News

31
Aug

QualiChain is a winner of the 2023 FinTech Awards

Wealth & Finance magazine has revealed the winners of the 2023 FinTech Awards and QualiChain is among them. The financial sector is continuing to see an overwhelming need for cutting-edge digital technology in today’s age. In its seventh year, this awards programme persists to showcase businesses and individuals who are revolutionising the world of financial […]

14
Aug

Openness in Education as a Praxis: From Individual Testimonials to Collective Voices

Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) has co-authored a journal editorial on the current state and the future of openness in education. The editorial is entitled “Openness in Education as a Praxis: From Individual Testimonials to Collective Voices” and has been published in the latest issue of the Open Praxis journal. This has been a […]

02
Dec

The Future Use of Self Sovereign Identity and Verifiable Credentials

Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) gave an invited talk at the event “The Future Use of Self Sovereign Identity and Verifiable Credentials”, organised by the European Horizon 2020 project TOKEN. The event took place online on November 30, 2022. Alexander presented the lessons learned from the European Horizon 2020 project QualiChain and specifically from […]

24
Oct

EDUtech Europe 2022

John Domingue (The Open University, UK) attended the EDUtech Europe 2022 conference that was held in Amsterdam between 5-6th October. The event brought together more than 3000 educators, 250 speakers and 200 edtech providers from across Europe to present stories, showcase innovation and inspire educators across the region. There were four event themes: T1: Schools Leaders and Hybrid Learning T2: […]

11
Oct

The Role of Web 3.0 and Blockchain in the Future of Education

Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) gave a keynote talk at the 7th panhellenic scientific conference “Integration and Use of ICT in Education”, organised by the University of Patras in Greece. The event was very well attended by researchers and educators from higher and secondary education. Participants exchanged best practices on the effective use of […]

10
May

ASEP presents its pilot in “Public sector: a world tour of HR innovations” study

Qualichain and the ASEP pilot was presented in the context of an interview with Nina Trifonopoulou, Responsible for ASEP QualiChain dissemination, in a special study conducted by Profil Public and OECD. The study titled “Public sector: a world tour of HR innovations” demonstrates the most daring international experiments that are shifting the lines of recruitment in […]

05
May

Transferable Research and Laboratory Outcomes

The “Transferable Research and Laboratory” event took place in Lisbon, Portugal (supporting also remote participants) on April 28-29, 2022. The event was co-organised by a plethora of European co-funded projects and was attended by over 50 participants from more than 10 countries. The event provided a unique opportunity for H2020 and Erasmus+ project representatives to […]

15
Mar

A successful conclusion for QualiChain

Last week saw the final review of the QualiChain project. Starting in January 2019, QualiChain has targeted the creation, piloting and evaluation of a decentralised platform for storing, sharing and verifying education and employment qualifications. The project pilots have targeted 4 key areas: (i) lifelong learning; (ii) smart curriculum design; (iii) staffing the public sector; […]

16
Feb

QualiChain featured in OpenLearn

A series of articles authored by John Domingue and Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) have been published in OpenLearn. OpenLearn is the Open University’s free learning portal, providing free courses and other learning resources that support the Open University’s mission of opening up educational opportunities to more people in more places. OpenLearn currently offers […]

21
Jan

Deadline extension for the QualiChain Special Issue

The QualiChain project is organising a special issue on Blockchain-Based Decentralised Solutions for Learner Empowerment, Education Reengineering and Public Sector Transformation. The special issue will be published in the new Elsevier journal Blockchain: Research and Applications. This is a peer reviewed, open access journal. Authors do not have to pay any open access publication fee. The submission […]

25
Nov

Participate in the Portuguese QualiChain pilot

In the context of the QualiChain project, we ask for your collaboration by participating in the Portuguese QualiChain pilot and testing the results obtained. For this, we ask you to perform the following three steps, in order to allow us to understand your opinion before and after using the developed system: Step 1. – Fill the horizontal […]

18
Nov

QualiChain at the Innovate Learning Summit 2021

The Innovate Learning Summit took place online on November 9-11, 2021. The conference was organised by the Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education and was attended by over 600 participants from more than 40 countries. The Innovate Learning Summit provides a unique forum for education and training professionals to discuss the latest research, development, applications, […]

10
Nov

Watch the new QualiChain video

A brand new video has been produced by the QualiChain project to explain what the project is about and what it offers. This short animated video provides an overview of the project objectives, as well as the main stakeholders targeted by the project. Additionally, the video introduces the project pilots conducted in the 4 key […]

