We are pleased to introduce you the new DRC President, Prof. Dr. Zdravko Kačič, Rector of the University of Maribor, Slovenia, as he shares his first words since he assumed the charge on the 1st of January. Let's discover more about our new President and his vision for the role of the DRC in the region!

Prof. Dr. Zdravko Kačič was born in 1961 in Maribor. He received his undergraduate degree in electrical engineering in 1986, the M. Sc. Degree in 1989 and the Dr. Sci. Degree in 1992, all from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Maribor, Slovenia.

He is currently a full professor at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Maribor and head of the Laboratory for Digital Signal Processing. He gives courses at undergraduate and postgraduate study programmes of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications. Up to the present, he was the supervisor of 17 doctoral students. His current research interests encompass digital signal processing, speech processing and analysis, speech recognition and synthesis, audio-visual content processing, and development of automated and content based initiated communication services in the framework of IP television, ambient intelligence and supportive living environments.

His bibliography includes 634 units, from which he authored or co-authored 97 articles published in scientific journals, 45 of them published in journals with impact factor. He is the author or co-author of 190 articles published in the proceedings of national or international scientific conferences. He is the author of two textbooks, co-author of eleven chapters in scientific monographs, co-author of scientific monography published by an international publisher, and author or co-author of four patent applications. He was guest editor of the journal International Journal of speech technology, New York: Springer Verlag, and from 2003 member of the same journal's editorial board. In years from 1994 to 2007, he was editor or co-editor of fifteen international workshops' proceedings Advances in speech technology. In the last ten years, he was several times a member of the scientific committee of international conferences from the field of speech and language technologies – Language resources and Evaluation and Interspeech, the latter being organized by the International Speech Community Association – ISCA.

In 2019 he was general co-chair of the international conference Interspeech, held in Graz. In the last five years, he served as peer-reviewer for international journals like Journal of Sensors, Journal of Engineering applications of artificial intelligence, Journal of Digital Signal Processing, and International Journal of Speech Technology. He had invited lectures at different universities in Germany, Spain, Croatia, and Sweden. He was visiting professor at the University of Umea, Sweden, a guest researcher at the University of Technology Berlin, Germany and two times at the University of Technology Munich, Germany.

From 2010 to 2014, he was a member of the COST Domain Committee for Information and Communication Technologies (DC ICT). In 2013, he was appointed to the working group for the preparation of the Higher Education Financing Act at the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Slovenia. In 2016, he joined the working group to support the project Peer Counselling for Performance Based Funding of Higher Education in Slovenia at the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Slovenia. In 2019, he was appointed to the working group for the preparation of the Higher Education Financing Act at the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Slovenia.

Prof. Dr. Zdravko Kačič is President of Slovenian Rectors’ Conference, an active member of EUA Council and strongly engages in the Slovenian Higher Education Reform process. Being aware of the challenges put forward to universities by the on-growing process of negation of research and science-based knowledge, he entered the newly formed network of Universities for Enlightenment and stands for truth, honesty and openness. It is Prof. Kačič’s strong belief that universities have to re-assure their position in our dramatically changing global society and are the best solution for a knowledge-based and reason-driven handling of today’s and future societal challenges. In the same way, the motivation for his application for President of DRC is the cognition that an active contribution of DRC in the process of design and progress of the Danube Strategy and strong involvement in the matters of the common European Higher Education and Research Area shall be continued and even enforced, especially Danubius Young Scientists award, contributions to the discussions on the future of Europe, cooperation with neighbouring areas and other actual themes of the DRC. It is about our most multi-cultural, multi-national and also vulnerable Danube region to become a valuable and added-value region of united Europe that we all strive for. Actual topics of the European Higher Education Area come to the agenda, as there are European University Initiatives, where DRC should envisage the potentials and impact on this, as well as the setting up of cooperative mechanisms for brain circulation of master and especially doctoral students within the Danube region and finally, tackling the improvement of innovation potentials of our region for more added-value jobs and incentives for young people to live and work in the Danube region.

Upon his appointment as rector of the University of Maribor Prof. dr. Zdravko Kačič emphasised that “with its performance, the University has to justify the confidence of the broader society in fulfilling its mission".

It has been an intense and fruitful year despite the difficult circumstances we have faced regarding the pandemic. Nevertheless, on behalf of the Danube Rectors’ Conference, we would like to wish you Happy Holidays and a successful New Year!

The Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Science and Research (BMBFW) and the Institute for the Danube Region and Central Europe (IDM) are pleased to invite you to join the Danubius Awards 2020 Virtual Ceremony taking place on 6th of November 2020 at 13:00 via YouTube livestream.

You can follow the Danubius Awards 2020 Ceremony by clicking on the YouTube link below.

