"According to the action plan of EU concerning energetic efficiency, EU must reduce electric consumption by 20% and increase renewable energies by 20%. RF, UZ and MN were developed their economies mainly due to oil and gas production. However, in response to the crisis these countries manifest their strong interest in the construction of smart homes and cities for energy saving and improving the quality of life of urban residents. They approved the National Programmes in the field of renewable energy up to 2020. The analysis of the enterprises needs concerning recruitment of engineers in the sector of the technical building management in RF,UZ and MN showed that electrical or automation engineers only partially meet the needs of market. Smart Houses and Smart Cities require interdisciplinary competencies and leading skills.Thus the project is aimed to update and quality increase the curricula (BA&MA) in sphere of High-Tech Green Buildings and Smart Cities in RF, MN and UZ to meet the needs of sustainable development in a global world.New interdisciplinary model of engineers training and two cycles (MA, BA) of competence-based curricula will be created as the project result. The necessary infrastructure - Network ""Green Buildings"" will be carried out. Developed curricula and courses will allow growing R&D engineers with strong interdisciplinary skills: electronic-automation and computer from one side and energy and thermal of the building on the other part. They will be able to analyze the problem and find innovative solutions.This BA and MA programmes brings together students from different fields to study in interdisciplinary teams that increases understanding of different backgrounds and offers students opportunities to collaborate with research projects and companies. Students receive a wide conceptual design skills and it greatly increases employment opportunities."

The CCWater project addresses 'knowledge building' to address water scarcity and water management in 3 partner countries in Asia. It will strengthen the local capacities to cope with Climate Change adaptation through 3 universities from Sri Lanka, 3 from China, and 2 from Mongolia. 3 program countries, Norway, Germany and Poland, with 3 universities with broad and diverse experience in climate-resilient water management will build a knowledge-sharing partnership with the 8 universities in 3 partner countries. The universities, as the key stakeholders preparing tomorrow's leaders, engineers, and scientists, have a key role to play when educating the graduates in the water sector. The participating units of the universities have teaching responsibilities related to water resources, water supply and wastewater management, which are the focus of the CCWater project. The CC Water project aims to strengthen the water-related higher education in 3 partner countries to increase the resilience against climate change impacts. This is achieved by developing HEI’s competences and skills with modern technology and teaching resources. The international collaboration, which is a unified strategic priority of all participating HEIs, will be strengthened together with improved gender and ethnic diversity and inclusion. The main objectives is designed to achieve with five focus areas with five concrete results: (1) enhancing climate resilience and sustainability of water resources and infrastructures in the Partner Countries (2) modernising water-related higher education with climate change issues and internationalise HEIs from the Partner Countries (3) improving the level of competences and skills in HEIs from the Partner Countries (4) strengthening relations of HEIs in the Partner Countries with the wider economic and social environment, and enhance their innovation capacity and (5) improving diversity and inclusion of higher education in the Partner Countries.

The project aiming at strengthening cooperation between Kazakhstan, Russia and Mongolia, addresses their shared problem: the need for modernization of HEIs in Agriculture and Forestry (A&F). In this way it will address the highest priority for the A&F sector in all three PCs –shortage of specialists, capable of bringing A&F to international standards. The project is also consolidated by the cross-cutting theme of internationalisation and environmental issues. The consortium includes 10 academic and 2 non-academic partners (an enterprise and a research institute). It integrates both experienced in EU projects and new partners.The wider objective is to contribute to empowering of HEIs in KZ, MN and RU by harmonising Master programs in A&F with the EU quality standards and internationalising them via English Medium Instruction (EMI).To achieve this goal, the following specific objectives are envisaged:To develop a model for modernising and internationalising Master programs in A&F via EMI and blended learning (BL);To enhance teaching capacities of the PC HEIs;To design a trans-institutional multidisciplinary e-learning platform for BL delivery of the new modules;To raise awareness of the A&F problems;To create potential for internationalization.As a result of the project the following outcomes/outputs will be achieved:- A model for modernising and internationalising Master programs in A&F via EMI and BL; - Teaching capacities of the PC HEIs enhanced: staff trained, the teaching environment at PC universities modernized;- The MA programmes for A&F developed/modernized, with harmonized, ECTS -tuned modules based on blended learning and EMI, supported by a digital library of course materials;- the e-learning platform designed and installed;- quality of teaching and management at PC institutions improved;- wide dissemination achieved, including agriculture and forestry problems awareness in the society at large.- efficient management of the project implement

The project addresses such root causes of environmental problems in MN,UA & VN, as poorly formulated policies, inadequate selection of management actions and the lack of suitable technology, by building capacity for academic excellence in doctoral training in environmental studies in PCs (and beyond). It aims:(1) To improve the practice of doctoral training and professionalise its governance by integrating PhD programs dealing with environmental policy, management and technology in 7 PCIs to 3 nationwide integrated doctoral schools (INTENSE NIDS), based on common Code of Operational Practices & research framework (COP & RF), and consolidating these schools into the INTENSE International Network.(2) To enhance doctoral training provision by integrating and upgrading existing learning contents that can be used for doctoral provision (total 80 ECTS by M36), infrastructure for accessing the courses and setting&monitoring flexible research training trajectories and their progression (INTENSE open education platform, including sustainable mechanisms for its development and maintenance) and shared access to research facilities.INTENSE will offer PhD students customized training trajectories and options to enrol on the courses, which will contribute to the progression of PhD theses; the IT infrastructure will provide access to the e-courses (including MOOCs) collected from all the PCIs belonging to INTENSE, from the full range of disciplinary fields related to environmental policy, management and technology, and to eScience modules creating individual learning portfolio.(3) To build the capacity of PhD students to improve their published output, through a strengthened multidisciplinary approach to doctoral training, aided by facilitating access to global and EU research networks (including facilitation of academic mobility), development of transferable skills, promotion of joint research/supervision arrangements & interdisciplinary & practice-oriented thesis topics.

Diversity permeates our everyday life and covers many dimensions, such as competence, culture, gender or economic across humans and social relations. Technology has evolved to a point where humans from diverse backgrounds, cultures, and experiences have an unprecedented ability to connect with each other. Yet technology does not in-and-by-itself provide support for developing and maintaining the social relationships that transcend geographical and cultural backgrounds. WeNet addresses this gap by providing a diversity-aware, machine-mediated paradigm of social relations. The goal is connecting people that can support each other, and the key is leveraging their diversity. The WeNet paradigm includes a family of computational diversity-aware models supporting human interaction. Learning models construct diversity profiles based on people's past behaviour and interactions. A diversity-aware search builds upon these profiles to connect the "right" people together. To support people’s interactions, a diversity alignment mechanism lifts communication barriers to ensure that messages between humans are interpreted correctly, and a diversity-aware incentive mechanism generates incentives to motivate people to support each other. The entire paradigm is developed taking into consideration ethical guidelines. The WeNet platform provides the technological infrastructure to set out a series of studies that will be carried within universities worldwide with diverse student populations, and with the final goal of improving students' quality of life inside and outside the academic environment. Beyond universities, WeNet's innovative paradigm impacts human interactions in general, especially those that may benefit from a collaborative approach (creative industries, medical diagnosis, ...). The WeNet consortium will develop a research infrastructure that will allow the exploitation of the project results and strengthen the European innovation eco-system in a worldwide perspective.