Modernization of rail higher education in Europe – International rail intensive study course for students and third project meeting of the ASTONRail project in Zagreb, Croatia
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From May 2nd to 4th, 2022, an international rail intensive study course for students took place at the University of Zagreb, Croatia. This was organized in the ASTONRail project for students from the project's partner universities and aimed at testing new teaching and learning methods in rail-related higher education in practice. In the ASTONRail project, the Technical University of Applied Sciences Wildau (TH Wildau), together with seven other project partners from seven European countries, is developing innovative methods, approaches and practices for rail higher education. The third project meeting was held after the intensive study course.
From May 2nd to 4th, 2022, a three-day, international rail intensive study course for students from the partner universities of the ASTONRail project (Advanced approacheS and practices for rail training and education TO inNovate Rail study programmes & Improve rail higher education provision), took place in Zagreb, Croatia. The intensive study course was hosted by the University of Zagreb. The main objective of the ASTONRail project is to develop a portfolio of innovative methods, approaches and professional practices for rail skills development and as a result to improve and modernize the current rail higher education provision in Europe in order to support the recruitment of qualified employees for the rail industry.
In the work package "ASTONRail intensive study programme", the English-language intensive study course was organized and carried out with the participation of the project's partner universities, which also include the TH Wildau. Participants were teachers and students from the partner universities Aston University in Birmingham (England), the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm (Sweden), the Sapienza University of Rome (Italy), the University of Zagreb (Croatia), the University of Žilina (Slovakia), the University of Málaga (Spain) and the TH Wildau (Germany). Courses from lecturers of the partner universities were held on the topics of rail safety and security, rail technology, rail infrastructure, rail operations and control and safety technology as well as rolling stock. This was done with the focus of testing and validating modern teaching and learning methods previously elaborated in the project. A first evaluation of the students' feedback showed that three quarters of the students think that the experience from participating in the intensive study course will influence their future career plans and that all students would recommend their fellow students to participate in the intensive study course. For two-thirds of the students, the English language was not an obstacle to understanding the course content. The project partners will carry out a detailed evaluation of the intensive study course in the coming weeks.
At the subsequent partner meeting on May 5th and 6th, 2022, the status of the work packages were presented and discussed. Until the end of May, the University of Málaga is asking interested people about their perception of rail-oriented career opportunities as part of the development of strategies for making the railway sector more attractive for young professionals. The survey is available at http://astonrail.eu/survey_railway_knowledge_approach/.
The TH Wildau informed about the goals and the planned content of the ASTONRail handbook, for which the TH Wildau is responsible for within the project. The aim of the handbook is to present the project results to various target groups, to outline the need for modernization in rail higher education in Europe and to show the approaches, methods and best practice examples developed in the ASTONRail project.
The ASTONRail project is funded by Erasmus+: Strategic Partnerships for higher education (KA203) of the European Union. At the TH Wildau, ASTONRail is run by the Research Group Transport Logistics in collaboration with Prof. Dr. Martin Lehnert and Prof. Dr. Christian Liebchen. The project ends in August 2023.
More information about ASTONRail: http://astonrail.eu/ https://www.th-wildau.de/forschung-transfer/verkehrslogistik/projekte/astonrail/
The Research Group Transport Logistics at TH Wildau, headed by Prof. Dr. Jens Wollenweber, has been analyzing and developing solutions in the field of logistics in conjunction with new technologies and testing their application in practice together with business partners since 2004. The focal points of the research include the topics of warehouse logistics with location analyses and process optimization, city logistics, logistics for the forestry and timber industry, as well as analyses and application testing of new technologies in transport, such as e-mobility.
More information about Research Group Transport Logistics: http://www.th-wildau.de/fgvlog
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Specialist contact:
Anne-Katrin Osdoba (Research group transport logitsics) / Prof. Dr. Martin Lehnert ( Transportation System Engineering (B.Eng.)
TH Wildau
Hochschulring 1, 15745 Wildau
Phone: +49 (0)3375 508 370 / -541
Mail to: osdoba(at)th-wildau.de / martin.lehnert(at)th-wildau.de
Contact communication TH Wildau:
Mike Lange / Mareike Rammelt
TH Wildau
Phone: +49 (0)3375 508 211 / -669
Mail to: presse(at)th-wildau.de
Caption: From May 2nd to 4th the international rail intensive study course of the project ASTONRail for students took place in Zagreb, Croatia.
Photo: Reem Hadeed, Aston University, Text: A.-K. Osdoba