ITM Management blogs

Ongoing Developments in Education at ITM

Anna Jerbrant

, 2018-10-15

One of the most important news coming from me as Dean of Education is that we are changing the guidelines for how we at the ITM-school should manage the written exams. Right now we are preparing a school management decision where Jan Wikander will determine ITMs guidelines for managing written exams as a complement to the KTH exam rules. The decision will be taken later on this autumn and it has been discussed (I hope) in several different groupings (so that you’ve had the possibility to influence it). One of the most important aspects in the decision is that all teachers shall send a digital version of their exams to the studentexpeditions at least three working days before the exam date. This since it’s the studentsexpeditions responsibility to print the exams, make sure all the exam guards get their copies as well as delivering it to the FUNKA unit. This means that the possibility for teachers to print the exam themselves and then deliver it directly to the exam rooms disappear.

And although the decision isn’t formally made yet, it is desirable that we implement this routine right away, for exam period 1.

In addition we are also reinstating the routine that the studentexpedition will send out an email to all the exminators approximately one week before the exam with the information on how many student that are notified, a room placement list (which shows the rooms that are booked for that specific exam) and a reminder to submit the exam to them no later then three days before the examination date.

Besides this other interesting educationally focused things are happening at KTH. The Vice Dean of Education, Per Berglund, welcomes KTH’s staff to four seminars focusing on education and quality:

The first one is on October 23^rd and is focused on Language Policy 2.0, which is a policy for a bilingual KTH.
The second one is on November 12^th and is focused on discussing experiences from the work done with the program analysis performed during 2018.
And the third one is on November 27^th and are focused on a Higher education excellence program. This since KTH needs to introduce a clear incentive structure to highlight the importance of pedagogy and encourage an excellent educational environment (according to the development plan 2018-2023).

Finally I would like to take the opportunity to market two of ITMs new educational programs. From the fall semester of 2019 we will include both a Masters Programme in Sustainable Production Development (given by the Department Sustainable Production Development located at Campus Södertälje) and our ämneslärarutbildning med inriktning mot teknik, årskurs 7-9. This program gives students an opportunity to work within two professions, as both högstadielärare and högskoleingenjör.

Have a nice week!

/ Anna Jerbrant, Director of First and Second Cycle Education

ITM in Mozambique – Science Outreach

Pär Jönsson

, 2018-10-05

This time I want to share an experience I had last week in Maputo, Mozambique. I had been invited to give the opening speech at the conference organised by Eduardo Mondlane University (UEM). The title of the presentation was Ideas How to Stimulate a Sustainable and Innovative Research Development at UEM.

My trip started with an experience that illustrates how small the world is. On my way home from my last working day before traveling to Maputo I ran in to Fredrik Lundell. As we discussed we realised that Lars Geschwind that works with Fredrik, will get 2 PhD students from Maputo. Then, I mailed Lars and got the information that the new students are part of a new program entitled Comparative Higher Education, Policy and Innovation Studies. In the end I could add this new happening to my talk. It would have been embarrassed if they would have asked me about Lars collaboration and I would not have known about it, especially since we are from the same school!

My talk focused on how research is done at KTH, impact, working environment as well as how to attract students to education and research. Here, I tried to give some examples from KTH where we for example use household waste as a raw material to produce both energy and bricks as well as how you can recycle cars and electronics. Specifically, focusing on important issues related to circular economy and sustainability and which are important to society as well as are attractive for potential students. Besides an audience from the academics from different countries, represents from embassies/financial institutions from Sweden, Belgium, The Netherlands and Italy participated. After my opening lecture, there was especially a large interest for how we could use household waste (landfills) as raw materials also in Mozambique and other neighbouring African countries. Especially, SIDA shown an interest in future research projects in the area of landfill mining.

The technical outcome from my trip seems to be a serious attempt to write a SIDA proposal on the use of landfills to produce energy and building materials. Here, the KTH researcher Weihong Yang will be important but we expect the collaboration with researchers from the Department of Energy and the Department of Industrial Economy and Management. Another potential scientific outreach from KTH could be a project focusing on cleaning of water from metals such as Hg, Cd and Pb. I know that our colleague Gunno Renman at the ABE school is an expert in the field and I have contacted him regarding this topic.

Besides the engineering talks at the conference, I also listened to other talks in a wide range of areas: violence against women, traffic deaths, malnutrition of children, presence of heavy metals in food, lack of clean water, agricultural methods and biodiversity in nature. This definitely helped me to get another perspective on issues of importance for Mozambique.

As I was shown the neighbourhoods at the outskirts of Maputo I experienced the many temporary houses (“kåkstäder”). Then, I thought that it would be great if we could use the solid material that is left after combustion of household waste as an inexpensive building material for low-cost homes. I thought maybe it is even possible to use this solid waste material to 3D print houses in the future. Is it really possible to combine a fashionable high-tech method with a cheap rest product to influence the life of those in need…

/ Pär Jönsson, Deputy Head of School

Communications, Salary Review, and the Review of Support Function at KTH

Christina Carlsson

, 2018-09-25

Communications

ITM is strengthening administrative support for communication. Currently, the school has two employees working in communications, communications manager Jenni Hollbrink, and Peter Waites, who is focused on web and digital communication. A third recruitment is under way, which is linked to research communication and the Södertälje initiative.

