Future Tech in higher education University Future Festival at TU Braunschweig

On 13 May, TU Braunschweig hosted a stage at the University:Future Festival for the first time. The festival is the largest conference on the future of academic education. The main theme in Braunschweig was ‘Future Tech’, i.e. the transformation of teaching through technologies such as AI, VR/XR and quantum computing. Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

Numerous presentations addressed possible scenarios for how teaching could change in the future, such as the talk ‘Reimagining Education: Scenarios for a Digital Future’ by Rasmus Benke-Åberg and Gül Akcaova. Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

The event was moderated by Alexandra Siering from the Braunschweig-based start-up ‘Wissenswald’. Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

All lectures from lecture hall SN 19.1 at TU Braunschweig were simultaneously livestreamed on the conference platform of the Stifterverband, which organised the festival. Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

Parallel to the presentations, several workshops took place, such as ‘Saved by the Bot – Developing exam simulations and feedback bots for teachers and learners’ by Barbara Schnieders (centre) and Marco Schmickler... Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

... and also the workshop ‘Diskursdisko :with_edm – Techno dancing, coding, reflecting’ by Anna Schürmer (centre) and Paul Zoder. Image credit: Jess Bahl

In addition, there were lightning talks and film screenings in the Media Lab, pictured here is Mareike Bernien with a film preview. Image credit: Adina Mahmutovic/TU Braunschweig

Throughout the day, visitors to the Architecture Pavilion were able to try out numerous VR exhibits, including those from the QuantumVR and InterXR projects. Image credit: Jess Bahl

The keynote speeches were given by Jürgen Geuter with his presentation ‘AI and other hypes – Should we really do it or should we leave it alone?’... Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

and by Aya Jaff on the topic ‘Don't Just Teach Tech. Teach Power.’ Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

Speakers from abroad were also represented, including Keith Ranaldi from the University of Rhode Island.

Further presentations were given by Simon Büttner (‘Virtual Campus Creation: A Multimedia Playbook’, together with Keith Ranaldi), Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

Robert Lepenies, President of Karlshochschule International University, on the topic ‘More than skills: Future capabilities for the Anthropocene,’ Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

Franziska Greinert from TU Braunschweig (‘Quantum technologies: New challenges for skilled worker training’), Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

Markus Weber, visiting from TU Darmstadt with the title ‘Future Learning Designs with 360°, AR and VR’

as well as Ann-Kathrin Watolla and Sarah Spitz (‘Bias and Generative AI – Blueprint for a Constructive Learning Programme’) from the Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society. Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

The total audience of 270 came from various universities in the region, but numerous employees and students from Braunschweig were also represented. Image credit: Stefan Böhme/TU Braunschweig

In addition, numerous people watched the live broadcast. The recordings will be available on YouTube shortly. Image credit: Adina Mahmutovic/TU Braunschweig