May 2020

 
 
 
 
About the IEEE Education Society Newsletter:
 
 
The IEEE Education Society (EdSoc) Newsletter aims to provide members with relevant time-sensitive announcements and news.
 
 
About the IEEE Education Society
 
 
The IEEE Education Society was founded in 1957 and is one of the oldest technical Societies in IEEE. It is a worldwide Society of professionals dedicated to ensuring high-quality education in science and engineering. Our members engage students each day, research and propose new theories in learning science, and innovate classroom practice. We welcome your contributions to our community and hope you can benefit from the dialog the society helps to foster.
 
 
President's Message
 
 

In the novel War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy wrote: “There is nothing stronger than those two: patience and time, they will do it all.” In his context, Tolstoy was describing his General’s philosophy of avoiding needless battles. Those of us currently teaching at the university or K12 level have certainly faced multiple battles over the past six months as the 2019 Coronavirus pandemic has circled the globe, shuttered economies, and caused education to rethink the way we mentor our engineers and computer scientists in training. And, a great deal of uncertainty remains as institutions in the southern hemisphere continue to deliver content in the middle of their academic year while northern hemisphere schools write contingency plans for both traditional and remote-learning scenarios when they return to class in August or September. Each of us has a unique and important story about how this current educational environment has affected and changed us. I am interested in hearing about your experiences and how you reacted to your new responsibilities as teachers... Continue Reading

 
 
Education Society June 2020 Board of Governors Meeting
 
 
The IEEE Education Society June 2020 Board of Governors meeting will be held virtually on 22 June 2020 due to the travel restrictions imposed by COVID-19. As stated in the Society’s governing documents, this meeting is open to all Education Society Members. If you are interested in attending this meeting, please contact [email protected].
 
 
Frontiers in Education Conference Turns 50
 
 
The Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE) is a well-respected international conference on engineering and computer science education. The IEEE Education Society founded the conference in 1971. The American Society for Engineering Education joined as a co-sponsor in 1973. For more than two decades, these two sponsoring societies held the conference in various locations around the United States and, occasionally, in international venues. In 1995, the IEEE Computer Society became a sponsor and together these three groups have continued to plan high-quality events that provide engineering and computer science educators the opportunity to network and showcase peer-reviewed scholarly contributions in educational research and classroom practice. In 2013, the FIE Steering Committee formed a formal policy that places FIE within the continental United States with the possibility of an international location at five-year intervals.

The educational research and practice literature generated by FIE is regularly cited in scholarly work and helped to inspire a well-regarded textbook in engineering education written by John Heywood and published by Wiley-IEEE Press (ISBN: 978-0-471-74111-4).
 
 
Peer Review
FIE uses a two-stage review process that begins with the issuance of a call-for-papers in June of the year preceding the conference. The first stage requires submission of a short abstract that is then peer-reviewed by the technical program committee for appropriateness to the conference, the yearly theme, new and engaging ideas, etc. Authors of selected abstracts are invited to submit full papers and works-in-progress (short papers) for double-blind peer-review. A double-blind peer review means that reviewers cannot see the names or affiliations of the authors and the authors are not told the names of the reviewers.

The FIE acceptance rate is quoted based on the full two-level peer review of acceptable papers. The average acceptance rate is around 50%.
 
 
Attendance
The Frontiers in Education Conference is one of the world’s premier conference events covering the areas of engineering, computer engineering, software engineering, and computer science education. It has a loyal author and attendee base. Registrations have remained relatively constant over the past twenty years. The reason is the sense of community that FIE provides to attendees: the high-quality technical papers consistently provide state-of-the-art conversation in education, the registration fee has remained relatively affordable, and registration pays for an opening reception, three breakfasts, three lunches, all coffee and refreshment breaks, as well as the conference bag, the proceedings, an exhibit hall, free wireless internet, and other amenities. Registrants consistently compliment FIE on the common food functions that foster a sense of camaraderie and provide ample opportunity for participant networking.

The Society is proud that FIE has achieved its status in the Engineering and Computer Science educational community.
 
 
Division VI Director Message
 
 
IEEE is the largest worldwide Association of Engineering with more than 400,000 members. Two of their focus areas are Technical and Educational activities, which complement their other focus areas like the Membership and Geographic activities, as well as Standards that have a big impact technically and, in both management, and organization. All of the mentioned focus areas have been impacted for the pandemic and closure times, as our members have changed their way of life with limited mobility, teleworking, and increasing activity at home due to the combination of family issues and professional ones.