JRC enlargement and integration workshop: expectations and concerns about connected and automated vehicles

15-16 October 2020

Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs) can improve transport and reducing its negative impacts.

CAVs are expected to

• be safer,
• more energy efficient,
• increase the road network capacity.

To discuss about expectations and concerns, we organise a co-creation workshop about connected and automated mobility.

Call for Applications

We invite representatives who work in relevant sectors in

• academia, industry, NGOs and national ministries and are from
• Enlargement and integration countries, including:
  Candidate and potential candidate countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Kosovo* – This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence – Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey),
  European neighbourhood policy countries Associated to Horizon 2020 (Armenia, Georgia, Moldova, Tunisia, Ukraine), and new EU Member State (Croatia)

To apply, please send your CV and supporting letter to JRC-EI-CCAM@ec.europa.eu.

Deadline: 31 August 2020

The number of places is limited to a maximum of 30 participants.

The workshop will be organised as an online participatory event.

Objectives

• Update participants on the EU's policy on development of cooperative, connected and automated mobility.
• Discuss about main factors that can help or hinder the introduction of CAVs on the market.
• Identify regional differences in the attitudes towards CAVs

You can find more information on the programme here.

We are pleased to announce that the Danube University Krems is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. The official celebration ceremony will take place on October 2, 2020 in Krems, Austria. The number of participants is limited, however, the entire event will be broadcast online. An official invitation will follow soon.

The DRC Secretariat congratulates the Danube University Krems on a successful 25 years of continuing education and scientific excellence and wishes her success in the years to come.

Call for a GYA membership from 2021 is open until 15 September 2020 (22h:00 UTC).

Applications are sought from young, independent scholars who combine the highest level of research excellence with a demonstrated passion for delivering impact.

The GYA is a global organization that places a high value on its diversity. We encourage applications from all qualified candidates. All applicants receive consideration and will not be discriminated against with regard to race, colour, ethnicity, religion, creed, sex, marital status, ancestry, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, physical or mental disabilities, or other factors. We especially encourage women and applicants from different minority groups, and from diverse disciplines including the natural, physical and social sciences as well as the arts and humanities and people working in government, industry, and non-governmental sectors to apply.

More information on how to apply and our online application form can be found here:

http://globalyoungacademy.net/call-for-new-members/

About the Global Young Academy

The GYA was founded with the vision to give a voice to young scientists around the world. By empowering early- to mid-career researchers to lead international, interdisciplinary, and intergenerational dialogues, the GYA mobilises talent from six continents for capacity-building, mentoring, providing science advice, engaging in science policy and improving the existing research environment. Members are chosen for their demonstrated excellence in scientific achievement and their commitment to service. Currently, there are 200 GYA members and 298 alumni from 86 countries. The GYA Office is hosted at the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, in Halle (Saale), Germany.

According article VII of the DRC statute the DRC Presidency shall be composed of Rectors of universities that are full members of the DRC. The Presidency is elected by the DRC General Assembly, following nominations sent to the DRC secretariat after a call for candidates has been sent to all members.

Therefore, we are here intending to call to nominate the candidates for DRC Presidency for 2021-2022. The nominations should be sent to DRC secretariat.

The election will take place during the General Assembly for all DRC member universities that will be held as an online meeting on 6. November 2020 10:00 CET.

According to Article VI.2 the President of the DRC calls for a Permanent Committee meeting to be held as an online meeting on 22nd of September 2020 at 15:00 CEST. The draft agenda will be sent accordingly.

Information about the Permanent Committee is available on our website.

The guest of the IDMonSite discussion on 7th of July 2020 was Maurizio Fermeglia, Full Professor at and former rector of the member university of the DRC University of Trieste. As member of the Programme Committee of the EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF) 2020, Prof. Fermeglia gave insights to the reorganization of the ESOF taking place in Trieste, Italy, and originally planned for 5-9 July.

In addition to the presentation of the ESOF, Daniel Martínek (IDM, DRC Secretariat) discussed with the renowned scientist the role of science and research during coronavirus times and the (un)preparedness for the environmental crisis that awaits us in the years to come.

Watch the discussion in the video below!

Given the travel restrictions and other difficulties the universities are facing in relation to the Covid-19 pandemic, the DRC Presidency, after careful consideration and in consultation with the Uzhhorod National University, agreed unanimously on the postponement of the Annual Conference scheduled to take place on 4.-6. November 2020 at the Uzhhorod National University to 2021. The new date for the 2021 Annual Conference will be announced in due time.

The General Assembly for all DRC member universities will be held as an online meeting on 6. November 2020 10:00 CET.

Information regarding the registration as well as the draft programme will be available in the upcoming weeks on the DRC website.

We look forward to seeing you during our General Assembly in November!

