1. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Needs analysis and user profiles: Country ROMANIA Gabriel Dima, Alina Borcos, Cristian Negrescu University “Politehnica” of Bucharest, Romania

2. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Target Users people living in rural communities disadvantaged in terms of access to knowledge society services and technologies with special regard to teachers and students within multigrade schools; people working within very remote establishments with limited communication links. In the pilot phase two target user groups have been selected belonging to the following categories:

3. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 2: Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds, Bucegi National Park, Romania Pilot site 1: Community of Dezna, Arad County, Romania Selected Pilot Sites

4. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Selection Criteria (1) General: geographically remote and/or no broadband access; existence of a basic ICT infrastructure; multiple activities that can benefit from a broadband connection; technical maintenance support available during the project lifetime; high potential for transferability of experiences & results; informal expression of interest in active participation; good perspectives for sustainability of the service after the end of the project.

5. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Selection Criteria (2) Specific: Even the Community of Dezna is not geographically remote it has been chosen as it can serve as a relevant example of good practice for the use of satellite technology to integrate rural communities within a knowledge society … and can motivate the Romanian Ministry of Education and Research to allocate funding within the Rural eSchool Project to provide broadband access through satellite technologies to rural communities that can not be linked through ground infrastructure.

6. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 1: Community of Dezna (1) The Community of Dezna is physically located within the administrative limits of Commune of Dezna that is situated in the Ineu-Gurahonţ Depression, at the foot of the Codru- Moma Mountains and the junction of the rivers Moneasa and Zugău. The commune has an administrative area of 8350 ha and it is made up of 5 villages: Dezna, Buhani, Laz, Neagra and Slatina de Criş. The population counts 1.523 inhabitants from which 98,2% are Romanian natives, 0,6% Hungarians, 0,7% Roma and 0,5% others. The geographical coordinates of Dezna are: 46°40’N latitude and 22°25’E longitude.

7. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 1: Community of Dezna (2)

8. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 1: Community of Dezna (3) The proposed location is the school located in Dezna village that has primary multigrade classes and normal lower secondary ones.

9. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 1: Community of Dezna (4) The education and learning needs are related to the following aspects: lack of in-service teacher training; lack of qualified teachers for all subjects; insufficient and poor quality teaching-learning materials; lack of Internet access for both students and teachers in majority of schools; lack of basic communication means; rate of school drop-out; scarce use of ICT within the learning & teaching

10. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 1: Community of Dezna (5) increased access to knowledge by setting up number of services and technologies, including the Internet and communication services and specific content provision for students, teachers, local administration, citizens and businesses in the community; a local network with multiple nodes: school, public administration, library and a PPAI. in-service training for the school teachers and other staff; increased quality of multigrade education provision; new channels for disseminating information of the community economic potential with special regards to tourism and health care facilities. The main education and learning needs are as follows:

11. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 2: Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds (1) The Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds (NSG) is one of the nine national sports bases under the patrimony of the Ministry of Youth and Sports. This NSG is an important location used by sportsmen/sportswomen both from Romania and abroad as well as by students and teachers from sport schools and HE institutions for different sport and non-sport related events (seminars, training sessions, training camps, holiday camps etc.). The geographical coordinates of the Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds are: 43°38’N latitude and 25°48’E longitude. It is situated at 1950 m altitude.

12. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 2: Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds (2)

13. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 2: Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds (3) Unfavorable weather conditions, alpine climate: average annual temperature: 2°C average annual rainfall: 1200-1400 mm strong winds: 5-10m/sec on average 40 days/year with clear sky and 140 days/year with clouded sky Reachable by funicular/cabin railway, engine sledges The internet access is through the existing phone line (modem, 56Kb/sec) or occasionally, on individual basis using mobile phones.

14. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Pilot site 2: Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds (4)

15. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece lack of basic communication services; lack of access to learning resources and collaboration tools; lack of dissemination channels of information related to the establishment; low social interaction with their normal environment ; lack of backup system. Pilot site 2: Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds (5) The education and learning needs are related to the following aspects:

16. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece in-service training for the establishment’s staff and other categories of users of the establishment; continuation of the normal or close to normal educational activities for the students and teachers that spend different periods of time within the establishment; new channels for dissemination of information related to the establishment, activities undertaken and/or any other issues related to it. Pilot site 2: Piatra Arsa National Sports Grounds (6) The main education and learning needs are as follows:

17. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Conclusions the provision of broadband Internet connectivity is mainly seen as the first step toward granting access to knowledge by a number of services and technologies, including computers, the Internet and communication services and specific content provision for local administration, citizens, businesses and pupils in rural and small urban communities; … and may contribute as a catalyst to the development of Local Community eNetworks with multiple nodes: school, public administration and library through which communities will integrate themselves within a knowledge society.

18. 2nd Plenary Meeting 4-5 July 2006, Rhodes, Greece Contact University “Politehnica” of Bucharest Center for Advanced Learning Services Phone: +40 21 4024607 Fax:+40 21 4024676 e-mail:cals@reu.pub.ro http:www.pub.ro