A uniform course for next-generation ICT experts
The sustainability of the information and communication (ICT) infrastructure is an extremely important issue, because uses such as training the latest and best large language models is highly energy-intensive. Unfortunately – as far as we know – no university course in the Netherlands or beyond currently covers the full breadth of the subject.
Although the academic community does take an interest in the sustainability of ICT systems, attention is divided across various departments, research groups and institutes. As a result, knowledge is fragmented and not systematically organised. Meanwhile, the ICT industry is trying to develop its own sustainability-focused educational resources, but they tend to be concerned with certain narrowly defined fields, such as software engineering. Przemysław Pawełczak is therefore developing a first (publicly available) uniform course on designing sustainable ICT systems, aimed at ICT experts and recent graduates. The plan is to make the course freely available on one of the popular MOOC platforms. A grant from SIDN Fund will be used to develop course material (including assignments, exercises and exam questions) and accompanying audiovisual resources.
This project falls within the call ‘Internet Sustainability’. With this call we called for proposals for projects aimed at improving the sustainability of the Internet or reducing its environmental impact.