If you have ideas or are in need for support in these areas, do not hesitate to contact our communications staff. Above all, make sure you are up to date on the school’s internal website, as our ambition is to develop internal– and management communication within the school. The idea is to offer all school employees and visitors relevant and engaging content, which will hopefully increase traffic on our internal website. This requires commitment, good ideas, and persistent work.

A first step in this new initiative is to present let our Head of School and a few key members of management give short introductions into our activities, vision and strategies. The films in question were produced last spring in order to present the ITM-school to the principal’s school visit in May 2018. The first film – in which Jan Wikander, Head of School, presents ITM’s vision and strategy – has been published on our internal website as well as on our new channel at KTH Play. New short videos in which the school’s head’s of department each present their departments will be released once per week. The films’ audio is in Swedish, but English subtitles have been provided so that all employees at the school can appreciate these presentations.

Salary Review

The school is in the middle of the yearly salary review. Salary talks are being held throughout September. Our ambition is that information regarding new pay levels will be available in the first two weeks of November. Payment of the new salaries is planned for the December salary payout. At KTH, new salary criteria have been in effect since June 1, 2018. The statement is available in Swedish and in English.

Review of Support Function at KTH

In the autumn of 2017, the President decided that a review of KTH’s management– and operational support was needed, one that was based on the needs of the university’s core activities. These activities were defined as research and education conducted at KTH. The starting point for the review has been “One KTH.” KTH should provide and offer equal and unified support to everyone, regardless of where in the organisation you are operating. This is a prerequisite in order for students and employees to experience KTH as “One KTH.”

A decision on this issue is expected this week, and will be published on the KTH internal website under Organisation and Regulation.

/ Christina Carlsson, Head of Administration

SoTL conference ITM Digilab and Changed rules for written examination

Anna Jerbrant

, 2018-09-07

The autum term of 2018 has started and our P1 courses is up and running, as well as new Ladok. Another administrative news is that KTH this week released a new version of the rules for written examinations (KTHs anvisningar för tentamensregler), that mainly includes these changes (compared to the rules announces a year ago):

Lärare ska rondera i tentasal för att svara på frågor
En giltig ID-handling är ett krav enl det beslut KTH tidigare fattat.
De som inte anmält sig ska överlämna utkrivet kursregistreringsintyg (inte bara visa i t ex mobil).
Insläpp ska ske senast 10 min innan tentan börjar, men att det kan ske tidigare

Good for us all to know 🙂

Another area for discussion right now is pedagogical development by the help of digitalization. So, therefore I also want to inform you that there is resources availabe at Media Production where we all can receive coachning when it comes to developing Flipped Classroom in our courses. If you’re interested in develop your course, or learn more about this, please contact Jonas Thorén (Media Designer & Media Coach)

Finally, I also want to emphasize that KTH arranges the third SoTL (scholarship of Teaching and Learning) conference for the faculty. The conference will take place at KTH, Campus Valhallavägen in Stockholm, and will start in the afternoon March 28 and end in the afternoon on March 29, 2019. Call for abstracts begins on September 10^th.

Have a nice weekend!

/ Anna Jerbrant, GA

Evaluation of research quality

Pär Jönsson

, 2018-08-29

In the academic world all researchers work hard to discover new findings, which will lead to great improvements in the scientific world. The leadership at universities monitors the success of groups/department with respect to the research quality. At KTH, this has been done at research evaluations (RAE) in 2008 and 2012. It is not exactly clear when the next evaluation will be done, but a good guess is that it will take place in 2020.

Currently, I am in Helsinki to take part in a one week research evaluation of the materials science and metallurgy research at Aalto University, RAI2018. As a matter of fact I am also joined by our Head of School Jan Wikander, who has been invited to evaluate the mechanical engineering research at Aalto University. Overall, 45 scientist from all around the globe have been invited to this exercise. It is a very interesting experience that provides me and Jan with important input which we can share with the ITM researchers, so that they can be better prepared for a future evaluation at KTH.

One important thing with the evaluation is that each department should be compared to peers at other benchmark universities. Thus, there is not a focus on comparing department’s performances on a university level. This is very good since there exist different ways of publishing research results, having an impact on society, etc. So the focus should be on comparing how each department performs in comparison to similar departments elsewhere.

Aalto University is a fairly new university which in 2010 merged arts, business and engineering into one new school. What we have seen so far they have already been able to create new exciting collaborations. Maybe one interesting example is the production of textiles from forest-based raw material rest products that has been developed by engineers. Then, the art scientists have used these materials to produce fashion clothes that already have been shown on so called “cat walks”. Maybe later the business school will create business models on how these fashion clothes, produced based on recycled product, can be branded as a sustainable fashion!?

Overall, it seems like Aalto University has created an atmosphere which stimulates collaboration between different research groups and scientist. During the interviews it is clear that both PhD students and faculty thinks that laboratories have opened up so that basically everyone has access to all experimental equipment. Maybe something for us to think about…..

Pär Jönsson, Vice Head of School

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