Building New Bridges Together
Thematic Track 1: Creating New Societal Visions in Higher Education: Values for Living Together
In times like these, higher education institutions worldwide are facing several new challenges. On the one hand, these relate to the numerous complexities of our globalised world. On the other hand, the new situation that has emerged as a result of the pandemic shows that these complexities have increased dramatically. The interrelatedness of politics, economies, health care systems, care for the environment and education has come more clearly to the fore, prompting a renewed conversation on the way societal life has to be organised and on how to address global disparities.
In this context, it can be argued that one of the most important ethical tasks of higher education institutions is to support an ethos of integrity in the world. This can be done through contributing to and creating new societal visions for cohabitation, which can transform lives and societies. Furthermore, visions are needed, which can help to build bridges together across the economic, technological and educational divides that the current situation forces the world to face. It is ultimately, about fostering a dialogue on sharing ideas and values for a new societal situation after COVID-19.
Higher education institutions are serving as laboratories and archives for developing these visions for living together. The conversations to which we invite the conference participants in this thematic track bear the potential to deepen the understanding of the increased complexities, to identify best practices and to forge new alliances between higher education and societal actors.
Speakers and topics for Thematic Track 1: Creating New Societal Visions in Higher Education: Values for Living Together
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MODERATOR Maria Eugenia BarrosoGlobethics.net Latin America Argentina
| PANDEMETHICS: TOWARDS A GLOBAL HEALTH ETHICS FOR IMPENDING PANDEMICS IN THE 21st CENTURY Wirkwajie E. Wirba | TOWARDS INCLUSIVENESS THROUGH KNOWLEDGE AND COMPASSION Suparna Chakraborti | CONTRIBUTIONSS OF A CONFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY FOR SOCIETY Rudolf von Sinner | INTEGRATED REPORTING IN HIGHER EDUCATION Fiona Robertson |
Thematic Track 2: Bridging the Gaps: Ethical Foundations of Online Teaching and Learning Pedagogies
The current pandemic situation has revealed significant gaps in higher education. Access to education and educational resources is unevenly distributed, as are the levels of preparedness of teachers and learners for the rapid transition from onsite to online learning the pandemic crises has called for. Propitious technological literacy and infrastructures are, however, only one facet of the challenge before us. Educators and learners alike are articulating questions on how learning can be facilitated to respond to the new global situation we are experiencing.
This thematic track is designed to offer a space for deepening these questions and to identify viable avenues for solutions. How can we close the digital gap? What kind of pedagogical theories help us to navigate between onsite and online learning environments? And which ethical foundations do institutions need to build and to take seriously when proposing online education?
Different voices have begun to articulate enriching perspectives on these questions that we propose to deepen during this pre-conference conversation. One of these is to enhance online teaching and learning through the professional development of all who teach and support the teaching activities and through boosting their digital competences. Another perspective emphasises identifying novel learning designs, tools and innovative approaches for online learning environments, such as the challenge of a-synchronic course delivery, digital skills and the integration of blended learning modules.
Ethics in this process of digitalization in higher education, particularly as institutions start to position themselves anew in the wake of the pandemic, will play a preponderant role in accompanying the transformation process – from onsite to online learning and in the development of blended forms. By constantly drawing attention to values such as inclusivity, equity, sharing, integrity and transparency throughout the learning experience we can go a long way to ensuring quality education and optimal learning and teaching outcomes.
Speakers and topics for Thematic Track 2: Bridging the Gaps: Ethical Foundations of Online Teaching and Learning Pedagogies
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MODERATOR Maria Lucia UribeArigatou International Colombia
| CURRENT CHALLENGES Otilia Manta | FAIRNESS AND EQUITABLE ACCESS TO HIGHER EDUCATION USING ONLINE PEDAGIGIES Dicky Sofjan | THE Rekha Sood | A PEDAGOGICAL Njojo Kahwa |
Thematic Track 3: Online Education for a Sustainable Future: Quality and Ethical Standards in Higher Education
One of the most important purposes of education is to secure the path of learning, knowledge and skills to enable a sustainable future for individuals and for society. The same is valid for online education. The achievement of this goal to prepare the next generation of professionals and leaders for their roles in academia and society requires innovative teaching that takes into account the need for a rapprochement between regional and global communities of knowledge.
Online education bears the potential for bridging the gaps of a research-based exchange between these communities for developing sustainable models of coexistence across the globe. However, while the new situations of learning with online education can create and increase awareness of sustainability as a paradigm for actively engaging to meet the global challenges endangering our common future, they cannot be sustainable themselves at the expense of quality standards and values. These standards can be strongly supported if online learning insists on the intrinsic relationship between quality and ethics, on matters of form and on methods of learning in relationship with the expected outcome and attitudes of the learners in the world.
Online learning has to promote transparency and contribute to equity in access to higher education. Quality and future-oriented online learning can also assist in facilitating professional development and adaptability in the labour market.
The conversations during this thematic track will deepen the understanding on how ethics and quality standards contribute to and accompany the transition from offline to online learning, on how blended learning can complement classical forms of learning and on how the aim of equipping students, teachers and institutions for a sustainable future can serve as framework for all these different provisions for learning in the 21st century.
