Other News from Participating Centers

Democracy Index 2017

The Economist: “The latest edition of The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index records the worst decline in global democracy in years. Not a single region recorded an improvement in its average score since 2016, as countries grapple with increasingly divided electorates. Freedom of expression in particular is facing new challenges from both state and non-state actors, and is a special focus of this year’s report.

The Follower Factory

 Nicholas Confessore, Gabriel J.X. Dance, Richard Harris And Mark Hansen in The New York Times: “…Fake accounts, deployed by governments, criminals and entrepreneurs, now infest social media networks.

A Roadmap to a Nationwide Data Infrastructure for Evidence-Based Policymaking

Introduction by Julia Lane and Andrew Reamer of a Special Issue of the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science: “Throughout the United States, there is broad interest in expanding the nation’s capacity to design and implement public policy based on solid evidence. That interest has been stimulated by the new types of data that are available that can transform the way in which policy is designed and implemented.

The Tyranny of Metrics

Book by Jerry Z. Muller on “How the obsession with quantifying human performance threatens our schools, medical care, businesses, and government…

Tennis statt Tabletten: Regelmäßiger Sport verbessert kognitive Fähigkeiten stärker als Medikamente

Hintergrund: Regelmäßiger Sport hat einen positiven Einfluss auf die kognitive Leistungsfähigkeit bei Patienten mit leichten kognitiven Störungen im Alter. Dies ergab eine Auswertung von Studiendaten aus den USA, die in die neuen Leitlinien der American Academy of Neurology aufgenommen wurden.

Zellprozesse magnetisch kontrollieren

Jun.-Prof. Dr. Cornelia Monzel ist Expertin für „Magnetogenetics“, einer neuen Methode, bei der Zellprozesse mittels magnetischer Nanopartikel und unter Verwendung äußerer Magnetfelder berührungslos kontrolliert werden können. Die Nanopartikel sind nur wenige Milliardstel Meter groß und damit deutlich kleiner als jede Zelle. Sie können spezifisch an Proteine innerhalb oder auf der Zelloberfläche binden und anschließend über äußere Magnetfelder manipuliert werden.

Breaking the web and killing innovation: Now even lobbyists admit that’s the plan behind the extra EU copyright for news

Julia Reda, writing in her own blog, warns of the dangers of the new EU copyright law. Please share this video and text widely.
Julia Reda: For months now I’ve been raising the alarm about the plan to limit the freedom to link that has been slowly but surely making its way through the EU legislative process.

Alfred Whitehead w domenie publicznej

W 2018 roku do grona autorów, których dzieła znajdują się w domenie publicznej dołączył wybitny matematyk, filozof i zwolennik nowoczesnych teorii edukacyjnych Alfred North Whitehead. Pochodził z rodziny, w której od pokoleń zajmowano się edukacją (zarówno jego ojciec, jak i dziadek byli dyrektorami szkół dla chłopców).

Universities, Enterprises and Maker Communities in Open Design & Manufacturing across Europe: an exploratory study

Which knowledge, skills and learning environments can boost Open Design & Manufacturing at meaningful scale? How can OD&M  become the ground of collective experimentation and co-creation between Universities, Makerspaces and Enterprises?

Democracy and the Internet: A Retrospective

Essay by Charles Ess at Javnost: “In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the emerging internet and World Wide Web inspired both popular and scholarly optimism that these new communication technologies would inevitably “democratise”—in local organisations, larger civic and political institutions, and, indeed, the world itself.

SC Constitution Bench on Aadhaar – Final Hearing (Day V)

In October 2015, a 3-judge bench of the Supreme Court of India referred challenges to the Aadhaar program to a constitution bench. One of the primary concerns of this petition was to decide on the existence of a fundamental right to privacy, which has since been upheld. Other similar petitions, concerned with the legitimacy of […]

Mobile Devices as Stigmatizing Security Sensors: The GDPR and a Future of Crowdsourced ‘Broken Windows’

Paper by Oskar Josef Gstrein and Gerard Jan Ritsema van Eck: “Various smartphone apps and services are available which encourage users to report where and when they feel they are in an unsafe or threatening environment. This user generated content may be used to build datasets, which can show areas that are considered ‘bad,’ and to map out ‘safe’ routes through such neighbourhoods.

Governments are not startups

Ramy Ghorayeb at Medium: “…Why can’t governments move fast like the private industry? We have seen the rise of big corporations and startups adapting and evolve with the needs of their customers. Why can’t the governments adapt to the needs of their population? Why is it so slow?

Persönliches Dankeschön: Lauftrikot für Oberbürgermeister Thomas Geisel

„Mit dem Marathon-Trikot wollen wir uns bei Oberbürgermeister Thomas Geisel für seinen Einsatz für die Düsseldorfer Palliativmedizin bedanken“, erklärt Martin Neukirchen. „In der Palliativmedizin der Uniklinik geht es uns darum Lebensqualität zu verbessern und die Selbständigkeit der Patienten so lange wie möglich zu erhalten. Unser Förderverein ermöglicht es uns dort zu unterstützen, wo die medizinische Regelversorgung aufhört.

​Mentors, internships and career fair boost NTU students’ job prospects​

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Can scientists learn to make ‘nature forecasts’ just as we forecast the weather?

Crowdfunding site aims to get homeless back into work

Springwise: “Beam is a new crowdfunding website that has been launched to try and help homeless people based in London get back into work. The idea behind the website is that people donate money online to homeless individuals, which will then be used to give them the qualifications and training that they will need to become fully employed and therefore able to also get themselves secure in their own accommodation.

Mil estudiantes se matriculan en la U. de Chile en una hora

A través de un sistema cada vez más eficiente, que permite a los estudiantes hacer el trámite de matrícula totalmente en línea, este año el proceso ha sido notoriamente más ágil y expedito que en años anteriores, mostrando resultados nunca antes vistos. Así, a la 01:00 hrs. de este 19 de enero, tan solo una hora después de abiertas las matrículas, la U. de Chile ya contaba con sus primeros mil nuevos hijos de Bello entre sus filas. Todo un récord en la historia de nuestro plantel. El proceso de matrícula ha marcado números inéditos este 2018 para la U.

Carreras de la U. de Chile son las más demandadas por postulantes

Según datos entregados esta jornada por el Sistema Único de Admisión del CRUCH, de las 10 carreras a las que más postularon los jóvenes chilenos dentro de todo el sistema, las cuatro primeras corresponden a programas de la U. de Chile: Ingeniería, Derecho, Ingeniería Comercial y Medicina, respectivamente. A esto se suma que por primera vez los convocados a matricularse en la Casa de Bello superan los 7 mil cupos.

60% de directores de escuelas ya no ejerce dicho rol luego de 5 años

Un reciente estudio de Líderes Educativos y del Centro de Investigación Avanzada en Educación (CIAE) sobre trayectorias de directores de escuelas chilenas, pone una señal de alerta al sistema educativo de nuestro país.