EU Leonardo da Vinci Community Vocational Training Action Programme

The Leonardo da Vinci (LdV) program is designed to build a skilled workforce through European partnerships. This mobility program is a part of the European Commission's new Lifelong Learning approach. LdV funds overseas work placements and the development of training materials with the objective of improving the provision of Vocational Education and Training (VET) across Europe.

Leonardo concentrates on raising the quality and relevance of VET, and provides an opportunity for organizations involved in VET to build European partnerships, exchange best practice, increase the expertise of their staff and develop the skills of learners. Leonardo da Vinci is the European Community's vocational training program. It encourages collaboration between organizations involved in vocational training, aiming to improve the quality of training provision, develop the skills and mobility of the workforce, stimulate innovation and enhance the competitiveness of European industry.

Project Name: Concepts & Skills in Applied Earth Sciences

Project Partners:  International Institute for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC), Holland

    Middle East Technical University  Geological Engineering Department, Turkey

Project Administrative Coordinator: Tülay Rojay (Faculty of Engineering, EU office)

Project Academic Coordinator: Dr. Bora Rojay (GEOE)

Duration of the Project: 3 months

Duration of the Placement: 13 weeks

Date: March-July 2007

Project Budget: 11.750 Euro

At the International Institute for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC), knowledge of geo-information management is plenty available and is continually being developed and extended. By means of education, research and project services, a contribution is made to capacity building in countries that are economically and/or technologically less advanced. In doing so, considerable attention is paid to the development and application of geographical information systems (GIS) for solving problems. Such problems can range from determining the risks of landslides, mapping forest fires, planning urban infrastructure, and implementing land administration systems, to designing a good wildlife management system or detecting environmental pollution.

The key words characterizing the activities of the institute are geo-information management, worldwide and innovative. Earth observation, the generation of spatial information, and the development of data integration methods are the main field of interest. Furthermore, the tools that can support the processes of planning and decision making for sustainable development and the alleviation of poverty in emerging economies are provided.

The education at the ITC is based on knowledge exchange between scientific and professional organizations in less developed countries on the one hand and those in the Western world on the other, whereby ITC acts as a two-directional gateway for knowledge exchange.

The knowledge field of ITC is geo-information science and earth observation, which consists of a combination of tools and methods for the collection, storage and processing of geo-spatial data, for the dissemination and use of these data and of services based on these data.

ITC's approach is application-oriented, directed at finding solutions for and strengthening civil society in addressing issues of local, national and global dimensions such as the multifunctional use of scarce resources, including space, the effects of climate change and environmental security. As an associated institution of the United Nations University (UNU), ITC contributes to the UNU mission, which is "to contribute, through research and capacity building, to efforts to resolve the pressing global problems that are the concern of the United Nations, its Peoples and Member States".

Participants comments on the Programme:

For the professional point of view, the most important contribution of the program was providing an experience at working with international partners. ITC is a multinational institute and working in a group of different nationality and culture provided significant improvements in personal adaptation to international work environment. The training program also played an important role in development of academic skills like reading and analyzing scientific literature, research proposal preparation, and oral and visual presentation.  The training was especially designed for academic staff employed in earth sciences and for employees from the private sector concerning earth resource exploration and management. As a result of this, it was very useful to have contacts for future research projects with people from various institutes, companies and agencies. ITC also provides special research clusters which are very suitable for both group projects and personal use..

Second important contribution of training was the extensive usage of computer software and digital technology. The first software program that we have learned was academic referencing software called Endnote. It was simple and very useful software for any kind of academic writing. Then comes the remote sensing and GIS software namely; ERDAS Imagine, ENVI, e-Cognition, ILWIS and ArcMap. There were several exercises and group projects to gain familiarity to the software. The work schedule was very condensed and it was a very good opportunity to have profession on the software.

The training program and ITC also provided opportunities to use technical equipments which are not present in our universities research environment. We had a chance to practice those equipments and even if not being an expert of them, at least we had an idea of working principles and areas of application. One of them was Portable Infrared Mineral Analyzer (PIMA) used for reflectance spectroscopy. Another one was IPAQ which is a portable device that digital field data can be downloaded and field observations can be digitalized on the field with the help of integrated GPS.

Rather than professional and academic experiences the LdV training program and ITC provided many social options. ITC has a library, a bookshop, and a restaurant for the use of students and researchers. ITC also provides accommodation in rooms or apartments at the ITC International Hotel. The living conditions are very comfortable and prices for accommodation is reasonable when compared to same standards of living facilities. The hotel and the institute are located in the centre of Enschede. Since the city is not so big every facility such as railway station, bus station, shopping centre, open market, post-office, restaurants and cafes are in walking distance. However it is also recommended to own a bicycle to save time and visiting other areas near the city.

The Institute has coffee break times one in the morning and one in the afternoon and a lunch time. At those breaks people have the chance to socialize interact with each other. ITC gives great importance to social aspect in every two weeks they arrange social activities like festivals, celebrations, sport events or parties. Moreover, excursions are arranged to major tourist attractions in the Netherlands and neighboring countries. Since the institute is very multinational, we had an opportunity to learn different culture, not only Dutch culture but also South Asian, Middle Eastern, African, and South American culture.

Even though the official language in Holland is Dutch, every individual in the society speaks English. That was one of the biggest opportunities for us to practice and improve our English in everyday life. Education language in ITC is also English and helped us a lot for improving our technical English as well. Other important linguistic aspect was to hear different accents from people all around the world, since people are coming from different countries whose mother language is not English.

To sum up, the training Program was very useful both in terms of professional and social experiences. When all the achievements are taken into consideration it can be said that LdV mobility program was very beneficial. All of the objectives consisting cultural, intellectual and professional has been achieved.