06.06.2016.
At the Award Ceremony of the World Cultural Council, which this year is organized by Riga Technical University (RTU), awards for remarkable contribution to human development will be awarded to a world-renowned particle physicist, researcher into string theory, Edward Witten and Kalevi Edvard Ekman, the founder of the concept of design factory. On receiving the awards, both scientists will deliver public lectures in Riga.
The Award Ceremony will be held on October 14, 2016, within celebration of 154th anniversary of RTU in Ziedonis Hall of the National Library of Latvia. The prizes are awarded on decision of the Interdisciplinary Committee of the World Cultural Council. This year RTU Rector academician has been elected as a member of the Committee as the only representative of Latvia.
Professor E. Witten will receive the Albert Einstein World Award for Science. He has conducted fundamental research, which has influenced our understanding of psychical processes. This outstanding work has been performed uniting the knowledge of mathematics and physics; it has opened a new area of research that transcends the disciplinary borders.
In turn, professor K. E. Ekmans will receive the José Vasconcelos World Award of Education. He is the founder of the Design Factory of Aalto University in Finland, as well as the founder and facilitator of a global network of design factories. At present, the network unites ten design factories in five continents. RTU Design Factory has also been established following the patterns of Aalto University Design Factory. The award will be granted to the professor as an acknowledgement for popularizing design factories as a learning methodology that has inspired academic personnel and thousands of students in the entire world to change the concept of higher education, facilitating student involvement in the study process, interdisciplinarity and business idea development.
Special awards will be also granted to nine facilitators of research and general development of RTU – Vice-Rector for Research professor Tālis Juhna, professors Elīna Gaile-Sarkane, Jānis Grundspeņķis, Oskars Krievs, Māris Turks, Jānis Krastiņš, Igors Tipāns, leading researcher Kaspars Kalniņš and the Head of RTU Design Factory Guntis Kuļikovskis.
The awards for remarkable achievements in culture, education and science have been granted since 1984. Each year the ceremony is held by a university or an academic institution in different countries. Previously Award Ceremonies were held at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Australian National University, University of Oxford, Princeton University and other universities.
The World Cultural Council was founded in Mexico in 1981. It is an international organization that aims to promote cultural values and goodwill, as well as to raise the role of philanthropy. Many outstanding scientists, artists and cultural professionals take part in the work of the Council, including a number of Nobel Prize laureates. The award was granted to such world-renowned scientists as Nobel Prize laureate in chemistry Frank Sherwood Rowland (1995), Ahmed Zewail (1999), Ada E. Yonath (2009), as well as the Nobel Prize laureate in medicine Sir Paul Nurse (2001).
Official web page of the event: wcc2016.rtu.lv.