Regarding technical and educational activities, online action is rising exponentially. We receive different options daily of webinars or online workshops to attend in every IEEE discipline.

The educational (and teleworking) activities are mainly focused on the new scenario of closure and the conversion of daily work (an academic or professional one) to online work. New technological tools, the boom of the video conference tools, and new ways of continuous evaluation and teamwork are competencies and skills that we must fluently manage from day to night.

Connected with this new professional scenario, the mobility blackout converted all meetings and events into online ones that affected teamwork (as cited), conferences big and small have been involved in new online environments.
 
 
Main Lessons Learned
From activities performed through IEEE technical Societies,and with the support of their Divisions, we can see that the webinars are one of the most offered and demanded activities, as members and general attendees at home use some part of the time they devote to professional activities to improve their skills, related to the pandemic online time or regarding more classical technical ones.

The use of videoconferencing systems is one of the most efficient and demanding tools, as well as team working environments like cloud-oriented sharing files, project organization or management ones (calendars, etc.) for professional and personal use. This is a time we can see every day technical tools being used in both environments.

And inside the events, the full transition to remote environments happens suddenly and the online or virtual (offline, remote, or hybrid) scenarios have been the solutions selected. Some few have been delayed to the first semester of 2021 having expectations (and hope) of improvement in the mobility options.

Altogether, the main lesson learned is that a general overworking has been produced for the authors, presenters, and at a high level, organizers, and managers. New tools, new roles of literacy on the management of the tools, supporting documents, and files, are needed inside the organization for supporting people. Technical and educational activities already share the issue of managing global time zones and adding differing home conditions (family, children, elder people) complicate this even more.

It can be concluded that this situation will continue for many months or years. The future will be hybrid, and people will be online much more than they were in the past. Mobility issues, financial issues, and even personal issues will impact the future of meetings and events, and social distancing will impact our relationships everywhere.

Manuel Castro, IEEE Fellow
IEEE Division VI Director and IEEE EdSoc President Emeritus
UNED
 
 
COVID-19 Impact on Academic Market
 
 
 
COVID-19 Impact on the US Academic Market
By:James J. Sluss, Jr.
 
 
 
 
 
COVID-19 Impact on the Latin American Academic Market
By:Claudio R. Brito
 
 
 
 
Education Society MERLOT Teaching with Technology Resource Center
 
 
The IEEE Education Society, in collaboration with MERLOT, the Multimedia Educational Resource for Online Teaching, has launched the EdSoc Teaching Resource Center (ETRC), a Web-based resource to facilitate the discovery of relevant and high-quality teaching resources for higher education instructors of electrical and computer engineering, computer science, and information systems.

The Education Society has been a partner of MERLOT for several years, having recently renewed its Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the two partners. The Education Society, along with the Computer Society, endorse and sponsor the Information Technology and Computer Science communities in MERLOT.

The EdSoc Teaching Resource Center (ETRC) responds to the current challenge lecture-oriented instructors face, the need to use “online” instruction to address their teaching assignments. At present, ETRC includes resources to help both teachers and students preparing to start teaching and learning online, to meet the direct needs in, and provide direct access to, MERLOT’s Engineering, Computer Science, and Information Systems community portals – the latter two portals having been developed in alignment with ABET/CSAB guidelines. Users will also be able to access MERLOT’s overall repository of almost 100,000 learning materials; dozens of other OER libraries; a customized Collabratec community for sharing experiences regarding online teaching; other existing IEEE learning resources; and a host of teaching and learning resources available through the MERLOT system.

ETRC complements other resource-focused products offered by IEEE staff and volunteers, by providing access to hundreds of thousands of other free and open resources of potential interest to the Education Society and other IEEE members.

For more information about this resource, please contact:

Edmundo Tovar
Technical University of Madrid
[email protected]
IEEE Education Society - President-Elect
 
 
Pivot to Virtual Conferences: Report on authors expectations and perceptions concerning EDUNINE2020 and EDUCON2020
 
 
Due to the current challenges conferences are facing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the IEEE Education Society decided to evaluate the immediate impact on those that have moved to virtual events. We were mainly concerned with the perception and expectations of authors regarding future editions and the experience of attendants regarding the online model.
 
