EUSEcure Winter Seminar
28 February - 4 March 2023, Piraeus, Greece
From 28 February to 4 March 2023, 50 students and several National University of Public Service faculty members participated in the EUSEcure Winter Seminar in Piraeus, near Athens, as part of the EUSecure Project, supported by the European Union under the Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership in Higher Education program.
The EUSecure project aims to develop a transdisciplinary elective course (EU Security Resilience and Sustainability), a simulation exercise, a MOOC (open online learning platform), and the EULite (secondary school version). The course itself consists of 15 modules (one module = one weekly topic = one policy area) and the used teaching methods combine traditional and online learning and are complemented by simulation exercises.
The four other universities participating in the UPS-led project (the University of Piraeus, Greece (UNIPI), Fernando Pessoa University, Portugal (UFP), University of Salento, Italy (UNISAL), and the Sapientia Hungarian University of Transylvania, Romania (SAPIENTIA)) were also represented in the winter university course with their own student teams and lecturers. In this way, the participants were able to develop their knowledge and skills in a rich and diverse international environment, to successfully tackle the major security challenges facing Europe in the future.
The Winter University consisted of a handful of modules related to security issues such as megatrends in the 21st century; EU strategic autonomy; terrorism; migration; cyber security; critical infrastructure protection; water security and water geopolitics; social media and fake news; and public health and disease control. These modules were developed and presented to the audience by a well-prepared and expert international team of professors.
The EUSecure project itself is based on the themes of security, resilience, and sustainability of the European Union, so in addition to learning about how the European Union works, participants were able to participate in a variety of lectures and practical sessions. These lectures covered topics like cyber and climate security, terrorism, fake news, and international governance. The course has paid particular attention to creative teaching methods, including simulation exercises and role-playing games. In addition, the EUSecure Winter University instructors put a strong emphasis on having participating students work in pairs and groups with students from other universities on different exercises, in order to further broader their horizons on the covered topics.
By making the most of the opportunities offered by the winter seminar, participants came home with a decisive experience, new friendships, and a broader knowledge base.
