First video calls as funded action
A unified open science workspace for coordinated action, shared credentials and joint deployment across the COST area on one health education via new technologies
Reading time: five to ten minutes tops.
Executive summary: the action now relies on a unified platform for collaboration, teaching material development, research coordination and communication. Nextcloud, BigBlueButton and Moodle form the core of this system, all governed under our open science principles. Each member has received a message to set their personal password. This one credential grants access to all components of the ecosystem. The meetings on the 9th and 12th of December at 10 AM CET Madrid time will introduce the roadmaps, explain the infrastructure and provide operational guidance for immediate engagement. Please, save both dates. These are key moments for ensuring alignment across the network. Kindly follow the credential link received earlier to activate access before attending.
Please, unsubscribe if not interested in this. You are welcome to share the meeting invitations with colleagues and anyone wishing to contribute to or become part of the wider EU BEACON action research network. This collective reentry point into the action strengthens participation, broadens expertise and reinforces our capacity to deliver open course ware and scientific outputs across the entire COST area. We take it from here anew, with more consortia formation and other funding activities, along with communication, dissemination and exploitation ones.
To introduce the action roadmaps and the new integrated systems, two online meetings will take place on the 9th and 12th of December at 10 AM CET Madrid time. These sessions will explain how coordination, research, pedagogic development and implementation will be structured across the network, and how the tools now available will support the scientific, educational and governance work expected from us. Joining at least one meeting is strongly recommended so that all participants can operate within the shared environment from the outset and engage in the collective tasks ahead. The action is now entering a period in which coordinated work, shared resources and common standards become essential for delivering the scientific and educational objectives set for the COST area. A unified digital environment has been deployed to support this collective endeavour, ensuring that every member can reach the same materials, collaborate transparently and contribute to the production of open course ware in a coherent and reliable manner. All members have already received an email enabling them to set their password and activate their single credential for the entire infrastructure:
https://nextcloud.health.int.eu.org/
Nextcloud provides an integrated workspace where storage, editing, scheduling and coordination operate in one place under our direct governance. It centralises documents, calendars, shared folders, templates, task boards and real time collaborative writing through Collabora. This removes dependence on external providers, ensures compliance with European data protection requirements and keeps all materials persistent and accessible to every member of the action. Workflows become clearer, since drafts, reviews, curricular materials and administrative documents remain organised, versioned and traceable. It strengthens governance by offering unified spaces for planning, role assignment and progress monitoring through calendars, Gantt structures and Kanban boards.
https://tele.health.int.eu.org/done/deal/
BigBlueButton adds a specialised communication layer focused on education and scientific collaboration. It delivers videoconferencing with breakout rooms, polls, shared notes, whiteboards, screen sharing and session recording stored in the same environment. Its integration with Nextcloud avoids platform fragmentation and keeps every meeting within our infrastructure.
In combination, both systems give the action a coherent digital backbone. They enable secure teamwork, standardised procedures, documented outputs and coordinated participation across the full geographic spread of the network, while maintaining full control over data, continuity and long term scientific and educational reliability. Both systems integrate cleanly with Moodle and other open source pedagogic platforms, allowing us to develop, test and deliver the open courseware the action must generate. Nextcloud supplies the shared authoring environment where curricula, lesson plans and evaluation instruments are drafted, while Moodle and related tools provide structured learning spaces for pilots, comparative evaluations and classroom deployment. BigBlueButton embeds directly into Moodle, enabling live teaching, workshops and demonstrations without leaving the platform. This coherence allows the action research network to build a unified educational pipeline where materials are conceived, refined, taught and assessed across countries in a consistent and reproducible manner.
All members are encouraged to sign in. Each participant must have now received an email enabling them to set their personal password. A single unified credential will serve for every component of the EU BEACON infrastructure, present and future. This approach reduces friction, avoids duplicate accounts and keeps the entire ecosystem more secure and easier to operate. For a European and COST area wide network committed to open science, it ensures transparent access, controlled governance and stable continuity. It raises our operational standard by aligning every tool with the same identity layer, strengthening collaboration, increasing reproducibility and preserving long term integrity across the full breadth of our shared work. Open science rests on transparency, accessibility and verifiability. It means that knowledge, methods and outputs are shared transparently, remaining available for scrutiny, reuse and improvement rather than confined to closed systems. This principle strengthens scientific reliability and accelerates progress, since results can be reproduced, compared and expanded by any qualified group. It also aligns with the ethical obligations of publicly funded work, ensuring that insights and tools generated through collective effort remain accessible to all stakeholders.
We rely on open source because it offers full control over the tools we use while allowing technical inspection, adaptation and long term preservation. These platforms do not lock us into corporate policies, shifting pricing structures or opaque data handling. They allow the network to maintain sovereignty over sensitive educational and scientific materials, scale the infrastructure as required and integrate components as needed. Beyond software, the same logic extends to our outputs in the form of open course ware. Teaching materials, curricula, evaluations and methodological guidelines become resources that others can adopt, adapt and improve, creating a cumulative effect.
All members are kindly requested to follow these standards and adopt the shared infrastructure as the central environment for organising work, developing documents, coordinating tasks, managing calendars and maintaining internal communication. It all will be further presented, and migration further facilitated, during the video calls and next posts. Using the same space ensures coherence, reduces fragmentation and allows every contribution to be visible, traceable and aligned with the action objectives. This unified approach strengthens our collective capacity, supports rigorous scientific and educational output and provides the stability required for effective collaboration across the entire network.
This model maximises impact because it transforms the action into a generator of shared capacity rather than a closed unit producing isolated deliverables. Once materials and tools are openly available, implementation across the COST area becomes easier, faster and more consistent. Collaborative refinement by educators, researchers and institutions leads to iterations that strengthen quality and relevance. Over time, this approach builds a living system where improvements continue beyond the duration of the mandate, expanding the reach of our work and deepening its influence across the educational and scientific landscape.
The action Nextcloud platform will be populated over the coming days with tasks, calendars, working group documents, templates and all materials required for coordinated work. By Sunday or Monday a further update will be posted in the media kit, including a new video and complementary resources, together with news on the media campaign and the announcement of the finalised new website. This will complete the initial communication layer and provide a clear entry point for all members to follow developments and participate in the shared activities.
I am wishing you all a wonderful weekend.