Swiss Digitaltage 2022: Focus on promoting young talent, diversity and sustainability
Ongoing digitization is permeating all areas of society. But which skills are important for the digital future, how can female talent be attracted to technical professions, and what role will sustainable digital solutions play in tomorrow's world? These questions are the driving force behind the NextGen - Future Skills Labs, #herHACK and Greentech Startup Battle series of events.
The three main formats of the Swiss Digital Days 2022 are all about setting the course for the digital future. A proactive approach to current and future challenges is essential to secure Switzerland's position as a leading digital location. Diana Engetschwiler, Deputy Managing Director of digitalswitzerland, says: "The main formats are intended to sensitize the population, business and politics to the digital challenges in terms of sustainability, diversity and talent development. Because these topics are important for the preservation of Switzerland - not only as a business location, but as a place to live."
NextGen - Generating enthusiasm for digitization
The NextGen event series enables school classes to discover digitization topics in a playful way and to reflect on the associated future skills. Children aged 10 to 15 thus learn about new technologies and methods and are encouraged to want to help shape our digital future. So far, 144 schoolchildren have taken part in the NextGen format at the Biel, Liestal, Zurich, Lausanne and Lugano sites and explored sensor and robotics solutions, among other things. In this way, the NextGen workshop participants learned, for example, how a distance sensor works and programmed a parking aid for cars with the knowledge they acquired.
Prof. Dr. René Hüsler, Director of the Department of Computer Science and Deputy Rector of the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts: "The Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts supports the NextGen format so that young people can be shown the potential of digitization and learn the necessary skills for the future. The shortage of skilled workers can only be countered with early involvement of the 'Next Generation'. This main format of Digital Days 2022 fits very well with our diverse activities for young people in the STEM field."
#herHACK - Swiss Digitaltage 2022 with Hackathon by and for women
The event, which has a symbolic character, is intended to encourage women to pursue a career in the technology industry. Following last year's premiere, the promotion of women in technical professions is the focus of the Digital Days for the second time. The offer is aimed at women of different ages and educational backgrounds, with no specific prior knowledge of programming, to raise awareness and enthusiasm for technology. Women are still heavily underrepresented in the tech industry. This needs to change as soon as possible. This year, women are once again working in teams to find solutions to social challenges that contribute to the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the UN Agenda 2030. Since the kick-off on September 15 in Basel, 4 workshops have already taken place. Digital solutions so far revolve around topics such as gender equality in the workplace, clean energy production and climate protection ideas for Swiss SMEs.
GreenTech - digital solutions with sustainable impact
Solutions that enable us to live, work and produce more sustainably are more in demand than ever. At the GreenTech Startup Battle, a total of 20 young companies present particularly sustainable project ideas that preserve and protect natural resources. Five of the seven finalists have already been selected after five weeks: mobileup from the capital region, myFeld from northwestern Switzerland, viboo from the greater Zurich area, resilio from French-speaking Switzerland and Hive Power from Ticino. mobileup brings together supply and demand for used electronic equipment, MyFeld is the first online garden in Switzerland, viboo offers self-learning predictive control as a cloud service for heating and cooling equipment manufacturers, resilio accompanies companies in their sustainable digital transformation and Hive Power convinced the jury with innovative solutions for smart grids. The final will take place on October 27 in Zug. The prizes are CHF 10,000 in prize money, 25,000 AWS credits and 1 year of venture services or a coworking space.
Source: digitalswitzerland