29
Oct

QualiChain meets with the IMPULSE, HECAT and CO3 projects

On October 28, 2021 an online meeting was held between representatives of the QualiChain, IMPULSE, HECAT, and CO3 projects, which are funded under the EU Horizon 2020 programme DT-TRANSFORMATIONS-02-2018-2019-2020 – Transformative impact of disruptive technologies in public services. During this meeting, the project representatives presented their respective projects and discussed potential areas of collaboration. Several such […]

25
Oct

ASEP meets with CHAISE project members

On October 5 2021, ASEP met online with members from the Greek team of the European research project CHAISE in order to present QualiChain. The Ministry of Education and Religious Affairs is one of the project’s partners. Ιn this context, Sandra Tirovola and Eleni Kakna, IT and Computer Science teachers in secondary education, met with […]

11
Oct

New Badged Open Course: Decentralising Education Using Blockchain Technology

Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) has developed the new badged open course: Decentralising Education Using Blockchain Technology. The course introduces Blockchain technology and its potential for decentralising and transforming education. The course also presents the work carried out by the QualiChain project for the decentralised management and verification of education and employment qualifications, specifically […]

29
Sep

QualiChain presented at ICL2021

The 24th International Conference on Interactive Collaborative Learning (ICL2021) took place as a hybrid event on September 22-24, 2021. This interdisciplinary conference is focused on the exchange of relevant trends and research results, as well as the presentation of practical experiences in Interactive Collaborative Learning and Engineering Pedagogy. Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) presented […]

13
Sep

QualiChain at the ALT Annual Conference 2021

The ALT Annual Conference took place online on September 7-9, 2021. The conference was organised by the Association for Learning Technology and was attended by nearly 400 participants from 24 countries. This year’s conference offered an opportunity to bring together educators, learners, managers, senior leaders and policy writers, in order to reflect on the shared experience from […]

10
Sep

The QualiChain consortium meets online

The QualiChain project consortium met online on September 7-8, 2021. Representatives from all project partners joined the 2-day meeting to discuss the latest project developments and plan their next activities. The QualiChain project targets the creation, piloting and evaluation of a decentralised platform for storing, sharing and verifying education and employment qualifications. The project focuses […]

28
Jul

QualiChain presented to the first academic course on Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies in Greece

Α web presentation took place on June 29, 2021 titled “Blockchain Applications & QualiChain” organized by the Center for Training and Lifelong Learning of Panteion University and ASEP, in the context of the first academic course on Blockchain and cryptocurrencies. Its purpose was to present the key aspects of Blockchain technology, its broad applications in […]

02
Jul

QualiChain at SLERD 2021 and EKDDA info day

Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) recently gave two invited talks at the SLERD 2021 conference and at an info day organised by EKDDA. The first event took place online on June 25th. Alexander was invited as speaker on the panel “Towards Learning Ecosystems Based on Competences: the promise of the micro-credentials” panel, in the […]

16
Jun

QualiChain featured in CORDIS

The QualiChain project has been featured in a CORDIS article entitled: A better way to verify educational and employment credentials. The article provides an overview of the project’s objectives and innovations, related to streamlining and simplifying recruitment processes through the use of blockchain, semantics, data analytics, and gamification technologies. The article includes quotes from Dr Panagiotis […]

15
Jun

QualiChain presented in Madeira

The Madeira Digital Health and Wellbeing is an initiative of the SRS and UNINOVA, that features demonstrations of the technological solutions developed in projects funded by the European Union (EU) currently available and implemented in the Madeira Island, making all key stakeholders aware of the concept of health and wellbeing, as well as future developments […]

10
Jun

WHU meets with QualiChain

On June 4 2021, representatives of WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management (Yulia Kupriyanova, Manager Digital Learning, and Vincent Meertens, Associate Director Digital & Learning Innovation) met representatives of NTUA and ATOS from the QualiChain consortium, with the objective to investigate and identify potential synergies. Potential synergies included indicatively, yet not exhaustively, engagement of […]

28
May

Facilitating lifelong learning through the use of blockchain technology

On 26 May 2021, Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) delivered the webinar Facilitating lifelong learning through the use of blockchain technology as part of the CPD webinar series of the Association for Learning Technology (ALT). In this webinar, Alexander presented the QualiChain project and the lifelong learning pilot that he is leading. This pilot […]

28
May

ASEP presents QualiChain to postgraduate students

In the context of a web presentation that took place on May 18, postgraduate students in the Master program in Informatics of the University of Piraeus in Athens, had the opportunity to familiarise themselves with the potential of Βlockchain technology and its innovative features, as well as with the specific goals of the QualiChain research […]

13
May

QualiChain organises Special Journal Issue

The QualiChain project is organising a special issue on Blockchain-Based Decentralised Solutions for Learner Empowerment, Education Reengineering and Public Sector Transformation. This special issue will be published in the new Elsevier journal Blockchain: Research and Applications. This special issue explores how learner empowerment, education reengineering and public sector transformation can be achieved via blockchain-based decentralised solutions. […]

