From November 5th to 6th, delegations from the International Centre for Higher Education Innovation under the auspices of UNESCO (hereinafter "UNESCO-ICHEI") was invited to the 2024 Summit of Digital Education Council (hereinafter "DEC") in Singapore. This summit was held at the Singapore Management University, and representatives from over 20 countries in academia, international organisations, governments and the industries joined. The Summit focused on three key topics: "AI as a force for good: Strategies for long-term success", "Governance and sustainability: Ensuring responsible innovation", "Capturing future readiness: Empowering people for the future of work". Ms. BI Xiaohan, Deputy Director of UNESCO-ICHEI, and Ms. SU Rui, Chief of the Knowledge Production and Communications Centre, joined the summit. After the summit, DEC released it's latest brief on "30 Global Challenges in Higher Education and Skills Development", seeking collaboration from more stakeholders worldwide while informing more CIOs and CTOs of higher education institutions.

On November 5th, Architect and Lead Author of the EU Artificial Intelligence Act, Dr. Gabriele Mazzini, presented in the keynote session. Dr. Mazzini shared his insight into the EU Artificial Intelligence Act regarding permission rules and risk classification, value orientation, ethics, and ensuring a human-centric approach. He emphasized that higher education institutions need to understand the excellent capacity of AI and the risks HEIs may face when AI is introduced, called for a clear setting of expectations and understanding of how technology should be used.

Dr. Gabriele Mazzini

The President of DEC, Mr. Danny Bielik and the CEO of DEC, Mr. Alessandro Di Lullo announced the upcoming releases, including: 30 Global Challenges in Higher Education and Skills Development, Higher Education and the Future of Work Executive Brief, Micro-credentials and Skills Executive Brief. Representatives from Singapore Management University, National University of Singapore, University of California Berkeley(US), Bentley University(US), Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Aminty University (India) and more, shared practices and insights into "Trust-based to skills-based: Future-proofing employability and jobs" and more key concerns of higher education.

Mr. Denny Bielik

Mr. Alessandro Di Lullo

On November 6th, Ms. BI Xiaohan, Deputy Director of UNESCO-ICHEI, shared her insights and UNESCO-ICHEI's key initiatives around "Leveraging technologies to bridge the digital divide". As key representatives from the international organisation, Ms. BI's sharing emphasised the importance of South-South collaboration, South-North-South collaboration, and Academia-industry collaboration in mending digital gaps, and introduced how UNESCO-ICHEI strives to ensure proper and continuous upskilling and reskilling in digital competency in higher education through the flagship project ——IIOE Micro-certification Project for Higher Education Workforce Digital Competency Building. Ms. BI also emphasised that UNESCO-ICHEI adheres to the principles of ensuring the ethical use of AI, the human-centric application of AI technology in higher education governance, and the commitment to facilitate the realisation of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 4. After the Summit, attendees of the summit showed strong interest in joining research projects and initiating knowledge-sharing activities and identifying more opportunities with UNESCO-ICHEI.

Ms. BI Xiaohan sharing insighs in the roundtable

Ms. SU Rui (left) and Ms. BI Xiaohan (right)