discussions among global scholars and researchers. It was truly invigorating to delve into the profound implications of AI on education and society. The summit convened prolific minds from around the world, addressing the urgent need for higher education to adapt swiftly as AI integrates deeper into our daily lives. We explored strategies to empower students with essential skills while navigating the complexities of a technologically evolving landscape. The discourse also ventured into the ethical dimensions of AI, particularly its implications for social justice and global equity—a topic close to my heart. My contribution had a slightly different stance, leaning more towards the social sciences, examining the impact of AI colonisation and exploitation, including the ethical dumping of countries in the Global South. I am thrilled to be finalising my paper for publication, aiming to contribute meaningfully to this crucial dialogue. The warm hospitality extended by the organising committee, comprised of members from Honoris United Universities, Université Central, and ESPRIT, made the experience even more memorable. Following this insightful summit, we were invited to attend the 20th International CDIO Conference at Esprit School of Engineering, themed on "Engineering Education in the era of AI." I enjoyed enlightening exchanges and innovative insights as we continue to shape the future of education together. #Education #AI #AcademicSummit #HigherEducation #CDIOConference #GlobalDialogue #empowermentcoach #DrAra #authenticallyyou #learnmore #discoverunder10k #explorepage #phdresearch

All around the world we see Misty make a positive impact in STEM education, and today we would like to highlight BRAIINS (BRing AI IN Schools), a ground breaking project involving four European schools from #Italy, #Greece, #Austria and #Spain, that joined forces to reimagine the future of STEM education with Artificial Intelligence and Social Robotics. 👩🏫 🤖 Co-funded by the Erasmus+ program under the European Commission the project engaged students, teachers and local communities accross Europe to promote new teaching & learning approaches for improving digital literacy, and understanding of AI and Robotics. As a part of this mission, the schools set out to help participants develop competences such as critical and lateral thinking, computational creativity, algorithmic problem solving, and taking decisions in uncertain conditions based on data and probabilistic models. Misty and her robot cousins provided a natural and intuitive social medium for the participants to engage with AI and develop these competences, covering topics such as Physics, Math, Computer Science, History and much more. The robots also showed to have a positive impact on special needs kids' engagement in solving cognitive tasks and improving their social abilities. What a truly inspiring and amazing project! 🤩 💫 🚀 🏅 Find out more about the results of the project here: https://lnkd.in/gNPfrgsK #mistyrobotics #braiins #edtech #stemeducation #stemeducationforkids #innovation #euprojects #humanrobotinteraction #socialrobotics #robotics #robots #ai #llms #genai #education #computerscience #computerscienceengineering SoftBank Group Corp., McGraw Hill, KNIME

An exciting semester awaits! This September, I will teach my first course on Bachelor level at the ZHAW Angewandte Linguistik. Also, I will officially begin my Master's degree in Computational Linguistics and Language Technology at the Universität Zürich | University of Zurich. I can't wait to pass on my passion for #linguistics to students and to learn about #LLM and other exciting new #technology. In the wise words of Buzz Lightyear: “To infinity and beyond!”

