Ecole Supèrieure des Sciences et Techniques de Tunis
Contact person: Mohamed Jemni
mohamed.jemni [at] fst.rnu.tn
is a Professor of Computer Science and Educational Technologies at the University of Tunis, Tunisia. He is the Director of ICT at ALECSO (www.alecso.org). He has been the General chair of the Computing Center El Khawarizmi from 2008 to 2013. He is a Senior member IEEE and member of the Executive board of IEEE Technical Committee on Learning Technology (www.ieeetclt.org), New Initiative Chair.
His Research Projects Involvements during the last 25 years are tools and environments of e-learning, High Performance and Grid computing and Accessibility of Information and Communication Technologies to People with Disabilities. He published more than 250 papers in international journals and conferences and produced many studies for international organizations such as UNESCO, ITU and ALECSO.
He and his laboratory have received several awards, including the Silver medal of the International Fair of Inventions in Kuwait 2007, the UNESCO Prize 2008 for the e-learning curriculum they developed for visually impaired, President's Award for the integration of persons with disabilities 2009 and the 'World Summit Award (WSA) - Mobile 2010' in the field of social inclusion. In April 2012, his laboratory LaTICE received the Google Student AWARD and he has received the Best Communication Paper of the Web For All 2012. He received the International Telecommunication Union Award: “ICT Innovation application challenge” during the WSIS Forum in Geneva in May 2013.
Description of the smart city learning group operating in the affiliated institution
The Arab League Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (ALECSO) has, as its primary responsibility, the promotion and coordination of educational, cultural and scientific activities for Arab countries. In this perspective, a 'Plan for the Development of Education in the Arab Countries' (2008-2018) is being implemented by ALECSO. The implementation plan aims at systematically developing the Arab educational system, mainly through the effective use of ICTs in education.
The ICT Department of the Arab League Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (ALECSO) is conducting several strategic ICT projects in ALECSO. These projects aiming to contribute in the innovation and the development of the educational Arab system by the effective use of ICTs in education. These projects are focusing, in particular, in the following topics:
• Promoting Open Educational Resources (OERs) for K-12 education in Arab countries
• Creating MOOCs for Arabic language learning for native and non-native speakers
• Promoting cloud computing technologies for education and research in the Arab world
• Promoting the accessibility of persons with disabilities to ICT and educational content and environments
• Promoting educational mobile content and apps.
Competences
to be published soon
Relevant achievements, best practices, products
to be published soon
On going challenges
1) Promoting Arab Mobile Applications
The goal of this project is to provide the necessary technological and institutional environment for the promotion of an emerging digital creative Arab Mobile industry, related to the fields of education, culture and science through:
• Raising awareness about Mobile Application development and hosting
• Capacity building on Arab Mobile Application development
• Developing and maintaining an Arab Market (store) to host Arab Mobile Applications in the fields of Education, Culture, Science and Serious Games
• Developing and maintaining an environment offering a Rapid Application Development to allow users building and generating Arab Apps via few clicks
• Training of trainers on the proposed environments
• Evaluation and Follow–up
• Creation of Arab Community of Mobile Applications developers and practitioners.
The AlecsoApps project is composed of three main components:
• The AlecsoApps Store: a web-based application intended for hosting and gathering Arab Mobile Applications for free. This platform is also installable on supported mobile devices that run Android OS. This Arab marketplace provides the opportunity to Arab developers involved in Mobile Technology to innovate and to share their creations without any fees, restrictions or barriers.
• The AlecsoApps Editor: a platform that offers an environment of Rapid Application Development (RAD). This Development Studio is used through its convivial web interface and enables end-users to create their applications in few minutes, following four simple steps. The Editor targets people whom do not master programming languages such as JAVA and includes a real time previewer based on a WYSIWYG concept, which allows users to build and generate their apps via few clicks.
• The AlecsoApps Award: an annual challenge aiming to motivate and encourage Arab developers to meet high-level standards in term of Mobile Applications quality, innovation and Entrepreneurship. The competition is set over two stages: The first stage is national, lead and held locally in Arab countries to select the best Mobile Applications in each Arab country, in the areas of Education, Culture, Science and Educational games. The second stage is rather at a Pan-Arabic level: wining applications are selected among those getting successfully the first round. The amount of the AlecsoApps Awards would be about 50 000 $US
2) Promoting OER in Arab countries
The main goal of the project is to ensure wider scope and exchange of OERs in the Arab region, and consequently, to get the quality of used OERs enhanced and educational communities enlarged across Arab countries through:
• Supporting OER Policies development
• Raising awareness about OER and Creative Commons licensing
• Capacity building on OER and Creative Commons licensing
• Developing and maintaining a Pan-Arabian technical infrastructure (OER national portals and Arab Meta-Platform)
• Training of trainers on the proposed Pan-Arabian technical infrastructure
• Creation of Arab Community of OER developers and educational practitioners
Relevant publications
• S Ghallabi, F Essalmi, M Jemni
“Enhanced Federation and Reuse of E-Learning Components Using Cloud Computing”
Emerging Issues in Smart Learning, 159-166, Springer, 2015.
• Mohamed Jemni
“Promoting the Effective Use of ICT for Enhancing Education in the Arab World”
4th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies (ICALT2014), July 7-9, 2014, Athens, Greece.
• Mohsen Laabidi, Mohamed Jemni, Leila Jemni Ben Ayed, Hejer Ben Brahim, Amal Ben Jemaa
“Learning technologies for people with disabilities”
Journal of King Saud University-Computer and Information Sciences 26 (1), 29-45, January 2014.
• M Jemni, M Laabidi, LJB Ayed
“Accessible E-learning for Students with Disabilities: From the Design to the Implementation”
The New Development of Technology Enhanced Learning, 53-74, Springer, 2014.
• H Hebiri Madani, L Jemni Ben Ayed, M Jemni, DG Sampson
“Towards accessible and personalized mobile learning for learners with disabilities”
Fourth International Conference on Information and Communication Technology and Accessibility (ICTA), 24-26 October 2013, Hammamet, Tunisia.
• MK Khribi, M Jemni, O Nasraoui, S Graf
“Toward a Fully Automatic Learner Modeling Based on Web Usage Mining with Respect to Educational Preferences and Learning Styles”
13th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies (ICALT), 15-18 July 2013, Beijing, China.
• H Ben Brahim, A Ben Jemaa, M Jemni, M Laabidi
“Towards the design of personalised accessible e-learning environments”
13th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies (ICALT), 15-18 July 2013, Beijing, China.
• O El Ghoul, M Jemni
'Multimedia courses generator for deaf children'
Int. Arab J. Inf. Technol. 6 (5), 457-462, 2009.
• M.K. Khribi, M. Jemni, O. Nasraoui
'Toward Integrating the Pedagogical Dimension in Automatic Learner Modeling within E-Learning Systems'
The 9th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies July 14-18, 2009 Riga, Latvia.
• Fathi Essalmi, Leila Jemni Ben Ayed, Mohamed Jemni
'A Multi-Parameters Personalization Approach of Learning Scenarios'
The 7th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies, July 2007, Niigata, Japan.