DTU is participating in the Danish government’s Technology Pact to boost study programmes within the fields of technology, IT, engineering, the natural sciences, and mathematics.
This week, the Technology Pact was launched by four government ministers, and as an ambassador for the pact, DTU undertakes to realize concrete goals that will help more Danes acquire technical and digital skills, otherwise known as STEM competencies.
“The Technology Pact is important for Denmark because it represents—at long last—a joining of forces to ensure an increase in the number of people involved in educating STEM competencies. It applies all the way through the education system. Therefore, it’s important that the Technology Pact is composed so that the initiative involves primary and lower secondary schools and continues right up to PhD level, and onwards in a widely branched cooperation with the business community,” says Anders Bjarklev, President of DTU.
The Technology Pact has been endorsed by up to 50 partners and ambassadors, and 200 managers from the business community, education, training, and research participated in the event. On the part of the government, the Technology Pact has been signed by the Ministry of Industry, Business and Financial Affairs, the Ministry of Higher Education and Science, the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Employment.
After the event, the Minister for Industry, Business and Financial Affairs Brian Mikkelsen and Chairman of the Technology Pact Council and CEO of Netcompany, André Rogaczewski, were given an insight into new technology from two DTU start-ups VenomAid and Obital, which develop solutions for the rapid diagnosis of snakebite victims and eye control via mobile phone, respectively.
As an ambassador, DTU is committing to increasing the admission of engineering students, among other things through the creation of new study programmes targeted at the future labour market.
In 2018, DTU is offering two new BSc Eng programmes in Design of Sustainable Energy Systems and Data Science and Artificial Intelligence as well as a programme in Business Analytics.
DTU will be expanding its efforts to recruit women, especially within IT, and finally, in 2018, DTU will strengthen its cooperation with companies and organizations as part of an initiative making it easier for qualified international students to gain employment in Danish companies.
The aim of the Technology Pact is that by 2020 more than 150,000 children, young people and adults, and 250 companies will be engaged in the pact, and that in 10 years’ time, 20 per cent or 10,000 more students will be studying on the STEM higher education programmes.