H:\CCTWP\educcom.wpd 25 November 1999

IAG has initiated or sponsored a number of educational activities like summer schools and technical schools. They have been in different fields such as geoid determination, boundary value problems, engineering geodesy, and GPS. However there is a need for knowing which schools are planned and to which time. Besides many universities and private organisations organize courses with the possibility for international participation.

In Europe the modern PhD-education now frequently have course requirements. But since the number of PhD-students often is very limited (like 3 - 8) it is often difficult to justify having a complete course.

Even if textbooks are available, the development in geodesy is so fast, that new material always need to be included in the teaching. It is often difficult for teachers to acquire such material, if they are not experts in the field.

IAG could help here. A group of educational active geodesists should be asked to form a (special) commission (SC) directly under the Executive Committee with the following tasks:

(1) Collect information about educational material (texts, exercises, solutions to exercises, software used for educational purposes). Have important material translated.

(2) Propose courses in areas where there are no identified activities, and collect information about existing courses, which offer possibility for international participation (i.e. the teaching is done in English or French).

(3) Initiate courses in developing countries. (This means finding someone, who will take on the responsibility for organizing a course)

(3) Foster cooperation between educations offering PhD education. (DOGE-project, for those who remember this proposal).

(4) Investigate and test use of modern Computer Supported Cooperative Work Systems used to give international lecturers or class-room type training with possibility for student feed-back.

The SC should not try to evaluate curricula, or come up with a standard geodesy curriculum. Geodesy is taught in many relations (surveying, geophysics, astronomy, navigation, remote sensing, satellite systems), and IAG should assist these fields in having access to geodetic teaching material.

The SC should create a web-page on the IAG server, through which teaching material, course offerings etc. is accessible. The SC should review the material before it is made accessible via the IAG home-page.

Before creating a SC, the Executive should create a working group with 2 - 4 members who should formulate a final list of objectives and program of activities.