Montserrat Batet, researcher of the research group in K-riptography and Information Security for Open Networks (KISON), has been awarded the Dona TIC 2016 Award in the category of Academic/ Research. The prize is awarded by the Government of Catalonia’s Secretariat for Telecommunications, Cybersecurity and the Information Society, Tertúlia Digital and the Observatori Dona Empresa i Economia.
The Government of Catalonia awarded the Jaume Vicens Vives Award for quality university teaching to Montse Guitert, a professor from the UOC's Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, for her leadership in online education, specifically in the field of digital competencies in universities and the benefits felt by the public.
The UOC's mobile apps – Explica!, Assess and Submissions – received an honourable mention at the IMS Global Learning Impact Awards. The Learning Impact Awards recognize the most outstanding and influential learning technology applications from around the world. They were created in 2007 to showcase excellent technological applications that tackle the most important challenges in education on a worldwide scale.
In the category of academic promotion, the Golden Orange Awards, organized by the World Gastronomy Institute, acknowledged the work of the UNESCO Chair in Food, Culture and Development. The award recognizes the outreach work that the chair carries out in the field of food and gastronomic culture.
The Spanish Federation for Rare Diseases (FEDER) presented the UOC the Award for the Inclusion of People with Rare Diseases. FEDER highlights the UOC’s commitment to the social inclusion of people with disabilities and, specifically, the Disability Action Plan that it runs.
The UOC received the Special Professional Career Prize at the 15th Vodafone Journalism Awards organized by the Vodafone Spain Foundation. The award comes in recognition of the UOC's work as the first online university, designed from the start with an educational model that was 100% online. The jury praised in particular two of the most important areas of research and activity at the University: the information and knowledge society, and e‑learning.
The EHEA Bachelor's Degree in Tourism and the Master's Degree in Tourist Destination Strategy and Sustainable Management have been awarded this certificate for promoting sustainable development in tourism. TedQual is the only international teaching and training certificate awarded by the World Tourism Organization, a United Nations agency specialized in the field. The UOC is the first online university in the world to receive this certification.
The Spanish Red Cross awarded the UOC a Gold Medal, its highest distinction, in recognition of the work carried out in educating people in the values of integration, tolerance, peace and coexistence. In the fifteen years of collaboration between this humanitarian organization and the University, more than 9,000 students have studied on one of the 300 online training courses they have run jointly.
The Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT) approved the UOC’s adhesion to the Network of Scientific Culture and Innovation Units. The UOC thus becomes part of an initiative made up of universities, foundations and other organizations that share the common goal of improving and increasing training, culture and knowledge related to science in society.
The UOC's award-winning project is the Present@ tool, an interactive videoblog that makes it easy to upload and view large format video presentations. The IMS Global Learning Consortium has its headquarters in the US state of Florida and its members include large corporations and institutions such as IBM, Samsung, the University of Cambridge, the University of California, the Open University of Japan or Australia's Department of Education, among many others.
The UOC received a fem.talent - Promoció de la igualtat award for promoting equal opportunities for both men and women. The UOC received an honourable mention as an “Organization sharing fem.talent’s values”. The awards’ organizers highlighted four characteristics at the UOC: valuing and promoting female talent in high-ranking positions; developing a working organization that fosters initiatives to achieve objectives; increasing efficiency through work–life balance programmes and flexibility for training, cultural activities and personal responsibilities, and incorporating ICTs into the development of organizational systems.
Sílvia Sivera and Elisenda Estanyol, professors at the Faculty of Information and Communication Sciences, have been awarded the 6th Prat Gaballí Award in their respective fields of advertising and public relations. The prize is awarded by the Advertising and Public Relations Association of Catalonia.
The Faculty of Economics and Business have received PRME (Principles for Responsible Management Education) accreditation as a higher education institution and participant in the creation and development of guidelines in the framework of corporate social responsibility and sustainability.