Newsflash

Formation of BeeBIT e.V.

BeeBIT was registered as a non-profit association and is now called "BeeBIT e.V." (the addendum "e.V." is the German abbreviation for registered association). By establishing the association we hope to simplify and merge the structure of our project, so that working with us together trustfully on a regional as well as on an international level becomes more easier and concrete – both for our partner schools as well as for external institutions, companies and educational facilities. The association's scope of duties herein will be of an organizational character, particularly with regard to communication, project organization and public relations.

Meeting with Project Partners

From the 1st November to the 4th November, the project partners from all over Europe came to Würzburg for a meeting with the BeeBIT team. We mainly discussed the status and further planning of the entire BeeBIT project. They also recieved an introduction to the BeeBIT homepage and translated the diagram in their mother tongues, so we got six available languages by now (German, English, Italian, Swedish, Slovenian and Croatian, more to follow).

Awards

In the course of the so called "Land der Ideen" contest, our project was decorated with a prize. The contest was founded by the past German government and is yearly assigned to innovative and creative ideas from around the country. On October 21st the award was submitted at Friedrich-Koenig-Gymnasium in the context of a colloquium of natural sciences. On November 11th Christoph Bauer (FKG) and Arnold Weibel (DHG) represented BeeBIT e.V. at the awardee meeting in Berlin.

BeeBIT in German TV

On the 2nd November, the German TV broadcaster of the federal country Bavaria, the Bayerische Rundfunk, came to us to shoot a short report about our project. They interviewed our software engineer, David Schneller, a member of our association board, Christoph Bauer, and a student of the FKG grammar school. Unfortunately, the report is currently no longer available.

MINT-EC congress

On the 13th and 14th of November the German headmaster congress for participating MINT-EC (Excellence schools in STEM subjects) schools took place at the Friedrich-Koenig-Gymnasium. Martin Otersen (DHG) and Christoph Bauer (FKG) held a workshop about the BeeBIT project and informed about the eHive, especially about how to get involved in the project. Both options, purchasing an eHive or alternatively securing access to the collected data and provided materials by acquiring membership in our network were mentioned and explained.

Cooperation

Thanks to Schneider Electric, a global player in matters of electronic components with around 170.000 employees worldwide, BeeBIT e.V. can benefit of the support from a gifted and well-versed partner. Schneider Electric is involved in producing the eHive's new, improved and finally working circuit board. This board is planned to be finished at the beginning of January, which means we are able to ship the missing modules until the end of January to our European partners. In February all delivered eHives should be able to connect to the network and provide real-time data. At the moment this is our very first priority.

Besides that, Schneider Electric also offered us support on developing and producing better technical solutions for the eHive. Consequently, in the background we are beginning to work on enlarging the network and think about how to benefit from the offered possibilities.

Furthermore, we initiated a partnership with the LMU Munich, who will take over the duties of the University of Würzburg. This includes the creation of teaching materials and the scientific monitoring of didactics-related tasks. There will also be possibilities for final theses using our data. We would like to thank Dr. Monika Aufleger from the Institute of Biology Education.

We also want to thank the Umweltstation Würzburg, the conversation agency of Würzburg. Since the very beginning of our project, they supported us with knowhow and tools regarding beekeeping. Besides, two of our eHives are located on their site.

School seminar

The BeeBIT project emerged from a so called “Projekt-Seminar” at the Deutschhaus-Gymnasium more than two years ago. This autumn another seminar started which is thematically related. Its purpose is to support and enlarge our team. Until next spring their most talented programmers are working on a multilingual administration system for education materials. Additionally, the group produces a corporate video about the project featuring a 3d-model of the eHive and its important parts.

(cw, ds, cb, jh) 2015-11-28