We are pleased to introduce you the new DRC President, Prof. Dr. Zdravko Kačič, Rector of the University of Maribor, Slovenia, as he shares his first words since he assumed the charge on the 1st of January. Let's discover more about our new President and his vision for the role of the DRC in the region!

Prof. Dr. Zdravko Kačič was born in 1961 in Maribor. He received his undergraduate degree in electrical engineering in 1986, the M. Sc. Degree in 1989 and the Dr. Sci. Degree in 1992, all from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Maribor, Slovenia.

He is currently a full professor at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Maribor and head of the Laboratory for Digital Signal Processing. He gives courses at undergraduate and postgraduate study programmes of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications. Up to the present, he was the supervisor of 17 doctoral students. His current research interests encompass digital signal processing, speech processing and analysis, speech recognition and synthesis, audio-visual content processing, and development of automated and content based initiated communication services in the framework of IP television, ambient intelligence and supportive living environments.

His bibliography includes 634 units, from which he authored or co-authored 97 articles published in scientific journals, 45 of them published in journals with impact factor. He is the author or co-author of 190 articles published in the proceedings of national or international scientific conferences. He is the author of two textbooks, co-author of eleven chapters in scientific monographs, co-author of scientific monography published by an international publisher, and author or co-author of four patent applications. He was guest editor of the journal International Journal of speech technology, New York: Springer Verlag, and from 2003 member of the same journal's editorial board. In years from 1994 to 2007, he was editor or co-editor of fifteen international workshops' proceedings Advances in speech technology. In the last ten years, he was several times a member of the scientific committee of international conferences from the field of speech and language technologies – Language resources and Evaluation and Interspeech, the latter being organized by the International Speech Community Association – ISCA.

In 2019 he was general co-chair of the international conference Interspeech, held in Graz. In the last five years, he served as peer-reviewer for international journals like Journal of Sensors, Journal of Engineering applications of artificial intelligence, Journal of Digital Signal Processing, and International Journal of Speech Technology. He had invited lectures at different universities in Germany, Spain, Croatia, and Sweden. He was visiting professor at the University of Umea, Sweden, a guest researcher at the University of Technology Berlin, Germany and two times at the University of Technology Munich, Germany.

From 2010 to 2014, he was a member of the COST Domain Committee for Information and Communication Technologies (DC ICT). In 2013, he was appointed to the working group for the preparation of the Higher Education Financing Act at the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Slovenia. In 2016, he joined the working group to support the project Peer Counselling for Performance Based Funding of Higher Education in Slovenia at the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Slovenia. In 2019, he was appointed to the working group for the preparation of the Higher Education Financing Act at the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport of the Republic of Slovenia.

Prof. Dr. Zdravko Kačič is President of Slovenian Rectors’ Conference, an active member of EUA Council and strongly engages in the Slovenian Higher Education Reform process. Being aware of the challenges put forward to universities by the on-growing process of negation of research and science-based knowledge, he entered the newly formed network of Universities for Enlightenment and stands for truth, honesty and openness. It is Prof. Kačič’s strong belief that universities have to re-assure their position in our dramatically changing global society and are the best solution for a knowledge-based and reason-driven handling of today’s and future societal challenges. In the same way, the motivation for his application for President of DRC is the cognition that an active contribution of DRC in the process of design and progress of the Danube Strategy and strong involvement in the matters of the common European Higher Education and Research Area shall be continued and even enforced, especially Danubius Young Scientists award, contributions to the discussions on the future of Europe, cooperation with neighbouring areas and other actual themes of the DRC. It is about our most multi-cultural, multi-national and also vulnerable Danube region to become a valuable and added-value region of united Europe that we all strive for. Actual topics of the European Higher Education Area come to the agenda, as there are European University Initiatives, where DRC should envisage the potentials and impact on this, as well as the setting up of cooperative mechanisms for brain circulation of master and especially doctoral students within the Danube region and finally, tackling the improvement of innovation potentials of our region for more added-value jobs and incentives for young people to live and work in the Danube region.

Upon his appointment as rector of the University of Maribor Prof. dr. Zdravko Kačič emphasised that “with its performance, the University has to justify the confidence of the broader society in fulfilling its mission".

It has been an intense and fruitful year despite the difficult circumstances we have faced regarding the pandemic. Nevertheless, on behalf of the Danube Rectors’ Conference, we would like to wish you Happy Holidays and a successful New Year!

The Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Science and Research (BMBFW) and the Institute for the Danube Region and Central Europe (IDM) are pleased to invite you to join the Danubius Awards 2020 Virtual Ceremony taking place on 6th of November 2020 at 13:00 via YouTube livestream.

You can follow the Danubius Awards 2020 Ceremony by clicking on the YouTube link below.