26
Apr

QualiChain at the OERxDomains Conference

The OERxDomains Conference took place online on April 21-22 as a special edition of the 12th annual conference for Open Education research, practice and policy. The conference was organised by the Association for Learning Technology in partnership with Reclaim Hosting’s Domains Conference, thus incorporating a special strand hosted by the Domains Conference and bringing two communities together. This year’s […]

26
Apr

QualiChain at the European Blockchain Convention 2021

QualiChain has attended the European Blockchain Convention that took place online on April 12-16. The European Blockchain Convention is the leading Blockchain Conference for Business in Europe, attracting tech leaders, regulators, investors, corporations, developers and entrepreneurs from the Blockchain industry. The mission of this event is to provide world-class content in collaboration with the brightest minds […]

06
Apr

QualiChain presented at the General Assembly of the Hellenic Blockchain Hub

On March 30 2021, QualiChain was presented in the context of the annual General Assembly of the Hellenic Blockchain Hub. Dr. Panagiotis Kokkinakos provided a short overview of the QualiChain project, while Panagiotis Zarafidis presented the QualiChain pilot lead by HeP/ASEP. The event participants expressed high interest on QualiChain in general, and the HeP/ASEP pilot […]

29
Mar

The QualiChain pilot flyers have landed

The 5 pilots of the QualiChain project now have brand new flyers. The flyers provide an overview of each pilot, its objectives, the targeted stakeholders, as well as the main scenario. The flyers are available in the languages of each pilot, i.e., English, Greek and Portuguese. The flyers can be downloaded from here.

24
Mar

ASEP signs Memorandum of Understanding with Hellenic Blockchain Hub

The Supreme Council for Personnel Selection (ASEP, Hellenic Parliament’s linked third party) and the Hellenic Blockchain Hub (HBH) agreed to build cooperation by signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on January 22, 2021. HBH is a non-profit network of executives from the public and private sector aiming at the dissemination of knowledge on the blockchain […]

05
Feb

QualiChain articles at the International Journal on Advances in Intelligent Systems

The latest issue of the International Journal on Advances in Intelligent Systems has been published and includes 5 articles from QualiChain project partners. These articles have been invited and are extended versions of the papers published in the proceedings of the QualiChain Special Track, organised in the context of the 12th International Conference on Mobile, Hybrid, […]

05
Feb

QualiChain at the ARI Digital Show 2020

The ARI Digital Show is an event hosted annually by Atos Research and Innovation to present our experience and achievements resulting from our work in research projects. Due to the current pandemic crisis, this year the Digital Show went virtual and this gave us the chance to open it to the whole Atos community. The […]

01
Feb

QualiChain holds online plenary meeting

The consortium of the QualiChain project held an online plenary meeting on January 25-26, 2021. Representatives from all project partners joined the meeting to discuss the latest project developments and plan their next activities. The QualiChain project targets the creation, piloting and evaluation of a decentralised platform for storing, sharing and verifying education and employment […]

29
Jan

QualiChain meets with BlockAdemic and Web2Learn

On January 29 2021, Dr. Katerina Zourou (representing BlockAdemic and Web2Learn) met Dr. Panagiotis Kokkinakos (representing QualiChain and DSSLab NTUA), with the objective to enable cross-fertilisation of ideas, share lessons-learnt and identify potential synergies that may arise. The domain of education, and education innovated by new technologies in particular, as well as the use of […]

20
Jan

ASEP meets with University students to present QualiChain

ASEP (Hellenic Parliament’s linked 3rd party) gave a web presentation on December 21, 2020 titled “Blockchain Applications & QualiChain”. The event was organised by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Student Branch at University of Western Macedonia in Kozani, in collaboration with ASEP’s Software Department. Its purpose was to present the key aspects […]

20
Jan

ASEP participates in Blockchain in Business Conference

On December 2, 2020 ASEP (Hellenic Parliament’s linked 3rd party) participated in a web conference titled “Blockchain in Business 2020” organised by the Hellenic Blockchain Hub and Boussias Communications where QualiChain and the Greek pilot were presented as an example of blockchain implementation in the public sector. Its objective was to highlight the prospects and […]

16
Dec

HeP-ASEP pilot at eLmL 2020

ASEP participated in the Twelfth International Conference on Mobile, Hybrid, and On-line Learning (eLmL 2020) that took place on November 21, 2020 to November 25, 2020 in Valencia, Spain. Due to the Covid pandemic, ASEP participated virtually with a video, where ASEP’s Board Member, Foteini Bompoti, in the context of a special track organised by the […]

