30.07.2014

PRESS RELEASE – Kosovo’s Young Coders Compete in the “Festival of Code”

“Anyone can learn how to program, all you need is work and dedication” stated the 10 year old Lum Axhemi, who together with his other nine peers will represent Kosovo for the first time in the international competition of coding and programming “Festival of Code 2014”, which this year will be held in Great Britain.

Prishtinë, July 30 —Ten children from Kosovo aged between 9-15 years old, who are part of the “Young Coders” group, will participate in the international competition the “Festival of Code 2014” which will be held from July 29th until August the 3rd in Great Britain. The “Festival of Code” is part of the global initiative “Young Rewired State” which is a children’s network under 18 years old, who have programming skills.

Throughout the whole week, the children according to their imagination will have the opportunity to code and program games, mobile applications, webpages, or other hardware products.

The “Young Coders” project was initiated from the Kosovo Association of Information and Communication Technology (STIKK), in cooperation with the Innovation Centre Kosovo (ICK). The project was sponsored from ’Enhancing Youth Employment EYE, financed from Swiss Office for Development and Cooperation SDC, implemented from Helvetas Swiss Intercooperation HSI and Management Development Associates MDA and supported by “IPKO Foundation”, “Frutomania”, “Proper Pizza” and “City Bakery”.

The official ceremony of the team from Kosovo entering this competition was organized at the Innovation Centre Kosovo (ICK). Mjellma Hapçiu – Alijaj, host of the event, emphasized that in this particular day, a 4 month journey of training the children ended and a new one started for the children of Kosovo who are willing to expand their knowledge of programming. “We are very happy that all children who have been part of the training phase, did not give up, and are ready to compete as of today with their peers from Europe and the United States,” said Mrs. Hapçiu – Alijaj.

The executive director of the Kosovo Association of Information and Communication (STIKK), Vjollca Çavolli said that she was very proud with the children. “These children give us hope and optimism for the future of our country” said Mrs. Çavolli, adding that the children should not take this challenge too hard, but consider it as a game. “This week you will play, have fun and show the world that Kosovo as well has talented people that belong to this field” ended Mrs. Çavolli.

The director of the Innovation Centre, Mr.Uranik Begu said that they are very pleased with the performance of the children’s group and their cooperation with STIKK. “We have been expecting this collaboration with great pleasure, knowing that this is the first generation of young coders, and that professionals in the field of ICT, should start coding at a very young age,” said Mr. Begu. “This is the beginning of a long-term collaboration that will create new generations of young coders, and why not lobby for coding to be introduced as a subject in primary schools, similar as in many developed countries,” he concluded.

The children’s group during this competition, same as in the training phase, will be led by Mr. Driton Haxhiu (Expert in Programming), which will have the support of the other mentors / students: Doruntina Sadiku, Enkela Osmani and Fitore Salihu. Mr. Haxhiu said that the children have been very patient and active throughout this 4 month period. “It will be a very busy week, so I believe that the children will have the same commitment, so that we can end up with good results in this competition,” stressed Mr. Haxhiu.

The young coders who will represent Kosovo in this competition are: Doruntina Hoti (12), Enkelena Haxhiu (15), Jozef Komani (14), Erina Gashi (12), Lekë Hapçiu (14), Gentiana Hajdari (12), Leonard Ibrahimi (12), Gresa Isufi (14), Lorenc Ramadani (15) and Lum Axhemi (12).

All participating countries in the “Festival of Code” will present their final projects on Sunday, August 3, 2014, when the winners will be announced.

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25.07.2014

GIZ donates to STIKK

On Wednesday July 23rd, four pin boards arrived at STIKK from Frankfurt, which were a donation on behalf of GIZ.

This donation was more than welcome for the Kosovo Association of Information and Communication Technology,and is regarded as a major contribution that will facilitate the work of the association.

On the occasion of presenting this donation, the project team leader of GIZ for Kosovo, Mrs. Veronika Hofinger, congratulated STIKK for their work to date and emphasized that there is already a genuine German-Kosovar cooperation established in this sector, and that GIZ will continue to support STIKK in the future.

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25.07.2014

The thirty sixth STIKK board meeting held

On July 24th, 2014 the STIKK board held its thirty sixth meeting. The meeting was attended by 6 out of 9 members of the board.

These are the agenda items that were discussed during the meeting:

1. The discussion and approval of the minutes of the thirty-fifth meeting (regular) held on May 14, 2014.
2. The discussion and approval of the STIKK quarterly report.
3. Reporting on changes at ICK.
4.The new concept for the Training Academy.
5. The working visit in Germany from 6-10 October, 2014.

The decisions made during this meeting were:

1. The approval of the agenda.
2. The Minutes of the thirty-fifth meeting of the STIKK Board were unanimously approved.
3. The STIKK quarterly report has been approved.
4. It was decided that there will be changes made to the new concept of the STIKK Training Academy. Following these changes the document will be sent to the board members, who will provide their formal approval electronically.
5. The decision on the participation in the working visit to Austria and Germany of the two board members Mr. Brestovci and Mr. Sahiti was unanimously approved.

Following four hours of discussion the meeting was concluded by the chairman of the board Mr. Shkumbin Brestovci.