JRC enlargement and integration workshop: expectations and concerns about connected and automated vehicles

15-16 October 2020

Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs) can improve transport and reducing its negative impacts.

CAVs are expected to

• be safer,
• more energy efficient,
• increase the road network capacity.

To discuss about expectations and concerns, we organise a co-creation workshop about connected and automated mobility.

Call for Applications

We invite representatives who work in relevant sectors in

• academia, industry, NGOs and national ministries and are from
• Enlargement and integration countries, including:
  Candidate and potential candidate countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Kosovo* – This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence – Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey),
  European neighbourhood policy countries Associated to Horizon 2020 (Armenia, Georgia, Moldova, Tunisia, Ukraine), and new EU Member State (Croatia)

To apply, please send your CV and supporting letter to JRC-EI-CCAM@ec.europa.eu.

Deadline: 31 August 2020

The number of places is limited to a maximum of 30 participants.

The workshop will be organised as an online participatory event.

Objectives

• Update participants on the EU's policy on development of cooperative, connected and automated mobility.
• Discuss about main factors that can help or hinder the introduction of CAVs on the market.
• Identify regional differences in the attitudes towards CAVs

You can find more information on the programme here.

We are pleased to announce that the Danube University Krems is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. The official celebration ceremony will take place on October 2, 2020 in Krems, Austria. The number of participants is limited, however, the entire event will be broadcast online. An official invitation will follow soon.

The DRC Secretariat congratulates the Danube University Krems on a successful 25 years of continuing education and scientific excellence and wishes her success in the years to come.

Call for a GYA membership from 2021 is open until 15 September 2020 (22h:00 UTC).

Applications are sought from young, independent scholars who combine the highest level of research excellence with a demonstrated passion for delivering impact.

The GYA is a global organization that places a high value on its diversity. We encourage applications from all qualified candidates. All applicants receive consideration and will not be discriminated against with regard to race, colour, ethnicity, religion, creed, sex, marital status, ancestry, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, physical or mental disabilities, or other factors. We especially encourage women and applicants from different minority groups, and from diverse disciplines including the natural, physical and social sciences as well as the arts and humanities and people working in government, industry, and non-governmental sectors to apply.

More information on how to apply and our online application form can be found here:

http://globalyoungacademy.net/call-for-new-members/

About the Global Young Academy

The GYA was founded with the vision to give a voice to young scientists around the world. By empowering early- to mid-career researchers to lead international, interdisciplinary, and intergenerational dialogues, the GYA mobilises talent from six continents for capacity-building, mentoring, providing science advice, engaging in science policy and improving the existing research environment. Members are chosen for their demonstrated excellence in scientific achievement and their commitment to service. Currently, there are 200 GYA members and 298 alumni from 86 countries. The GYA Office is hosted at the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, in Halle (Saale), Germany.

According article VII of the DRC statute the DRC Presidency shall be composed of Rectors of universities that are full members of the DRC. The Presidency is elected by the DRC General Assembly, following nominations sent to the DRC secretariat after a call for candidates has been sent to all members.

Therefore, we are here intending to call to nominate the candidates for DRC Presidency for 2021-2022. The nominations should be sent to DRC secretariat.

The election will take place during the General Assembly for all DRC member universities that will be held as an online meeting on 6. November 2020 10:00 CET.

According to Article VI.2 the President of the DRC calls for a Permanent Committee meeting to be held as an online meeting on 22nd of September 2020 at 15:00 CEST. The draft agenda will be sent accordingly.

Information about the Permanent Committee is available on our website.

The guest of the IDMonSite discussion on 7th of July 2020 was Maurizio Fermeglia, Full Professor at and former rector of the member university of the DRC University of Trieste. As member of the Programme Committee of the EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF) 2020, Prof. Fermeglia gave insights to the reorganization of the ESOF taking place in Trieste, Italy, and originally planned for 5-9 July.

In addition to the presentation of the ESOF, Daniel Martínek (IDM, DRC Secretariat) discussed with the renowned scientist the role of science and research during coronavirus times and the (un)preparedness for the environmental crisis that awaits us in the years to come.

Watch the discussion in the video below!

Given the travel restrictions and other difficulties the universities are facing in relation to the Covid-19 pandemic, the DRC Presidency, after careful consideration and in consultation with the Uzhhorod National University, agreed unanimously on the postponement of the Annual Conference scheduled to take place on 4.-6. November 2020 at the Uzhhorod National University to 2021. The new date for the 2021 Annual Conference will be announced in due time.

The General Assembly for all DRC member universities will be held as an online meeting on 6. November 2020 10:00 CET.

Information regarding the registration as well as the draft programme will be available in the upcoming weeks on the DRC website.

We look forward to seeing you during our General Assembly in November!