16
Dec

ASEP meets with the Hellenic Blockchain Hub

The Supreme Council for Personnel Selection (ASEP, Hellenic Parliament’s linked third party) organised a web meeting on November 20, 2020 with the Hellenic Blockchain Hub (H.B.H.), and NTUA in order to discuss the QualiChain project and explore the potential for further cooperation.  H.B.H. is a non-profit network of executives from the public and private sector […]

01
Dec

QualiChain meets with DE4A and KRAKEN

On November 27 2020, representatives of the QualiChain project met with representatives of the H2020 projects DE4A and KRAKEN, with the objective to enable cross-fertilisation of ideas, share lessons-learnt and identify potential synergies that may arise. All 3 projects will provide, amongst others, decentralised solutions with the ability to share and verify individual qualifications while […]

27
Nov

Keynote and Special Track at eLmL 2020

The 12th International Conference on Mobile, Hybrid, and On-line Learning (eLmL 2020) took place online on November 21-25, 2020. eLmL is bringing together federated views on mobile learning, hybrid learning and online learning. The conference is dedicated to educators, eLearning experts, and students to exchange their ideas, experiences and lessons learned in different facets of modern learning. Alexander […]

24
Nov

QualiChain at IEEE Engineering Day 2020

The IEEE Engineering Day 2020 will take place on WebEx on November 27, between 2pm and 6pm (Portugal time, GMT). QualiChain will be represented by Professor Miguel Pupo Correia (INESC-ID, Portugal), who will deliver the special session: “Blockchain Cross-Borders: The European Blockchain Services Infrastructure”. Blockchain and distributed ledger technology are overcoming a period of exploration […]

23
Nov

QualiChain at Open Education Global 2020

The Open Education Global 2020 conference took place online on November 16-20. The Open Education Global conference is the most internationally diverse conference devoted exclusively to open education, attracting researchers, practitioners, policy makers, educators and students to discuss and explore how open education advances educational practices around the world. This year’s conference was held online, featuring […]

03
Nov

Self-Sovereign Identity Access Control

Rafael Belchior (INESC-ID, Portugal) participated in the PhD Open Days that took place on October 26-28, 2020 at Técnico Lisboa. This event offers a major opportunity for more than one thousand Ph.D. students to socialise and share their research with the rest of the academic community, companies, and alumni. The work presented by Rafael was […]

21
Oct

QualiChain ready to initiate its pilot at the National technical University of Athens

QualiChain aims to develop a technical solution that can solve various challenges and facilitate easier processes when it comes to education and the labour market. The QualiChain platform will be validated through 4 distinct pilot use cases, one of which will take place in the Electrical & Computer Engineering (ECE) School of the National Technical […]

21
Oct

QualiChain at eLmL 2020: NTUA publications

The Twelfth International Conference on Mobile, Hybrid, and On-line Learning (eLmL 2020) will take place on November 21, 2020 to November 25, 2020 in Valencia, Spain as well as in a digital format to accommodate researchers and scientists during the Covid pandemic. Under the context of that conference, a special track has also been organised […]

21
Oct

QualiChain at the iCERI 2020

The 13th annual International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation (iCERI 2020) aims to promote the cooperation and exchange of educational experiences among institutions all over the world and showcase the latest research activities around education. QualiChain, having participated in the conference in the previous year will leverage the stage of iCERI to showcase the […]

21
Oct

QualiChain at the ICECIET 2020

The 14th International Conference on Education, Curriculum, Instructional and Educational Technology (ICECIET 2020) took place on September 16-17 virtually. This is an annual conference that aims to bring together leading academic scientists, researchers and research scholars to exchange and share their experiences and research results on all aspects of Education, Curriculum, Instructional and Educational Technology. […]

14
Oct

QualiChain meeting in SRS

On October 8th 2020, the Secretary of Health and Civil Protection of the Regional Government of Madeira (SRS) met with the Human Resources Department and other congeners from Health Institutions under the SRS government tutelage to discuss the QualiChain platform latest developments. A representative from Knowledgebiz also joined the meeting to demonstrate the latest project […]

07
Oct

QualiChain meets virtually

The consortium of the QualiChain project has met virtually on September 30 – October 1, 2020. Representatives from all project partners joined MS Teams to discuss the latest project developments and plan their next activities. The QualiChain project targets the creation, piloting and evaluation of a decentralised platform for storing, sharing and verifying education and […]

07
Oct

QualiChain at ICL2020

The 23rd International Conference on Interactive Collaborative Learning (ICL2020) took place online on September 23-25. This interdisciplinary conference is focused on the exchange of relevant trends and research results, as well as the presentation of practical experiences in Interactive Collaborative Learning and Engineering Pedagogy. Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) delivered a hands-on workshop entitled “Decentralising Education […]