 
 
 
Profile of the Spanish and Portuguese Chapter activities from the EDUCON Session
 
 
On 29 April 2020, the Education Society Chapters special session was held at EDUCON2020, in Porto (Portugal). Due to COVID-19, this special session as well as the whole EDUCON2020, was held virtually.

This special session was chaired by Rob Reily, chair of the Chapters Committee, and Martín Llamas-Nistal, Vice President of Members and Geographic Activities.

Martín Llamas-Nistal made a brief presentation about the society: its publications, conferences, chapters and members, as well as the results of a survey about the chapters' activities, and Rob Reily presented his vision on the future of the chapters in the Education Society. As a result of the survey, it is found that the main activities developed by the chapters are Technical Seminars & Workshops and meetings.

The DLP (Distinguished Lecture Program) is an activity highly appreciated and demanded by chapters, along with financial support. Another important request is to have a "Chapter Playbook" that explains how to do typical chapter activities. The previous presidents (2018-2019) of the Spanish and Portuguese chapters Manuel Caeiro and Pedro Fonseca, respectively, also presented.

It should be noted that these chapters are the most awarded with the IEEE-ES Chapter Achievement Award, specifically the Spanish Chapter in the years 2007, 2011 and 2018 and the Portuguese Chapter in the years 2009 and 2019.

Among the most outstanding activities of the Spanish Chapter, it is worth highlighting the 2006 launch of IEEE-RITA, and the TICAI book series (applied ICT for engineering learning). TICAI intends to gather in an annual book the best contributions made at the congresses in Latin American on the subject of the IEEE Education Society and is a joint effort of the Spanish and Portuguese chapters.

Other outstanding activities are the awards for the best final project and the best doctoral thesis, launched in 2007. The theme of the awards is related to research or technological applications in the field of education, focused within the disciplines of the IEEE: areas of Electrical Engineering, Electronic Technology, Telecommunications Engineering and Computer Engineering.

The most outstanding activity of the Portuguese Chapter is that in 2019 they organized a series of webinars dedicated to topics on Engineering Education, with the objective aim at providing a meeting point for those interested in Engineering Education and to promote discussion on related topics. Whenever possible, the seminars were held in English, to allow the participation of people, not only from Portugal but from other countries too. In total, seven webinars were held with the participation of 148 attendees from 10 countries. This is an activity that can be generalized to the rest of the Chapters.

Russ Meier, current president of IEEE-ES, Edmundo Tovar, President-Elect and Manuel Castro, President Emeritus and current Director of Division VI of IEEE were among the attendees.

Martín Llamas-Nistal
IEEE Education Society VP for Member and Geographic Activity
Director of atlanTTic Research Center for Telecommunication Technologies
University of Vigo (Spain)
 
 
Message from the VP for Publications
 
 
Dear Colleagues,

As I write to you now our professions, whatever they may be, are experiencing profound change. In this intensive period of change, we must help to disseminate insights into how these changes have affected education at all levels. Many of us are active educators in different national systems of higher education, others may be educators in industry or government contexts. However, we all have a common interest in education; and how that education process is improved through research and innovation. With all the changes going on around us it is important that we also focus on documenting these transformations and play an active role in analyzing and identifying good practices and successful learning innovations in the digital domain.
 
 
 
 
The IEEE Education Society Provides Community and Resources
 
 
The IEEE Education Society (EdSoc) was founded to provide a community for engineering education and to provide related information and resources for professional development. Ongoing efforts to adjust our societal activities to needs within the community have been refocused as the global pandemic has resulted in pervasive challenges within our professional and personal lives. The importance of professional community and resources is heightened. Consider the following new and pending assets from EdSoc.

Members may join the IEEE Education Society LinkedIn group. This resource is intended as a platform for members to stay informed of society activities and to share information. Postings include updates on conferences, promotion of webinars, dialogues on best practices, etc.

EdSoc is collaborating with IEEE Educational Activities to offer a series of virtual events starting in July. Topics will address challenges in remote instruction and course design and will target the needs of both new and experienced educators.

The long-standing EdSoc Distinguished Lecturer program is getting an update. The expert list and their topics are being refreshed, new experts and topics are being sought out, and a virtual delivery option is being explored.

The Education Society has other professional development opportunities through its conferences and programs that will be discussed elsewhere in this newsletter and future issues.

