Subject Matter Committee

SMC (Subject Matter Committee) is a group of project members as well as external experts who have volunteered to seek advice and support Up2U in its mission of providing quality educational services and training to pilot schools participating in the project. SMC is expected to ensure that the educational developments and general progress of the project adequately address the educators’ and learners’ needs. The SMC is also the forum for exchanging state-of-the-art technology and methodologies as well as related information and knowledge between the work package representatives and the subject matter experts.

The SMC generates new ideas and validates existing ones. The SMC has a hierarchical structure: The top level SMC has permanent members nominated by the project participants and appointed by the Up2U Project Board. The permanent members of the SMC are allowed to create national sub-committees on a temporary basis, as they see fit. These sub-committees are created either for a fixed period of time or for a specific task, typically to advise the project on specific issues related to each pilot country.

Permanent Members

• Katerina Papakonstantinou (GRNET)
• Theodoros G. Karounos (NTUA)
• Antonio Vieira de Castro (ISEP)
• Stefano Lariccia (UROMA)
• Antonella Poce (UROMA)
• Ingrid Barth (TAU)
• Despo Ktoridou (UNIC)
• Position – Open vacancy 1
• Position – Open vacancy 2
• Position – Open vacancy 3
• Position – Open vacancy 4

National Sub-Commitee Members

* The sub-committee members will be appointed on-demand, according to the SMC ToR.

Terms Of Reference

Download the ToR….

Up To University – Subject Matter Committee

SMC is a group of project internal and external individuals who volunteered to seek advice and support Up2U in its mission of providing quality educational services and training to pilot schools participating in the project. SMC is expected to ensure that the educational developments and general progress of the project adequately address the educators and learners’ needs.. The SMC is also the forum for exchanging of both state-of-the-are technology and methodology related information and knowledge between the work package representatives and the subject matter experts.

The SMC generates new ideas and validates existing ones. The SMC has a hierarchical structure. The top level SMC has permanent members nominated by the project participants and appointed by the Up2U Project Board. The permanent members of the SMC are allowed to create temporary sub-committees as they see fit. These sub-committees are created either for a fixed period of time or a certain task, typically to advice the project on pilot country specific issues.

Duties and Responsibilities of the SMC

• Purpose of the Committee / Duties. The main role of the SMC is to seek advice for the Up2U project in scenarios related to project based learning and peer to peer learning in a community- driven collaborative ecosystem. SMC provides the Up2U project guidelines for the development of the training programs for the teaching and learning community. The SMC is also an instrument to improve coordination between school educators (teachers, curriculum developers) and technical experts (networking, IT and multimedia services teams).
• Composition. The SMC will include a limited number of permanent members from within the project and external representatives of all stakeholder on a voluntary basis. Each pilot country can have underlying temporary national sub-committees. The top level permanent SMC members are selected technical and pedagogical experts from the project’s work packages and distinguished individuals from outside. The national sub-committees can have a few representatives each, who are expected to advise the project on their particular schooling systems and pedagogical/teaching aspects.
• Chairs. The Chair and the Vice-chair of the SMC are permanent members of the top level committee, agreed by the attendees of the first SMC meeting.
• Appointment of members. The Up2U Board appoints the permanent members of the SMC based on the input provided by the Work Package leaders in consultation with the Up2U Assembly. The members of the national sub-committees are appointed by the permanent SMC members as they see fit.
• Term of office. The terms of office of each permanent member of the committee will by default expire with the completion of the project. The terms of office of the national sub-committee members are either time bound or linked to the completion of a given task. All members are acting according to their best intentions, on a voluntary basis. The members are free to resign from the SMC and the sub-committees at any time. WP5 Task 1 is responsible for keeping the SMC operational and sufficiently staffed.
• Meetings. The committee(s) meet remotely or face-to-face as frequently as deemed necessary to fulfil its duty, with a minimum of three times per year.
• Communication/Reporting to the Board and the Assembly of Up2U. The Chair of the SMC is responsible for regular communication and update on the work of the committee and sub- committees with the Up2U Board. Once a year a free format meeting of the Board and the SMC takes place to discuss ideas for future topics and the potential training programmes. In addition, the chair of the SMC will share her/his reflections on the progress and future directions of Up2U training programmes and tools at the Assembly.
• Decision making – Quorum. Decisions is normally be made by consensus. If voting was required, decision is made by simple majority of the attendees.
• Costs. Travel and accommodation costs incurred by the project internal SMC members will be covered according to Up2U project guidelines. Travel expenses of external members participating either in the top level or in the national sub-committees may be covered by the Up2U project, upon the final decision of the project coordinator, strictly on a case by case basis.
• Performance Review. The work of the committee and its terms of reference will be regularly reviewed by the Up2U Board.
• Documents. All committee materials will be open to all members of Up2U project, published under the Creative Commons License BY-SA.