07
Oct

QualiChain at the European Blockchain Convention

QualiChain attended the virtual European Blockchain Convention on September 21-22. The European Blockchain Convention is the leading Blockchain Conference for Business in Europe, attracting tech leaders, regulators, investors, corporations, developers and entrepreneurs from the Blockchain industry. The mission of this event is to provide world-class content in collaboration with the brightest minds in the space, […]

01
Oct

Blockchain and Smart Contracts course

Miguel Correia (INESC-ID, Portugal) is going to teach the second edition of a course on Blockchain and Smart Contracts, after the success of the first edition last year. A joint initiative of Técnico+ and Católica-Lisbon, with collaboration from INESC-ID, the course provides a 30-hour introduction to the topic. The first half of the course presents […]

01
Oct

QualiChain at BRAINS 2020

Diogo Serranito, Andre Vasconcelos, Sergio Guerreiro and Miguel Correia (INESC-ID, Portugal) presented the QualiChain project and their paper Blockchain Ecosystem for Verifiable Qualifications at the 2nd Conference on Blockchain Research & Applications for Innovative Networks and Services (BRAINS 2020), which was held online on September 28-30, 2020. The authors discussed the ways that their proposal […]

15
Sep

Supporting Lifelong Learning with Blockchain Technology

Blockchain technology provides a decentralised peer-to-peer infrastructure, supporting openness, transparency, accountability, identity management and trust. As such, the Blockchain has the potential to revolutionise education in a number of ways. Blockchain technology offers opportunities to thoroughly rethink how we find educational content and training services online, how we register and pay for them, as well […]

01
Sep

QualiChain at the ALT Summer Summit 2020

The first virtual Summer Summit of the Association for Learning Technology (ALT) took place on August 26-27, 2020. The event was a great success, with over 300 participants joining from 25 countries. The event’s theme was exploring Learning Technology in a time of crisis, care and complexity. Participants explored the themes of crisis, care and […]

14
Jul

QualiChain presented to the W3C Credentials Group

On July 13th 2020, QualiChain was presented to the W3C Credentials Community Group by representatives from the Open University. John Domingue, Allan Third, Alexander Mikroyannidis, Niaz Chowdhury and Mano Ramachandran joined a conference call between all members of the W3C group and presented their latest work on Verifiable Credentials and Blockchains. In particular, Alexander Mikroyannidis […]

22
Jun

QualiChain passes first review with flying colours

The first formal review of the QualiChain project took place on June 18th, 2020. The review was held online and was attended by representatives from all project partners, the Project Officer, two external reviewers, as well as DG CONNECT representatives. The review was a complete success, with the reviewers and the Project Officer commending the […]

20
May

Blockchain-based COVID-19 digital immunity passport

On May 19, researchers from the Open University (OU) delivered a webinar about the world’s first digital application to certify COVID-19 immunity test results. The Open Blockchain team, led by Professor John Domingue, have developed a prototype mobile phone app that enables instant verification of tamper-proof coronavirus test results and vaccination certificates. Speaking about this […]

01
May

QualiChain at the 9th eSTEeM conference

The 9th eSTEeM conference took place online on April 29-30, 2020. The conference is organised annually by the Open University, UK. Entitled “Informing Student Success – From Scholarship to Practice”, this year’s programme has been a mix of short orals, workshops and poster presentations, showcasing scholarship work conducted by STEM colleagues. Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open […]

31
Mar

QualiChain Special Track Proceedings

The proceedings of the QualiChain Special Track on “Decentralised Qualifications on the Blockchain” have been published and are available online. Project partners have contributed 6 papers that describe the context and goals of the QualiChain pilots, the key research questions driving the evaluation of the pilots, as well as the overall framework of the project. […]

24
Feb

QualiChain meets in Athens

The consortium of the QualiChain project has met in Athens, Greece on February 19-20, 2020. Representatives from all project partners spent two days discussing the latest project developments and planning their next activities. The QualiChain project targets the creation, piloting and evaluation of a decentralised platform for storing, sharing and verifying education and employment qualifications. […]

10
Feb

JTELSS 2020 workshop: Decentralising education using blockchain technology

UPDATE: This event has been cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) will be delivering a hands-on workshop at the 16th EATEL Summer School on Technology Enhanced Learning (JTELSS), which will take place on May 23-30, 2020 in Sani, Halkidiki, Greece. The summer school is a flagship event of the European […]

27
Jan

QualiChain at Blockchain Economía

The Spanish web of blockchain industry Blockchain Economía recently interviewed Daniel Field, Head of Blockchain in Atos Spain and a member of the Atos Expert Community. Daniel joined Atos in 2007, working with innovation teams to accelerate adoption and guide development according to market needs. He has worked with academics, SMEs and large businesses across […]