For more information about EdSoc Educational Activities, please contact

Steve E. Watkins, Vice-President of Educational Activities and Awards
Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla, Missouri
[email protected]
 
 
IEEE-Eta Kappa Nu THE BRIDGE Magazine Issue #2 2020
 
 
IEEE-Eta Kappa Nu or IEEE-HKN (hkn.ieee.org) is the honor society for students and professionals in electrical and computer engineering and related areas. The society was founded in 1904 and merged into IEEE to become IEEE-HKN in 2010. It promotes the profession through recognition, leadership, and service activities. More than 200,000 students have been inducted through about 240 chapters worldwide and others have been inducted as professional members. Membership is a lifetime recognition and it is conferred for excellence in scholarship, leadership, character, and service.

The magazine of IEEE-Eta Kappa Nu is THE BRIDGE which publishes a variety of features and content relevant to ECE students and professionals. The magazine is electronic and open access with pdf versions of the current and prior issues available here.

The theme of Issue #2 2020 is “Beyond Engineering.” The content highlights careers for and contributions beyond the boundaries of what is typically associated with engineering as well as the response of HKN and its chapters to COVID-19.

For more information on IEEE-HKN please contact Nancy Ostin, Director, and visit www.hkn.org.
 
 
Recent Activities of the Education Society Standards Committee
 
 
Chair: Hamadou Saliah-Hassane
Vice-Chair: Luis Felipe Zapata Rivera
Secretary: Janusz Zalewski

Three major activities took place this year.

1) Education Society Standards Committee Online Meeting on 28 January 2020.
  • Discussion of the activities related to the IEEE Std 1876™-2019, including the promotion of the standard and increasing its awareness in education and industry, as well as push towards its adaptation.
  • Information by the Chair about the formation of the new P2834 Working Group on the Standard for Secure and Trusted Learning Systems sponsored by the IEEE Education Society and IEEE Industrial Electronics and Computer Societies. The P2834 Kick-off Meeting was both a face-to-face meeting in San Francisco, CA and Teleconference 18 December 2019 where 10 people attended in face to face and 22 online.
2) IEEE SA P2834 Working Group Online 2nd Meeting on 4 March 2020.
  • Establishment of officers: Vice-Chair (Larissa Dunai) & Secretary (Scott Gallant) were appointed by the Chair (Hamadou Saliah-Hassane.)
  • Discussions and presentations about the scope and need for this standard (Eric Shepherd, Cihan Varol and others.)
3) IEEE SA P2834 Working Group Online 3rd Meeting on 4 May 2020.
  • Continuation of discussion about the scope and need for this standard.
  • Formation of a Subgroup on Digital Forensics for Smart Online Learning Systems led by Dr. Cihan Varol, Associate Professor and Graduate Coordinator at Sam Houston State University’s Department of Computer Science.
 
 
2020 IEEE Education Society Call for Officer and BoG Nominations
 
 
Nomination Deadline: 1 June 2020

The IEEE Education Society welcomes nominations and self-nominations for the following leadership positions:
  • Four Members-At-Large serving three-year terms on the Board of Governors beginning 1 January 2021 and ending 31 December 2023. A maximum of two consecutive three-year terms is allowed.
  • One President-Elect serving a two-year term beginning 1 January 2021 and ending 31 December 2022.
  • One Treasurer serving a two-year term beginning 1 January 2021 and ending 31 December 2022. A maximum of three consecutive two-year terms is allowed.
  • One Vice President for Member and Geographic Activity serving a two-year term beginning 1 January 2021 and ending 31 December 2022. A maximum of three consecutive two-year terms is allowed.
  • One Vice President for Educational Activities and Awards serving a two-year term beginning 1 January 2021 and ending 31 December 2022. A maximum of three consecutive two-year terms is allowed.
Please submit questions or your nominations to Claudio da Rocha Brito, Nominating Committee Chair, using the IEEE Education Society general email address ([email protected])

Nominees should complete the nomination form and submit it to [email protected] to be considered for the slate. If you are nominating someone else for a position, you must first confirm their desire and availability to serve; only if they accept this nomination should you submit the form to the committee. This form will assist the committee in their decision regarding the final slate of candidates.

The election of Members-At-Large will be completed later in the year by an electronic ballot of all Society members.

The Board of Governors will elect Society Officers during the Fall Board of Governors Meeting. Officer candidates are not required to be present at the election.

Important Note: There are two Board of Governors meetings per year, one at the ASEE Annual Conference in June and one at the Frontiers in Education Conference in October. Board of Governors Members-At-Large and officers are expected to attend a minimum of one face-to-face meeting every year of their term. The Education Society does not reimburse the costs of travel/hotel/registration for attending the meetings. BoG members must fund travel from their employer or personal budgets.
 
