The Steem and the Academia: @sndbox and the Charles University – Collaboration Project (Initiation Phase)
Introduction
The time has come to finally announce the first crypto project with an overlap to a physical world that I have been working on. And not any casual part of the material world! We shall start right in the center of higher education – the Academia! I’m studying on the Faculty of Arts and Humanities (philosophy): Institute of Information and Library science. I have dedicated quite a few months into a series introducing theoretical and practical Information science to my followers. Whoever has read them, or knows about Information science, and manages to turn on the imagination, will realize that Information science has MUCH to do with Blockchain technology. Doctors and professors of today though have very limited knowledge about it. Who could blame them? The technology is way too young for the Academia to recognize its importance. New generation will be needed to fully implement subjects about Blockchain into its syllabus. I plan to do that in the future. That is though story for different time.
Story for now would be the first effort in Czech Republic (that I know of) that would try to introduce Blockchain technology to the Academia and show her its wonderful benefits – the Steem and the Academia (for lack of better, or rather any, name lol). It’s just a first small step, but you know how the saying with a small step goes right?
Initiation phase
For those of you that are not familiar with the term, let me first break it down real quick. Initiation phase refers to a first phase in a project creation method called waterfall. As the name implies, its rather linear way of project production. Initiation phase is basically a “brainstorm sequence”. In this phase people working on the project present case study (whitepaper might be a more familiar term in a cryptosphere:P). It basically has to contain who is working on the project, what is the issue that is being tackled by the project, how is the issue supposed to be solved and if money is involved (not in this case) then how it’s going to be used. In this article I’ll tackle all afore mentioned aspects of the project. Keep in mind that (even though I already have everything necessary prepared – and not everything will necessarily be part of this article:P) nothing has been communicated with the university as of yet. The first meeting is going to happen on Thursday.
Subjects involved
As a @sndbox steward, most of my future Steem initiatives will be done under their banner. I simply owe them that much from my humble point of view. @sndbox will be the first involved subject then. Since I don’t want the post to be eternally long, I’ll just link our website, where @sndbox is more than sufficiently explained. Representatives for @sndbox will be @voronoi, @hansikhouse, and me (@fingersik) as an intermediator.
The other subject will be Charles University – the oldest and largest university in the Czech Republic that maintains a worldwide reputation for centuries. Part of the syllabus of Institute of Information and Library science is also project management. Project management is being taught by PhDr. Helena Lipková, Ph.D. who has even worked for giants like IBM as a project manager. She more than proved her knowledge and skill regarding project creation and management and she also seems very enthusiastic towards new technologies. She will therefore be the representative for Charles University in matters related to this project.
The problem
In the project management subject we only study grants as a fundraising method which at least for me is very morally problematic, but I believe that more people would feel the same way if they knew what exactly is, and what is not, part of the syllabus at our university concerning the fundraising methods. I believe that education should be "objective". It’s not like we are not told that other fundraising methods exist so technically the university remains objective, but we don’t explore other fundraising methods whatsoever and most importantly, we (mainly the librarians) don’t use them. I understand that for libraries, in a current way the system is run and with the lack of innovative economists, grants are fundamental. I though am part of the new generation and I see stuff the conservative librarians that mostly run the faculty do not.
The solution
I imagine the problem being solved by a new subject for limited amount of people. Dr. Lipková would be a guarantor of that subject. She already runs several “project-related subjects”, but it always is in a way, where she is contacted by any given company that wants to create a minor project that “can be fulfilled by mere students”. That is awesome too of course! If though several “project-related subjects” are from time to time run, it shouldn’t be problem to create a bit different “project-related subject”.
I imagine the subject to allow students to present and work on ANY project. Basically if anyone would believe that they have a creative idea that has potential to be impactful for local, or virtual community, they could try to make it a reality. There would be several guarantors of the quality. First one that would ultimately decide who deserves the credits and who does not would be Dr. Lipková. The project updates would be presented on Steem (IMO it could be in any form, but that is open up for a discussion). Students could fundraise the money for their projects through a voluntary method on Steem from the Steem community and @sndbox that would save some of their VP for this purpose. Steem community and @sndbox would the second guarantor of quality.
What’s next?
Whether the project will end in its initiation phase or will continue will be decided on Thursday after the meeting with Dr. Lipková. The outcome of that meeting and possible official launch of the project will be published on @sndbox account on Friday. Stay tuned and follow both of us!
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