21
Jan

QualiChain at the RedIRIS conference

The Technical Conference of RedIRIS, the Spanish network for the interconnectivity of universities and research centres, was hosted in Seville in May, 2019. QualiChain was presented by Andreia Inamorato representative of the Joint Research Centre for Education of the EC. A video recording of the presentation is available here (see 17.40 to 19.45 min, in […]

17
Jan

Kicking off the Decentralised Web

QualiChain representatives are among the leaders of a new group of academics, aDecentWeb, which aims to create a web where individuals and organisations remain in control. John Domingue and Allan Third (The Open University, UK) co-chaired the group’s first Decent(ralised) Web Symposium held in Vienna on January 17th, 2020. The focus of the event was […]

04
Dec

QualiChain at the Open Education Global 2019 conference

The Open Education Global Conference (OE Global 2019) took place in Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy on November 26-28. The OE Global conference is the most internationally diverse conference devoted exclusively to open education, attracting researchers, practitioners, policy makers, educators and students from more than 35 countries to discuss and explore how Open Education advances […]

22
Nov

QualiChain at ICWI 2019 and iCERI 2019

 The 18th International Conference on WWW/Internet (ICWI) took place on November 7-9 in Cagliari, Italy. This is an annual conference that aims to address the main issues of concern within WWW/Internet as well as the technological and non-technological developments in these domains. The 12th annual International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation (iCERI) took place […]

15
Nov

QualiChain featured in the KMi Festival

The Knowledge Media Institute (KMi) of The Open University, UK celebrated on November 14 its 25th anniversary by organising the KMi Festival. The event showcased how Knowledge and Media technologies are impacting education, science and beyond. A variety of booths allowed visitors to talk in depth to different research teams and see demonstrations of the […]

25
Oct

Maintaining Trust and Privacy of Personal Data with Blockchains

Following scandals in the media such as with Cambridge Analytica and Facebook, there has been widespread concern around the abuse of personal online data. These include from Sir Tim Berners Lee who in a Variety article called the over centralisation of data on the Web ‘anti human’. At the annual EU Big Data Value Forum, […]

25
Oct

Blockchains and Understanding the Post-truth Society

Early October saw John Domingue (The Open University, UK) participate in two panels in a Conference on Understanding the Post-truth Society held in Valletta, Malta. The aim of the event was to bring together technology experts, social scientists and journalists to discuss how recent challenges and issues associated with fake news, mass datafication, mass surveillance, […]

24
Oct

QualiChain at the EADTU 2019 conference

The Online, Open and Flexible Higher Education Conference (OOFHEC2019) took place on October 16-18 in Madrid, Spain. This is the flagship annual event of the European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU), Europe’s leading institutional association in online, open and flexible higher education. This year’s event was hosted by the National Distance Education University (UNED) […]

24
Oct

Overview of Horizon 2020 projects on “ICT-enabled Public Sector Innovation”

A new report has been published by the European Commission, presenting the projects that have received funding on the topic of “ICT-enabled Public Sector Innovation”. In the 2016-2017 period, 13 projects have received nearly €49 million EU funding via four calls for proposals and two research and innovation topics supporting ICT–based solutions for migration and […]

22
Oct

QualiChain at Digital Credentials Masterclass

John Domingue (The Open University, UK) will be presenting QualiChain at the Digital Credentials Masterclass, which will be held in Bled, Slovenia on 24-25 October 2019. The Digital Credentials Masterclass is the culmination of a multi-year, multi-country project investigating the potential of micro-credentials to transform the European Higher Education landscape, from the perspectives of policy, […]

23
Sep

QualiChain meets in Madrid

The consortium of the QualiChain project has met in Madrid, Spain on September 19-20, 2019. Representatives from all project partners spent two days discussing the latest project developments and planning their next activities. The QualiChain project targets the creation, piloting and evaluation of a decentralised platform for storing, sharing and verifying education and employment qualifications. […]

20
Sep

Blockchains at the Pan Commonwealth Forum

The Pan Commonwealth Forum (PCF), held at Murrayfield Stadium the home of Scottish rugby, brought together over 500 attendees from 61 commonwealth countries including many ministers and university vice chancellors to discuss the future of learning. The overall aim of this year’s event was to discuss, debate and showcase how innovations are improving the quality […]

16
Sep

QualiChain Special Track at eLmL 2020

UPDATE: This event has been postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. New dates: November 21-25, 2020. The QualiChain project is organising a special track at the 12th International Conference on Mobile, Hybrid, and On-line Learning (eLmL 2020), which will be held on March 22-26, 2020 November 21-25, 2020 in Valencia, Spain. This special track will […]

12
Sep

QualiChain at ALTC 2019

Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) joined the Association for Learning Technology Conference (ALTC) last week and delivered a QualiChain workshop. ALTC 2019 took place on 3-5 September 2019 in Edinburgh, UK with a packed programme and over 450 participants from across the globe. ALTC is an annual event aiming to confront and challenge established […]

12
Sep

QualiChain at De:Central Days

Ingo Keck (TIB, Germany) will be presenting QualiChain with a talk at the De:Central Days convention, which will take place on September 24-25 in Palma de Mallorca, Spain. The De:central Days convention is a new industry-focused conference that covers all parts of the digital economy, with focus on emerging decentralised technologies like the Internet of […]

30
Aug

QualiChain at TEDxOpenUniversity

The Open University will be hosting TEDx on November 8th in Milton Keynes, UK. The theme of the event is ‘Imagine What’s Next’: Today’s world is always evolving. Amazing innovation, change and discovery takes place around the globe and beyond, right in front of our eyes. Huge leaps have been made in our lifetime – […]

30
Aug

QualiChain at PCF9

The 9th Pan-Commonwealth Forum on Open Learning (PCF9) will be held in Edinburgh, Scotland at the historic BT Murrayfield Stadium on 9-12 September 2019.  In keeping with tradition, the Commonwealth of Learning (COL) has partnered with The Open University to co-host the Forum and celebrate the 30 and 50 years of our respective commitment to quality […]

29
Aug

Blockchains, Fact and Fiction – a legal perspective

Date: Monday, September 2, 2019 – 13:00 to 13:45 GMT Location: Online via YouTube What is a Blockchain? What are the benefits and risks of Cryptocurrency? Why should we be reconsidering the perception of what our personal data actually is? Join Prof John Domingue (KMi, The Open University, UK) and Dr Robert Herian (Law School, […]

21
Aug

Upcoming QualiChain Workshops

A number of hands-on QualiChain workshops will be delivered to renowned international conferences on open education and educational technology later this year. In particular, Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) will be delivering QualiChain workshops at: The Association for Learning Technology Conference (ALTC 2019), 3–5 September 2019, Edinburgh, UK. The Online, Open and Flexible Higher […]

09
Jul

Meet the QualiChain partners: Sofia Mota

In this QualiChain partner interview, we interview Sofia Mota, Director of the Digital Competencies Centre for the Portuguese Public Administration in the Administrative Modernization Agency (AMA), Portugal. Sofia has a degree in Computer Science and Business Management. In the last 20 years, she worked in IT consulting private companies, implementing and managing IT projects for several […]

04
Jul

Meet the QualiChain partners: Carlos Agostinho

We continue our series of QualiChain partner interviews with Carlos Agostinho, Director of Knowledgebiz, Portugal. Carlos holds a PhD in the area of industrial information systems by the Faculty of Science and Technology of the NOVA University of Lisbon (FCT/UNL) and a MSc in Computer Science from the same school. Having a large experience in […]

25
Jun

Meet the QualiChain partners: Foteini Bompoti

In this QualiChain partner interview, we talk to Foteini Bompoti currently serving as a Member of the Supreme Council for Civil Personnel Selection (ASEP), Greece. Foteini is an attorney-at-law with postgraduate studies in international trade and investment law and arbitration as well as maritime law and economics. She has over eight years of business, research […]

20
Jun

Meet the QualiChain partners: Ingo Keck

In this QualiChain partner interview, we talk to Ingo Keck, Web 3 Senior Scientist at TIB Leibniz Information Centre For Science And Technology, Germany. Dr. Ingo R. Keck is a physicist and holds the doctor europeus from the University of Granada. He worked as a researcher and lecturer in the fields of biomedical data analysis, machine […]

14
Jun

QualiChain at JTELSS 2019

The 15th EATEL Summer School on Technology Enhanced Learning (JTELSS 2019) took place on June 1-8, 2019 in Bari, Italy. Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) represented QualiChain and delivered a workshop entitled “How the Blockchain can shape the future of education”. During this hands-on workshop, participants explored the different scenarios that place the learner […]

14
Jun

QualiChain at ESWC 2019

The Extended Semantic Web Conference (ESWC 2019) took place on June 2-6 in Portoroz, Slovenia. QualiChain was represented by John Domingue and Allan Third from The Open University, UK, as well as Damien Graux from Fraunhofer IAIS, Germany. QualiChain was presented prominently at the opening and closing ceremonies as a conference sponsor and had a […]