We have been educated, pushed, cajoled and often coerced into symmetry, from a very early age. Symmetry in spaces, thinking, drawing, writing and behaving. Asymmetrical creativity is seldom tolerated, let alone encouraged. Neuro-diversity - something I know very little about but am trying to learn about, may feature aspects of the need to move from patterned symmetry in behaviour, thinking and expression to acts of Asymmetricality. But this applies powerfully in academic, intellectual and activist spheres. Symmetry appears in all academic publishing, either in form or concept. Everything HAS to be presented and written in the same way, same rules, same hierarchies of 'success', same start, middle, finish. Promotions are notorious for 'evaluating' someone's apparent merit...but not the Asymmetrical nature of individual lives and creativities. Symmetry is NOT inevitable. Neither is it 'natural'. It is NATURALISED, normalised using partcicular ideas of what is legitimate, and what is not. My Asymmetrical disruption appears in different forms: writing, teaching, talking...but also in activities which ACTIVATE creativities to nourish, reflect and move away from these patterns. By moving towards Asymmetry, one is moving away from the conditioned cosmologies of modernity framed scientific, limited notions of logic. Yes Symmetry works, but so do multiple forms of asymmetry. This is what decolonising the mind, spirit and action is grounded in: to De-Link from the 'only way' pushed into our beings, so that lots of ways are possible, towards forms of freedom. I write assymetrically I teach 'off' and away from 'the plan', I train asymmetrically I carve wood that often (always) goes with the flow of the grain, often asymmetrical I relate to people spontaneously and adaptively...I 'fail' / 'succeed' asymmetrically ...and my scholarship, teaching, and career in academia is a full on, no compromise embrace of this expression. Find me a promotion panel that can even begin to acknowledge, celebrate and award this, and I'll show you the signs that something might be changing in higher education. That's decoloniality framed praxis in motion. Dominant Systems work by 'cloning' through symmetry of values, norms, representations. Enough cloning. Let's get something different in the pipeline. Frankly, I'm tired of all this apparently anti-racist, social justice and decolonial talk, because in practice, on the ground, very little is changing in the power relations, structures and processes that shape and govern lives and livelihoods. Some would call a government who work this way as...corrupt. For some of us, this is a long goodbye to academia and it's much valued promise of affirmation, recognition, and awards. The myth of meritocracy needs busting.

Very relevant and insightful.

I highly salute the University of Zurich for their courageous decision. I'm not afraid to stir the pot with this post. Throughout my academic journey, I've noticed that the world of academic publishing isn't immune to corruption and preferential treatment. Citations count, cozying up to editors is often a condition for acceptance, and the whole process can feel like just rewriting old literature. Let's face it: publishing often doesn't add new knowledge, especially in social sciences. Instead, it's become a costly privilege for authors, while journals reap the benefits. After graduating, I realized there's more to scientific knowledge than just feeding into this closed loop. I'm passionate about using my expertise to make a tangible impact outside the academic bubble. With the AI revolution now available to the masses, academics are being pushed to rethink their approach to research and teaching. It's sparking a revolution that will shake up the outdated, corrupt systems of the past. I couldn't be happier about this advancement. It's high time for change. Here's to disrupting the old, bringing in the new, and making academia more relevant and meaningful than ever before. #AcademicRevolution #FutureofResearch #AIinEducation https://lnkd.in/d8hgUnNh

The good side of doing a PhD: 😁 One of the many responsibilities of a PhD candidate is to participate in conferences, workshops, and scientific events. It is not only a formality: these events allow us to work on how to present our research and we can also get to know other researchers in our field. By the end of our thesis, we are supposed to be able to appropriately present our research and learn from positive critics, which are essential guidelines in academic life. I have now taken the names of both of my universities Université Sorbonne Nouvelle and Unesp to University of Vienna, in Austria, where I participated in the Vienna Workshop on Portuguese Linguistics, and it was amazing! I could enjoy all the opportunities to grow my scientific skills, exchange ideas with a lot of super-competent people, and brainstorm a lot of new ideas to work on in my future works. And I could also discover this beautiful European capital during the Christmas Market season! 🎄 Doing a PhD is tough, and it often implies abdicating many normal-life things, but it is also an extremely enriching experience that changes our perception of the world! 💡🚀 #academiclife #phdcandidate #scientificresearch

What a brave & great move 👏👏 -----‐---------------------------------------------- The prestigious University of Zurich, is making a bold move. They're ditching the university rankings! Zurich believes these rankings prioritize churning out research, not groundbreaking discoveries. This, they fear, pushes professors to become "publish machines" focused on quantity, not quality. Zurich wants to focus on real learning, not chasing a number on a list. They see these rankings turning universities into businesses competing for students, not institutions dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge.