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Erratum to: T.J. van Weert and R.K. Munro (Eds.) Informatics and the Digital Society DOI: 10.1007/978-0-387-35663-1

What is informatics? It is both a pure and an application oriented science. The combination of applied informatics, i.e. informatics technology, with other related technologies is known as Information Technology. Applications of information technology play an important role in society and are also found in education. Current problems in society and education have much in common and may have similar solutions. In these solutions information technology plays a supportive role. However, characteristics of traditional educational organization hinder necessary innovation. Key issues concerning informatics and educational organization are: — the societal push of education towards an information technology supported, client-centred organization — the reorganization of education possibly being a necessary prerequisite for successful innovation. This paper addresses both of these issues.

The introduction of ICTs is causing considerable tension between systems like those of education, health and democracy and what is happening outside those systems. This tension has to be resolved. Therefore educational goals need to be redefined. In redefining the goals of education changes need to be directly related to competencies and how the acquisition of these competencies can be integrated into the curriculum and the evaluation system. This project aims are: creation of new pedagogical strategies; creation of international communities around these new strategies in higher education and upper secondary education; creation of new principles and methods; creation of knowledge building and exchange processes.

Higher Education operates in the real-life context of a Knowledge Society driven by innovation. Students are preparing to become knowledge workers in that society where ICT, innovation and knowledge work are closely interwoven. Three elements are essential in knowledge work: creation of innovative solutions, knowledge creation about these solutions (and how to get such solutions) and personal development. For without innovative solutions there are no satisfied customers, without new knowledge there will be no future customers and without personal development there will be no future job. Higher education students need real-life learning environments in which they can learn to deal with processes of real-life knowledge work. Real-life learning implies solving of key innovation problems in academic or professional practice, in accepted and acceptable ways. Real-life learning implies implicit and explicit learning while solving these problems. And real-life learning implies development of knowledge. Validation and critical reflection form the key to quality assurance of the problem solving process, to explicit learning and to knowledge development. Key characteristics of real-life learning environments that stimulate validation and critical reflection are presented.

A Knowledge Society is developing in which Information and Communication Technology is both a catalyst and a necessity. Knowledge is an invaluable asset in this ICT-integrated society, both tacit knowledge in the heads and hands of the workers and explicit knowledge. Human capital is becoming more and more important. Innovation is driving force in knowledge intensive economies. Therefore application and creation of new knowledge are normal part of the work of modern professionals: lifelong working implies lifelong learning. Students are the professionals of tomorrow and need to develop the competences of the knowledge worker. This implies a change in educational paradigm and educational transformation to new education. For developing countries and transition economies this offers threats and opportunities.

These are the nine edited reports prepared by the different Professional Working Groups at the SECIII conference. Each represents many hours of discussion — both during designated conference discussion time and at more informal sessions. All of these reports were delivered at the final session of the conference

Modem curriculum development should fulfil specific requirements that reflect developments in society. A proposed set of requirements is compared against two recent curriculum development initiatives in the area of informatics (computing science). The two initiatives are the IEEE-CS/ACM Computing Curriculum 2001 (Joint Taskforce 2001) and the IFIP/UNESCO Informatics Curriculum Framework 2000 (ICF-2000) (Mulder and van Weert 2001). Detailed comparison showed that the principles used in these two initiatives cover the proposed requirements, although not one-to-one and with different emphasis. A difference in approach between the two curriculum initiatives, concerning the linking of societal needs and student competence development, is illustrated by explaining ICF-2000 Professional Categories and Graduate Profiles.

Education is moving to a new ‘teaching’ model that implies learning in communities of students and teachers. In these networks learning is the central activity, not teaching. In these networked communities the teacher will be the expert learner, but sometimes a studentwill take this role or an outside expert. Those of the audience who took part in the discussions, were convinced developments in education go in this direction.

The workplace is becoming a learning organisation empowered by the use of information technology. And education is becoming “the” learning organisation, sharing many characteristics with this new workplace. Added value in new forms of education lies in more interactivity and feedback loops, in reorientation of the “process” of learning and in the use of meta-structures. New computer-based media contribute to this added value by providing dynamic simulation environments or virtual worlds.

Countries currently beginning to use Informatics and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in any major way should be able to benefit from the newest technological developments. Fundamental concepts and results of Informatics are independent of any computer platform or software environment. A cadre of professionals with a sound informatics background must be developed and supported. Advantage can be gained by capacity building through intemational cooperation, by using the similarity in the diversity of earlier experiences elsewhere and by concentrating on stable concepts. The UNESCO/IFIP secondary informatics curriculum — adaptable to specific cultural, educational and technological environments — can be implemented by countries and communities for the education of both computer literate and Informatics professionals at the secondary education level. But also elementary school materials, as well as materials for pre-service and in-service training of teachers, and for the preparation of teacher trainers can be based on the curriculum.

A changing discipline like informatics can be questioned with respect to its identity and its core concepts and skills. This concern is being expressed by the focus group papers and has led to this editorial paper. We discuss the different paradigms or views with respect to informatics that can be identified and comment on the resulting fragmented approach of the discipline. We advocate a more integral, generic and coherent approach. And we present some preliminary thoughts and notions as input for a search for the identity of the discipline, resulting in a first draft working definition for informatics as a discipline.

Informatics and informatics based technologies directly impact on mathematics and its teaching. But there is also an indirect impact through developments in society which are supported by informatics. In the last thirty years developments in informatics and associated technologies have been many and fast; this has forced the understanding of their impact to change over time. For a more fundamental understanding of these impacts the role of informatics must be clear, both in real-life and in education. But also the role of mathematics needs clarification before the informatics impacts can be understood.

What informatics knowledge do noninformatics majors need? To answer this question the relationship between informatics and other disciplines must be clear. This relationship is dependent on which view of the world is taken. Here we take the view that the world of informatics regards systems of interacting processes. From this view follows a relationship between informatics and other disciplines. This relationship allows derivation of competencies needed by noninformatics majors from competencies needed by informatics majors. First a terminology set is presented. Then a conceptual framework is developed which makes a distinction between informatics as a discipline and so-called informatical disciplines as well as between informaticians and so-called informatical professionals. Finally a common core of informatics is identified.

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on the discussion about what literacy will be needed in future society and what curricular change will have to be the consequence of this need by considering the characteristics of literacy, as it has developed to this day, and by presenting, on the basis of these characteristics, an outline of some important aspects of future literacy. Information technology may well bring about a society in which literacy presupposes integrative capabilities for abstraction and construction in a reality of loosely synchronized and interacting processes perceived through data. Education has the challenging task of educating students to achieve literacy in the Information Age. To be successful, education will have to communicate complex conceptual models to the students and will have to enhance their abstraction and construction skills. This will force education to shift its attention from the data-transmission side of the communication of concepts to the personalization of information. Science education seems to be the key to literacy in the Information Age. Education in the science of informatics will have a prominent place in this education.