DIgital activism: ways to cultivate your soft skills during the pandemic and beyond

Digital activism: ways to cultivate your soft
skills during the pandemic and beyond
Katerina Zourou, Ph.D., Web2Learn, Greece
Webinar “Coronavirus and beyond: soft skills for university learning and research”
Organised by the iPEN consortium (Innovative Photonics Education in Nanotechnology)
1-2 March, 2021, online
https://ipenche.chania.teicrete.gr/

iPEN Webinar “Coronavirus and beyond: soft skills for university learning and research”
Researcher in open, social and digital learning
Advocate of open access, open science and citizen
science
Head of Web2Learn (also partner of iPEN project)
Katerina Zourou, March 2, 2021

What does this picture
bring to mind?

And this
one?

And this
one?
An initiative of
Covid19Italia.help, a
collective of Italian civic
activists engaged in
solidarity actions during
the pandemic

Digital activism
Using the power of
digital technologies to
create and maintain
communities of
similar-minded citizens
for a social purpose

Digital activism as a manifestation of active citizenship
Citizens (incl. university
students) as social actors
shaping their discourse and
identity through social
participation
Citizens craft learning
trajectories through multiple
digital platforms and sites,
including social networking
ones.

New forms of digital social innovation
• Open Democracy
• Open Policy Making
• Collaborative Economy
• Collaborative Making
• Collaborative Consumption
• Environmental action
• New Collaborative approaches to inclusion,
agriculture, health, disaster management
EU study “Citizen Engagement in Science and Policy-Making” (2016)

Soft skills
Credit: https://oecdskillsandwork.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/blog44-0.jpg

https://business.linkedin.com/talent-solutions/blog/trends-and-research/2020/most-in-demand-hard-and-soft-skills
Needs in
soft skills
in 2020

Questions we will adress:
What forms of digital activism have occurred during the pandemic?
Is it possible to obtain soft skills through digital activism?
Are achievements of soft skills demonstrable?

4 indicative types
of digital activism
in the fight against
COVID-19
Massively multiplayer online games
(MMOGs)
Digital hacktivism and datactivism
Maker movement
1.Citizen science

Type #1: Massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs)
Examples: Eterna, Foldit@home and Foldit.

#1:
Massively
multiplayer
online
games
(MMOGs)

Puzzle solving environment+ chat
#1:
Massively
multiplayer
online
games
(MMOGs) iPEN Webinar “Coronavirus and beyond: soft skills for university learning and research”

MMOGs as
Collaborative puzzle
solving for a social
purpose: can act as
means to develop
one’s soft skills
#1:
Massively
multiplayer
online
games
(MMOGs) iPEN Webinar “Coronavirus and beyond: soft skills for university learning and research”

Type #2 : Digital hacktivism and datactivism
The EUvsVirus hackathon in April 2020
#2:
hacktivism
and
datactivism iPEN Webinar “Coronavirus and beyond: soft skills for university learning and research”

EUvsVirus hackathon data
• 21,000 participants
• 140 nationalities
• 27 countries
• 23 languages
• 600+ corporate partners
• 1,400 mentors
• 400 jury members
over 2,000 solutions to address coronavirus-related
challenges
#2:
hacktivism
and

+ 2 examples: Open Data Days and EU Datathon
Open data Days: Groups from around the world
create local events on the day when they use
open data in their communities.
EU Datathon: a competition for best teams
developing an application that uses open data
sets and is created for a social purpose
#2:
hacktivism
and

Type #3: maker movement
Emphasis on the value of an individual's
ability to be a creator of things.
For COVID-19: many maker communities
around the world engage in provision of
medical supplies (oxygen masks, personal
protective equipment including face
shields, and devices such as oxygen
concentrators)
#3:
Maker
movement iPEN Webinar “Coronavirus and beyond: soft skills for university learning and research”

Maker movement (2)
Since January
2020, Maker
communities
produced 48M
items, created
by 42M
volunteers in 86
countries
March 2021 data, cf. the
global Open Source
Medical Supplies (OSMS)
group
#3:
Maker
movement
https://opensourcemedicalsupplies.org/impact/

What is citizen science?
• Citizens can more easily than ever engage in scientific endeavours
• The activities undertaken aim to advance science, develop scientific
understanding and encourage the engagement and understanding
within local communities of science and their natural environment.
• A wider range of devices are used, including citizens own devices (such
as mobile phones and tablets), social media, DIY tools, etc.
https://inos-project.eu/
https://www.citizenheritage.eu/
2 examples of citizen science
at universities:

Type #4: Citizen science projects

Conlusion
We all agree that it is important to cultivate
soft skills along with hard skills =>
More opportunities are needed for
university students to cultivate soft skills =>
Forms of digital activism can act as means
to develop them during university studies
Hints for future developments
a) Create methodologies for skill
acquisition in digital activism contexts;
b) Works toward formal recognition of
skills in these contexts

Resources
Smartphone Spectroscopy Enables Citizen Science. Jan 21, 2021
https://www.photonics.com/Webinars/Smartphone_Spectroscopy_Enables_Citizen_Science/w317
Multiscale Observation Networks for Optical monitoring of Coastal waters, Lakes and Estuaries
https://monocle-h2020.eu/Home
Bringing research and teaching closer to society –the Sensebox of University of Muenster https://www.uni-
muenster.de/news/view.php?cmdid=10792
Covid19Italia.help collective https://covid19italia.help/issues/regione/piemonte/
Joint Research Centre (2016). Citizen Engagement in Science and PolicyMaking
https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/communities/sites/jrccties/files/mc10_rio_sio-lopez_mobility_reading.pdf.

• Digital Activism in Times of Pandemic Webinar
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImBgHO4iMaQ&feature=emb_title
• UNESCO, COVID-19 Educational Disruption and Response http://www.iiep.unesco.org/en/covid-19-
educational-disruption-and-response-13363
• https://opendataday.org/
• https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eudatathon
• Eterna https://eternagame.org/
• EU datathon https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eudatathon
• EUvsVirus hackathon https://www.euvsvirus.org/
• Foldit https://fold.it/
• GEO Indigenous COVID-19 Hackathon 2020
https://www.earthobservations.org/geo_blog_obs.php?id=432
• Just one Giant Lab https://jogl.io/
• Open Source Medical Supplies (OSMS) https://opensourcemedicalsupplies.org/
• The Coronavirus Tech Handbook https://coronavirustechhandbook.com/
• The Global Hack https://theglobalhack.com/
• emergenzeHack https://emergenzehack.github.io/
Useful links

Questions ?
https://web2learn.eu/
@web2learn_eu
katerinazourou@gmail.com
Credits: all images by Wikimedia commons

DIgital activism: ways to cultivate your soft skills during the pandemic and beyond

Empfohlen

Empfohlen

Weitere ähnliche Inhalte

Was ist angesagt?

Was ist angesagt? (20)

Ähnlich wie DIgital activism: ways to cultivate your soft skills during the pandemic and beyond

Ähnlich wie DIgital activism: ways to cultivate your soft skills during the pandemic and beyond (20)

Mehr von Web2Learn

Mehr von Web2Learn (20)

Kürzlich hochgeladen

Kürzlich hochgeladen (20)

DIgital activism: ways to cultivate your soft skills during the pandemic and beyond