Tag: Distance work

Distance work · DOME · eHealth · Grant application · Haptics · NORDeHEALTH

Just reached half-time of my assistant professorship at Örebro University!

Jonas Moll2 Comments

In the beginning of August 2019 I started off my work as an assistant professor in Informatics at Örebro University. The assistant professorship is a four year position, and towards the end you will, in most cases, be promoted to a senior lecturer or associate professor after an application procedure. Since I have now reached half-time, I think it’s reasonable to summarize what I have done this far and discuss what lies ahead.

Overall, I’m very happy with how the first two years played out when it comes to both research (~80%) and teaching (~20%), even though the pandemic posed some difficult challenges in both areas. I have gotten the opportunity to participate in some very interesting research collaborations. The funded Vinnova project I drafted the application for during the first weeks at the university ended just before summer 2021 and the collaboration that was built with the involved stakeholders was really fruitful. Representatives from both The Swedish Association of the Visually Impaired and The National Agency for Special Needs Education and Schools (SPSM) want to continue the collaborations and we are already looking for new funding opportunities in the area of accessible digital collaborative learning environments. The national and international collaborations in the NordForsk project NORDeHEALTH, which started up formally in January 2021, have also been fruitful and I look forward to another two years of research on personal eHealth services in the Nordic countries. Aside from working in externally funded projects, I also started up some internal collaborations, mostly related to pedagogical research. I will write more about the first two years of research, and the publications published, in my second and third posts about the first half of the assistant professorship.

The teaching has been more of a challenge than I expected when I stared working as an assistant professor two years ago. I know the courses, but being thrown into digital teaching mode made the teaching more difficult than ever before, especially since I have been course responsible for the courses I have been involved in (Interaction design and System development theory). Despite this, the courses worked really well and the students seemed to be happy with them. I will write more about these courses, and the challenges associated with digital teaching and examination, in my fourth and last blog post about the first two years of my assistant professorship.

I really hope, and also believe, that the second half will be just as rewarding as the first one. Hopefully, I will be able to start even more internal research collaborations, especially now when I have made sure that we have two brand new haptic devices at the department – this should open up several new research opportunities within, for example, the areas of digital learning environments and multimodal data exploration and analysis!

Distance work

Wrote a short text in a tourist guide about my year of distance work at my countryside!

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As I have written a few times before in my posts, I have been working from my countryside at Gräsö for more than a year due to the pandemic. Since I’m dependent on immune suppressive medication, working from the country side, and also living there, was the obvious solution.

A few months ago I was suggested to write a short story about my year of work at Gräsö, to be published in this year’s Gräsö tourist guide. I happily accepted and it was of course a bonus that I was promised the whole centre spread of the guide! It was published well before midsummer and you can see the result in the blog image above. The entire guide is available here. Since the text is in Swedish, I provide a translation here:

When I got a full time job as researcher and teacher at Örebro University, 14 months of continuous residence on Gräsö was not how I envisioned it! But after the corona outbreak distance work from home became the safest option for many of us.

Because I, since the 90s, have spent around 1/3 of the year in our house on Gräsö, and have my heart there at 3/3, it became my obvious infection-proof work home.

Working from the countryside has had its challenges, but also benefited from increased creativity due to the stimulating nature just around the corner. From Gräsö, I have participated in major research projects and carried out two courses for over 100 students – with everything from design to examination. The students should only know that the teacher was sitting in an armchair in a house far away in the forest during lectures and seminars!

This has worked so well thanks to two of the island’s most skilled professionals. On the one hand, an architect who has given the simple house a forward-looking floor plan with e.g. shower and toilet, and on the other hand a contractor and carpenter for whom nothing is impossible!

The work space (picture above) is no doubt smaller than at the university. The most important things needed for my research were moved to Gräsö, as e.g. two devices for haptic (= directed at sense of touch instead of sight or hearing) interaction with computers.

Having binoculars and a camera ready is important – suddenly a green woodpecker appears in the tree outside. If the squirrel is not there, the beautiful goldfinch can visit the bird feeding.

Proximity to nature on Gräsö, with such a rich flora and fauna, is what I appreciate most with the accommodation here. Regarding the flora, you can find almost all of Sweden’s orchids here. Along many of the roads you can find e.g. marsh-orchids in quantity and groups of lesser butterfly-orchids are also seen. On the countryside we are missing the beautiful slipper orchid [guckusko], but it is found within bike distance. In the fauna, the White-tailed Eagle is my favorite – eastern Gräsö has for a long time been among Sweden’s densest areas for this species!

At bare ground, a network of paths and roads is available for walks and bike rides – it may be to the lingonberry forest of Mon or to the east shore towards the Lilla Risten island (picture above). I have had time for experiencing many beautiful views by Lilla Risten during a quarter of an hour walks at longer breaks in Skype meetings. In case of snow, skiing is a long-awaited alternative to walking that invites to nice trips around the east shore’s capes and bays. Gräsö is very beautiful and the year here has been fantastic!

Let’s end this post with a picture of one of my animal friends who regularly visits the bird-only devoted feeding. 🙂

I wish you all a nice summer!