European Convention For Engineering Deans

Organised jointly by SEFI and CESEAR, the ECED 2014, European Convention of Engineering Deans, was successfully organised in April at LTH. For two days, everything from student recruitment to the use of global research facilities was discussed. The main theme was ‟Engineers for a connected world”. In total, around 80 vice-chancellors and deans from around twenty countries visited Lund and LTH.

The conference included a panel debate, led by Alex Tarchini from the company Mathworks. Industry representatives discussed the extent to which academia keeps itself sufficiently up to date with industry requirements. The panel featured representatives from the engineering industry and chambers of commerce as well as from academia.

‟You can’t lump academia together as one unit, in the same way as small enterprises do not have the same requirements as large companies. When it comes to specific employees, the personal attitude among the people you recruit is important”, said Bengt Arne Molin, location manager for Sony Mobile in Lund. He also emphasised the importance of engineers being willing to change in order to keep up with a changing world.

In the afternoon of the second day of the conference, participants visited MAX IV, where they were impressed by the size of the facility and discussed how it could be exploited by the international research community.

‟We benefit greatly from having good contacts with our European colleagues. In future, we will be part of the very latest sychrotron radiation and spallation research, which will make us obvious cooperation partners for our colleagues abroad”, said Anders Axelsson, dean of LTH.

Presentations are online on www.lth.se/eced/presentations/
Pictures are available on www.lth.se/eced/pictures/