SmaLog – Smart Transport and Logistics for Cities
Supporting exploitation and dissemination of smart transport culture
Master in Smart Transport and Logistics for Cities (SmaLog – project reference number 585832-EPP-1-2017-1-IT-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP) is aimed at providing support for sustainable economic growth in Ukraine and Georgia, through the development and promotion of Engineering Education in Transport Services.
SmaLog aims to reform and adequate the academic paths for supporting exploitation and dissemination of smart transport culture, including the overcoming of the limits of current scientific research and limited international relationships in involved partner countries.
Besides, in order to foster sustainability after the end of funding the project aims to create a solid and large scientific/educational network involving researchers and stakeholders from the society (e.g. industry, administrations and son on) in order to consolidate the obtained results. Attention is thus paid to involve people with fewer opportunities as well as to promote the increased inclusion of women in the transportation engineering field.
Integration of Transversal Skills
Advanced learning/training methodologies (mainly pointed out in the activities performed within the WPs 2, 4, 5, 6), quality education (mainly pointed out in the activities performed within the WPs 7 and 8), academia-enterprise cooperation (mainly pointed out in the activities performed within the WPs 9) and the integration of transversal skills into curriculum delivery (mainly pointed out in the activities performed within the WP 2), are intended to enhance the employability of graduates who will contribute to regional sustainability and growth as well as social, cultural and scientific development.
The outcomes of the project are disseminated through different media channels and events as will be summarised in the Final Deliverable in the description of the activities performed in the Work Package 9. To support sustainability, the developed Educational Programmes were accredited by the National Government and many of them already received the accreditation of the Evaluation Agency.
Besides, the advancement in the skills in analysing and simulating the complex urban transportation systems of the staff, master students as well as of the Ph.D. students, allow to create a solid linkage with the labour market as confirmed by the different agreement for consulting signed by Partner Country (PC) HEIs involved in the projects and the feedback of SmaLog alumni.
Developmento of SmaLog
During the development of SmaLog, it is intended that project results will be disseminated to partners, industry, prospective students and alumni, quality agencies and staff through engagement on curriculation and benchmarking activities, promotion of the project through electronic platforms, marketing of approved qualifications and meetings with industry.
Once the qualifications are implemented the post-project impact will be continued through the graduates receiving the qualifications and industry uptake of the graduates. The sustainability of the SmaLog project results will therefore be evident through the employable graduates and the alumni themselves.
While the dissemination and exploitation as well as sustainability strategy outlines specific activities related to the overall SmaLog project goals, the context is changing due to covid-19 pandemic. Therefore, for assuring the outcomes of long-life of the project the dissemination/exploitation/sustainability outcomes are considered dynamic and subject to changes and adaptation along the end of the project as well as in the future (which is expected different than the starting forecasts).
In summary therefore the sustainability strategy is intended to:
- define the role, commitment and concrete measures taken by the partner country beneficiaries to guarantee the sustainability of the project outcomes/results beyond the project’s lifetime (including the opportunity/possibility to receive funds from public and private institutions);
- explain how the project results were exploited;
- to formalise or institutionalise links with local non-university partners;
- to define the measures that were put in place in order to enlarge the implementation of the project results/outcomes beyond consortium participants.
SmaLog in synthesis
SmaLog, capturing the future challenges promoted by Sustainable Development Goals and in particular the SDG11 – Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable, reformed and adapted the Ukrainian and Georgian academic curricula for supporting exploitation and dissemination of smart transport culture, including the overcoming of the limits of current scientific research and limited international relationships in involved partner countries.
In SmaLog Consortium, the eleven research institutions, collaborated to:
- develop and test Masters (120/90 ECTS) in GE and UA, which were fully accredited by National institutions in Ukraine and Georgia;
- support local universities in defining and delivering the Masters, which are now part of the educational offers of each Ukrainian and Georgian universities; the first students were enrolled in 2018 and now it is at the 4th edition; about 70 students were graduated and part of them developed their master thesis jointly with European professors;
- support local universities in developing learning and training materials as well as in implementing e-learning platform for staff upgrading;
- support the implementation of laboratories dedicated to smart urban transport and logistics, in local universities; all universities built advanced laboratories in smart transport and logistics with new up-to-date tools for planning, managing and controlling urban transport systems;
- disseminate through the newsletters, events, workshops, seminars the importance of research in urban transport and logistics exploiting the new technologies; several seminars, workshops were organized with the involvement of local stakeholders and websites of Universities and the SmaLog project website http://smalog-2017.uniroma2.it/;
- set up national coordinated networks of HEIs, public bodies, private companies and NGOs involving them in the wider European network of research centres on smart urban transport and logistics. Staff from Ukrainian and Georgian universities attended international conferences presenting high level contributions and many of them were published in top journals and books, indexed in Scopus and Web-of-Science; they also had the opportunity to participate in international program such as Fulbright and to implement new Ph.D. courses on Transportation; cultural and scientific cooperation agreements among local (Ukrainian and Georgian) universities and European ones were signed.
Therefore, SmaLog strengthened the role of research in managing smart transport and logistics in cities on an evidence-base in Ukraine and Georgia, and thus transferred to Ukraine and Georgia the most recent knowledge and good practices developed in Europe as well as worldwide in the field of smart mobility.
Covid-19 Impact
Although Covid-19 pandemic impacted strongly on SmaLog activities, among the other things, the University of Rome Tor Vergata and the other Programme Country (ProgC) HEIs contributed allowing students from Ukraine and Georgia (e.g., 32 students at UNITOV) to visit and attending courses and developing training activities collaborating with ProgC HEI laboratories. The incoming students obtained credits (ECTS) which were fully recognized in their educational curricula at home university. Some of the incoming students developed their master thesis with ProgC HEI professors.
The University of Rome Tor Vergata in collaboration with the other involved ProgC HEIs (UNIROMA1, SUT and HSW) also promoted incoming and outcoming mobility for staff members. For example, about 15 professors visited UNITOV for more than one month, strengthening their knowledge in advanced transport system modelling and starting new scientific and educational collaborations.
Besides, the ProgC HEIs professors had the opportunity to visit the Ukrainian and Georgian Universities, offering seminars, lectures as well as participating in workshops on urban smart transport and logistics.
Website:smalog-2017.uniroma2.it