Speakers and topics for Thematic Track 3: Online Education for a Sustainable Future: Quality and Ethical Standards in Higher Education
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MODERATOR Deivit MontealegreToronto School of Theology, University of Toronto Colombia/Canada
| ETHICS IN HIGHER EDUCATION - AN AFRICAN PERSPECTIVE Jesse Mugambi | COMMUNITY-BASED HIGHER EDEUCATION ON SUSTAINABILITY AS EDUCATIONAL AND SOCIETAL QUALITY – AN EXPERIENCE FROM THE MALUKU ISLANDS Jenne Jessica R. Pieter | QUALITY AND ETHICAL STANDARDS IN HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS IN EGYPT Hany Youssef Hassan | TOWARDS A CULTURE OF HLISTIC AND INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACHES THROUGH ELECTRONIC NEGOTIATIONS IN HIGHER EDUCATION FOR SUSTAINABILITY AND PEACE Benoît Girardin |
Thematic Track 4: Ethics and Skills for a Responsible Global Citizenship
One of the main purposes of promoting ethics in higher education is the development of responsible global citizens, workers and leaders across all sectors of society. The current pandemic crisis has brought to the surface, more than ever before, the close relationship that exists between the values, skills and competences that prepare learners for embracing their responsibility as global citizens with the engagement to determine the future by addressing the pressing global challenges together with others and the international debate and initiatives around the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
Sustainable Development Goal 4 on Quality Education reposes on the value of equal access to and participation in education. The emphasis on education as a key and life-changing factor gains in the face of the global pandemic even more significance. Our individual lives, our educational paths and our professional vocations are intimately tied up with the learning chances and educational opportunities of others in the world. Ethics enables us to see and interpret these connections, to build competences on the insights of sharing this planet with others and in assuming responsibilities to remove and change conditions that result in exclusion from education.
The intensive exchange of knowledge and values, the internationalization resulting therefrom and the consciousness of a shared responsibility in inhabiting the world with others, will change our view on what education in this era is all about. The pandemic has sharpened awareness of the need for an ethos of global citizenship.
Cooperation among higher education institutions, public and private partnerships, can both challenge and strengthen the higher education sector, bringing it to a new level of quality with values-driven standards and ultimately lead to the formation of responsible global citizens. The conversations during this thematic track aim at gaining new insights on developments in this direction in various contexts.
Speakers and topics for Thematic Track 4: Ethics and Skills for a Responsible Global Citizenship
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MODERATOR Herbert MakindaGlobethics.net East Africa / Catholic University of Eastern Africa Kenya
| RE-IMAGINING SOLIDARITY: THE ETHICAL DUTY OF GLOBAL CITIZENS IN THE TIME OF COVID-19 Irene Ludji | ETHICAL LEADERSHIP IN A GLOBALLY DYNAMIC WORLD Ghadially Zoher | YOUTH FINANCIAL RESPONSIBILITY. HOW TO DEVELOP IT? Melita Marceta | RATIONALE OF ETHICS FOR GLOBAL CITIZENS Josfin Raj |
International Online Conference - #BuildingNewBridgesTogether: Stregthening Ethics in Higher Education after COVID-19
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Contributions of a Confessional University for Society Rudolf von SinnerProfessor and Head of Graduate Program, Pontifical Catholic Parana at Curitiba Switzerland/Brazil
| Building Bonds of Trust and Interconnectivity between Higher Education, Government, Private Sector and Civil Society Maria Eugenia Barroso | From a University to an Epistemic Shopping Mall: a Post Covid-19 Higher Education Vision Christian Anieke | The Role of Transformative Pedagogies in Fostering Ethics Education Maria Lucia Uribe | Educating Ethical, Entrepreneurial Leaders Angela Owusu-Ansah |
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Considerations for Student and Faculty Vulnerability in Remote Delivery Pamela D. Couture | Higher Education and Pedagogies in an Intercultural, Global Conversation Dicky Sofjan | An Ethics of Eco-Relationality: from an Oceanic Perspective to a Global Conversation Upolu Lumā Vaai | Knowledge and Empathy: A fresh perspective from the indigenous people in Maluku on sustainability in higher education Jenne J.R. Pieter | Higher Education and Awareness for Global Citizenship Kanan Kitani | |
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Ethics of Inclusiveness in Higher Education Esther Mombo |
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Listeners
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Thematic Track 1: Creating New Societal Visions in Higher Education: Values for Living Together Rajula V | Thematic Track 2: Bridging the Gaps: Ethical Foundations of Online Teaching and Learning Pedagogies Mary M. Doyle | Thematic Track 3: Online Education for a Sustainable Future: Quality and Ethical Standards in Higher Education Jeremy Punt | Thematic Track 4: Ethics and Skills for a Responsible Global Citizenship Daniel López Salort | Library & Publications Tilottama Ray |
Globethics.net team
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Moderator Obiora IkeExcutive Director Nigeria/Germany
| Co-Moderator Christine Housel | Framing Session Christoph Stückelberger | Award Presentation Amélé Ekué | Award Presentation Anja Sabrina Adriamasy |