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18.07.2014

Human Resource Management Training

From 30th of June till the 4th of July, STIKK organized a Human Resource Management training for all to 4th students and STIKK company members.

The training covered the following topics:

– Operational and strategic role of human resources,
– Process of manpower planning,
– Recruitment and selection of staff,
– Analysis Need for Training and Stages, and
– Procedures for disciplinary action.

During the training the participants had the opportunity to discuss real life examples and see how the learned concepts can be used accordingly. At the end of training after successfully completing their exams all participants received a certificate of participation. The training was attended by six participants and was lectured by Mr. Nazmi Zeqiri.

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18.07.2014

Marketing & Promotion Training provided practical examples for application of learned knowledge

Starting from 9th – 13th of June 2014, STIKK Training Academy organized a 5 day training course in Marketing and Promotion lectured by Mr. Valon Canhasi. This training was intended for all ICT students and STIKK members companies.

The training provided the participants with knowledge on:

– The process of Marketing,
– Analysis of the Marketing situation,
– Methods of obtaining information,
– Market Analysis and product segmentation,
– Marketing Strategy and Price and distribution planning.

On the last day of the training, participants were subject to examination and received a certificate of participation.

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17.07.2014

Training for “Business Games”, part of MFS II project

On the dates 23-26 June, 2014 the “Business Game” training was held in Mitrovica with all the partners of MFS II project in Kosovo. While on the training, Mr. Dieter Kohn elaborated and led Business Games with three modules: 1,2,3 and then all the participants of the training were obligated to lead the modules in order to get ready and to be able to lead such trainings to other students/startups that want to start their own businesses. Later on every participant presented the modules of the Business Game and received feedback in the ways of improving their presenting skills.

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17.07.2014

Advocacy and Lobbying training in Skopje

On June 30th – 2nd July, 2 STIKK representatives took part at the training on Advocacy and Lobbying which took place in Skopje, Macedonia. The training on Advocacy and Lobbying was very refreshing and very proactive. The training was based on personal experience and case studies which was very helpful because it included a lot of practical work and it provided all the necessary steps and information to start an advocacy and lobbying plan for any kind of organization/company.

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14.07.2014

STIKK enables discussion regarding the skills gap in ICT in a roundtable between businesses and universities

As a follow-up to the job fair, on 05/28/2014, STIKK organized a round table in which representatives from private sector and universities had the opportunity to discuss about the skills gap and ways to overcome this problem.

The meeting which was held in the offices of the Innovation Centre Kosovo (ICK), was opened by ms. Vjollca Cavolli who thanked the participants for their contribution in organizing the 2014 Job Fair. As an introduction to the discussion session the participants were presented with the statistics from the Job fair by ms. Lorika Tahiri, whereas Mr. Valon Canhasi presented the “ICT Skills Gap Analysis”.

The private sector had the opportunity to express their concerns regarding the absence of a certain set of skills encountered with the students, which makes the hiring process more difficult. Both parties: the businesses and the universities agreed that a more intense cooperation needs to be developed in order to ensure the development of a certain set of skills in order to overcome these impediments.

STIKK promised to continue the organization of similar meetings in order to facilitate a platform for the business community as well as the academia.

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11.07.2014

National Day of Information and Communication Technology

This year, for the sixth time in a row the ICT companies from Albanian territories met for the Nationwide Traditional ICT Day on 7/10/2014 at Prevallë. Over 40 representatives of the ICT sector including companies from Kosovo and Albania met with the goal of identifying the cooperation modalities, strengthening and creation of a nationwide professional network in the field of ICT.

Mr. Shkumbin Brestovci, Chairman of STIKK Board, as the host of the event welcomed the participants to the event. The audience had an opportunity to listen to the presentation of Kosovo IT Barometer by Mr. Bardh Kadiu, STIKK Program Coordinator and the Albana IT Barometer presented by Mr. Romeo Sharko, AITA Board member.

Following the presentations the participants had an opportunity to contribute to the open discussion regarding the difficulties occurred in terms of cooperation between the two countries. The companies continued to exchange their experience and their knowledge during the cocktail with was also planned as a networking event.

The attending companies highly evaluated the need to further continue the cooperation in order to overcome the identified barriers and creation of a more favorable environment for doing business.

This day was concluded with the visit to the Prizren League.

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03.07.2014

STIKK took part in the Triple Helix Workshops (Researchers, Donors & Business Community)

On 26 and 27 June, STIKK was part of the workshops organized by OECD / EC for the implementation of the Triple Helix project that aims to increase the cooperation between the Government-Academy-Industry for the enhancement of innovation and application of R & D in Kosovo.

In the first workshop, it was more discussed around engaging researchers and academia for research and development as well as a better cooperation between academia and private industry. In the second workshop, the donors had the opportunity to show their projects in improving education, developing research, providing assistance for local companies etc.. The last workshop was a focused group of Kosovar businesses interested in helping to implement the Triple Helix in Kosovo, where the government and academia would have a more proactive approach to the needs of business. Part of this workshop were Sharrcem, Mamidoil, ProCredit Bank etc., while AdaptivIT was the only company that represented the ICT sector.

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