Quantitative thinking is at the heart of modern societies. Skills and programming competences related to quantitative thinking increase a student's employability and allow an enlightened citizen to make informed decisions. Every day we are bombarded and challenged by quantitative information: How long will a journey be delayed due to traffic? What are the chances of a change in weather conditions? More important questions and decisions in life are also quantitative in nature. What is the risk of a medical intervention? What are the potential benefits of an investment? Answers to these essential questions are usually provided in terms of statistics and quantitative information. Large modern societies require that quantitative information is communicated effectively so that it can be used by active citizens to make informed decisions. However, there is typically a huge gap between quantitative information released by experts, how this information is picked up and communicated by media, and how it is received and digested by members of the general public. Programming and coding skills are closely linked to quantitative thinking and is in high demand by employers in a society geared towards IT solutions. Learning IT and programming skills in a traditional course can be costly, time consuming, and the format and content often lacks the flexibility many students but also adult learners demand. At the same time, information and computer technology has advanced quickly and offers new and powerful software solutions for data analysis and visualization. To stay up-to-date, students and teachers must constantly upgrade their knowledge and learn new quantitative skills and competences to meet these demands. This has increased the need for new approaches to learning and teaching of quantitative thinking, particularly in the social sciences but also beyond. The TquanT project will be conducted by a consortium of 12 European universities that will lead the way to teaching of quantitative skills and associated programming competencies. We will hold blended mobility activities that combine traditional teaching in a classroom with innovative e-learning techniques to teach quantitative skills and programming competences to international students. The blended mobility will employ interactive software tools for teaching various aspects of quantitative thinking in modular knowledge structures. These tools can be used to establish an open-access adaptive e-learning system and course that is attractive to students at all levels of education, accessible to disadvantaged students from diverse cultural and geographic backgrounds, but also to adult learners, teachers, and the general public.
Every day we are bombarded by quantitative information: How long will a journey be delayed due to traffic? What are the chances of a change in weather conditions? More important questions and decisions in life are often also quantitative in nature. How much can I save when switching between providers? What is the potential benefit of an investment? What is the risk of a medical intervention? Answers to these essential questions are usually provided in terms of quantitative information and statistics. Large modern societies collect data and require that quantitative information is communicated effectively so that it can be used by citizens to make informed decisions. However, there is typically a huge gap between the quantitative information released by experts, how this information is picked up and communicated by the media, and how it is received and digested by members of the public. Programming and coding skills are closely linked to quantitative thinking and is in high demand by employers in a society geared towards IT solutions. Learning IT and programming skills in a traditional course can be costly, time consuming, and the format and content often lacks the flexibility many students and adult learners demand. At the same time, information and computer technology has advanced and now offers new and powerful software solutions for online data analysis and visualisation. To stay up-to-date, students and teachers need to upgrade their knowledge and learn new quantitative skills to meet these demands. This has increased the need for new approaches to learning and teaching of quantitative thinking, particularly in the social sciences but also beyond. The TquanT project and strategic partnership is based on a consortium of 12 European universities leading the way to teach quantitative skills and programming competences in the social sciences. We organised three blended mobility activities in different countries: Portugal 2016, Austria 2017, and the United Kingdom 2018. The 8-day activities combined traditional teaching in classrooms with innovative e-learning techniques to teach quantitative skills and programming competences to a group of 50+ international students each year. During each blended mobility we developed new interactive software tools (Shiny/RStudio) for teaching various aspects of quantitative thinking. These tools were used to establish adaptive tutorials and open-access e-learning courses targeting students at all levels of education, accessible to disadvantaged students from diverse cultural and geographic backgrounds, but also to adult learners, teachers and the general public. These interactive tools and online courses as well as other teaching resources are accessible on our central website https://www.tquant.eu. So far the strategic partnership has produced more than 60 interactive apps, 3 online tutorials and 3 e-learning moodle courses. More than 30,000 hits/registrations on the TquanT website were recorded until June 2018. In addition, the partners have published about 20 research papers in international peer-reviewed journals, most in high-impact journals and two multiplier events were held to disseminate results. In order to secure the long-term benefits of this partnership we will maintain the TquanT website as long as possible. Different online platforms provide interactive apps, source code, online tutorials, e-learning courses and lecture material, offering opportunities for further innovation, exchange and collaboration.