04
Jun

QualiChain at EDCON 2019

The 7th International Big Data & Analytics Education Conference (EDCON), is taking place on June 3-4 in Maryland, USA. EDCON brings together experts from Big data and education to discuss novel solutions from the areas of Big data analytics, knowledge representation, Artificial Intelligence, and cognitive computing. In the context of the EU H2020 project QualiChain, […]

29
May

New study: Blockchain for Digital Government

One of the key foundations of the QualiChain project is taking advantage of Blockchain ledgers as decentralised, permanent, unalterable stores of information that can help with the archiving and trust issues in education, as well as provide a frictionless method for transacting with others. Blockchain is at the forefront of research initiatives and projects all […]

22
May

Meet the QualiChain partners: Simon Scerri

We continue the series of QualiChain partner interviews with Simon Scerri, Senior Researcher in Fraunhofer IAIS, Germany. Simon leads the Big Data Management and Value Extraction competence area at Fraunhofer IAIS, which explores Linked Data applications to support Data Value Chains and realise various data infrastructures. In 2011, Simon received his Ph.D. from the Faculty […]

21
May

QualiChain featured in international high-profile events

During the past few weeks, the QualiChain project has been featured in several prominent and high-profile events internationally. At the end of April, the Blockchain Expo took place at the Olympia Grand in London with over 8,000 participants. John Domingue (The Open University, UK) gave a Keynote on applying blockchains to lifelong learning. The event […]

15
May

QualiChain meets in Lisbon

The consortium of the QualiChain project has met in Lisbon, Portugal on May 9-10. This has been the first plenary face-to-face meeting of the project, after its kick-off meeting in January 2019. Representatives from all project partners spent two days discussing the latest project developments and planning their next activities. The next plenary face-to-face meeting […]

29
Apr

Meet the QualiChain partners: Pilar Pérez Berganza

In this QualiChain partner interview, we talk to Pilar Pérez Berganza, Business consultant in Atos, Spain. Pilar graduated in Advertising and Public Relations (University of Barcelona, Spain) and is also certified in PBA® (Certified Professional Business Analysis) by the Project Management Institute PMI®. Pilar has more than ten years of work experience in R&D business […]

24
Apr

Meet the QualiChain partners: Sérgio Guerreiro

We continue our series of QualiChain partner interviews with Sérgio Luís Proença Duarte Guerreiro. Sérgio is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon (IST/UL), Portugal, acting in the Information Systems scientific area. He is also a researcher at the INESC-ID, IDSS (Information and […]

16
Apr

Meet the QualiChain partners: Panagiotis Kokkinakos

We start this series of interviews with Panagiotis Kokkinakos. Panagiotis is a Project Manager and Research Associate at the Decision Support Systems Laboratory (DSSLab) of the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA). He holds a MSc. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, an MBA in Techno-Economic Systems and a […]

12
Apr

Meet the QualiChain partners

Would you like to know more about the work and vision of the QualiChain project partners? In the coming weeks, we will be featuring a series of interviews from representatives of each project partner. In these interviews, our project partners will talk about their role in the project and how this relates to their background […]

20
Mar

The Open University has been awarded a Fellowship of the British Blockchain Association

Last week, John Domingue (The Open University, UK) was awarded a Fellowship of the British Blockchain Association. As stated on the British Blockchain Association website, an award of the Fellowship is “recognition of exceptional achievement and contribution to Blockchain research and allied disciplines”. Additionally, recognition through a Fellowship demonstrates a “commitment to excellence, leadership, advancing […]

11
Mar

JTELSS 2019 workshop: How the Blockchain can shape the future of education

Alexander Mikroyannidis (The Open University, UK) will be delivering a hands-on workshop at the 15th EATEL Summer School on Technology Enhanced Learning (JTELSS), which will take place on June 1-8, 2019 in Bari, Italy. The summer school is a flagship event of the European Association of Technology Enhanced Learning (EATEL). It provides a stimulating learning […]

08
Mar

WWW2019 workshop: Linked Data on the Web and its Relationship with Distributed Ledgers (LDOW/LDDL)

John Domingue (The Open University, UK) is co-organising a workshop on Linked Data on the Web and its Relationship to Distributed Ledgers (LDOW/LDDL). The workshop will be held in the context of the Web Conference (WWW 2019). The Web Conference 2019 will be hosted in San Francisco, California, on May 13-17 to celebrate the 30th […]

20
Feb

QualiChain has kicked-off!

The new H2020 project QualiChain has had its kick-off meeting on January 22-23, hosted by the coordinator partner NTUA in Athens, Greece. QualiChain targets the creation, piloting and evaluation of a decentralised platform for storing, sharing and verifying education and employment qualifications. The project focuses on the assessment of the potential of blockchain technology for disrupting the […]