 
IEEE Conferences Committee Announces Introduction to IEEE Virtual Events Resources
 
 
The IEEE Meetings, Conferences & Events (MCE) team along with the IEEE Conferences Committee have developed An Introduction to IEEE Virtual Events as a resource to provide conference and event organizers with a framework for transitioning their in-person event to a virtual environment.

This resource is an introduction on how to virtualize an event - providing, guidance, tips, and answers to the most common questions. Organizers may find it valuable to review the information in the guide before considering new formats and tools.
 
 
IEEE Education Society Flagship Conferences
 
 
 
 
IEEE Learning with MOOCS (LWMOOCS) 2020

The safety and well-being of all conference participants is our priority. IEEE has been monitoring the developing COVID-19 pandemic (Coronavirus).

After studying and evaluating the announcements, guidance, and news released by relevant national departments, we are sorry to announce that the in-person gathering of the 2020 Learning with MOOCS Conference (LWMOOCs), scheduled to be held 30 September – 2 October 2020, Antigua, Guatemala has been canceled. LWMOOCs 2020 will now be held as a virtual conference, to be held 30 September – 2 October 2020.

LWMOOCS, the leading international conference about Learning with Massive Open Online Courses, announces an expansion of its scope to “blended and remote learning” and invites late submissions through June 30, 2020. Researchers and practitioners from around the world will join together in an all-online blended/hybrid learning format for three days of content discovery, experiences, keynote speakers, and lightning round speakers. We are pleased to announce a late-paper submission phase (June 2020) to allow authors to join the conversation. We are also pleased to announce a special track on Emergency Remote Learning Case Studies and we encourage authors to consider submissions.

 
 
 
 
 
 
IEEE Frontiers in Education (FIE) Conference 2020

IEEE FIE 2020 will be held in Uppsala, Sweden, from 21-24 October 2020. ASEE and IEEE unite to create an inclusive venue where excellence in research, teaching, and creative activity are valued. FIE brings together a multidisciplinary global community committed to improving scholarship and practice in engineering and computing education.

 
 
 
 
IEEE International Conference on Teaching, Assessment, and Learning for Engineering (TALE) 2020

IEEE TALE 2020 will be held in Yogyakarta, Indonesia in December 2020. The target audience of the conference is diverse and includes those working in higher education, Vocational Education and Training (VET), K-12, corporate, government, military, and healthcare sectors.

 
 
 
 
IEEE World Engineering Education Conference (EDUNINE) 

IEEE EDUNINE 2021 will be held in Guatemala. 

 
 
 
 
IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON)

IEEE EDUCON 2021 will be held in April 2021, in Vienna, Austria.

 
 
COVID-19 Related Research and Technologies Free to Access in IEEE Xplore®
 
 
IEEE realizes that many are directly or indirectly engaged in the fight against COVID-19 and its effects on global health and safety, research, infrastructure, communications, and more. IEEE has identified articles from the IEEE Xplore digital library that may help researchers understand and manage different aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic and technologies that can be leveraged to combat it.

All content in this collection is now free to access, with additional rights for all types of reuse, including full text and data mining, and analysis.

We are continually monitoring the developments and will update the IEEE Xplore content periodically.

Thank you for your support of our shared mission to advance technology for humanity.
 
 
IEEE Fellows Elevation
 
 
The IEEE Education Society wishes to congratulate its member Ashutosh Dutta for being elevated by the IEEE Communications Society to the prestigious IEEE Fellow grade in 2020 for leadership in mobility management and security monitoring in mobile networks.
 
 
 
 
IEEE Education Society Publications

The IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies (TLT) covers research on such topics as Innovative online learning systems, Intelligent tutors, Educational software applications and games, and Simulation systems for education and training.

The IEEE Transactions on Education (ToE) publishes significant and original scholarly contributions to education in electrical and electronics engineering, computer engineering, computer science, and other fields within the scope of interest of IEEE.

The IEEE Journal of Latin-American Learning Technologies (IEEE-RITA) focuses on technological applications and research in Education.

 
 
Current Publication Issues
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Interested in meeting like-minded people in your area? Visit the Chapters page on our website to find an Education Society Chapter near you.

View the Education Society News & Notes website for news and updates from your Education Society Chapters.