Information About Project “InnoCENS”
Project InnoCENS (Enhancing Innovation Competences and Entrepreneurial Skills in Engineering Education) is Erasmus+ KA2 activity grant institutional development project (573965-EPP-1-2016-1-SE-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP) and was aiming to enhancing innovation competences and entrepreneurial skills in engineering education partner country universities of Georgia, Armenia, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
The coordinator of the project is KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm (Sweden).
Project Consortium Members:
- Turku University of Applied Sciences (TUAS) –Finland;
- Polytechnical University of Valencia (UPV) – Spain;
- Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia (MoES) – Georgia;
- Georgian Technical University (GTU) – Georgia;
- Batumi State University (BSU) – Georgia;
- National Polytechnic University of Armenia (NPUA) – Armenia;
- National University of Architecture and Construction of Armenia (NUACA) – Armenia;
- Belarusian State University (BSU) – Belarus;
- Brest State Technical University (BrSTU) – Belarus;
- University of Power Engineering and Telecommunication (AUPET) – Kazakhstan;
- Taraz State University (TarSU) – Kazakhstan.
This project had the following concrete objectives:
- Establish Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at 8 partner country universities;
- Train 104 partner university staff on innovation and entrepreneurship through 1 study visit in Europe and 4 workshops;
- Introduce 2 master courses “Innovation systems and processes”and entrepreneurship for engineers;
- Introduce innovation pedagogy in learning and in curricular design;
- Define and assess innovation competences of engineering students;
- Start business mentoring services to students and staff to help them start innovation‐based new enterprises;
- Organize an innovation competition;
- Disseminate the project results to all other universities in partner countries;
- Develop a business plan for innovation centers including recommendation for a national innovation strategy.
The target groups of Project InnoCENS were:
- University administration, teachers and students at participating partner country universities;
- University administration, teachers and students at non‐participating partner country universities;
- Education ministries in these countries;
- Industry and business branch organizations;
- Private and public enterprises.
GTU was participating in all project activities. In particular, GTU:
- Selectedstaff members to one study visit in Europe and 4 workshops/training courses on innovation and entrepreneurship;
- Establishedan Innovations Center at GTU (Students and staff have got help from innovation center when they try to commercialize their knowledge and inventions);
- Developedand introduceed 2 master courses on innovation systems and entrepreneurship (Students have benefit from the 2 master courses on innovation and entrepreneurship which give them useful skills to turn good ideas into successful business sides and startups);
- Experimentedon teaching and learning using innovation pedagogy (Students have better opportunity to be more creative and innovative from the introduced innovation pedagogy and innovation competence assessment tool);
- Implementedinnovation competence assessment in teaching and learning;
- Developedbusiness services to support technology commercialization by teachers and students;
- GTU students were participatedin the innovation competition;
- Disseminate the project results within and outside GTU.
University as a whole will benefit from the strengthened link and cooperation with industry partners established through the project. In the future they may be able to further develop such cooperation into successful partnerships, or technology parks or technology‐based joint venture.