Today, I’ll be at Trinity College in Dublin for the Irish Finals of Imagine Cup 2009.

From Liam Cronin, Microsoft Ireland Academic Engagement Manager:

Twelve teams, whittled down from 550, will go head to head next Thursday, 30^th of April, to see who will represent Ireland at the global finals of Microsoft’s Imagine Cup in Egypt this summer.   The finals will take place from 9am in the Science Gallery at Trinity College Dublin and the top three teams in the Irish finals will be announced at 1pm. Following this they will present their projects to an open audience – after which the winning team who will compete in Egypt will be announced. The 12 finalist teams are as follows:=

1. Dundalk IT – Team Mob- Racism, bigotry and Prejudice educational game / web-site.

2. Griffith College – FRoute- Offline route planner / traffic management system.

3. IADT Dunlaoighaire – ECO Stroll –Social networking site, to promote healthy forms of transport, such as walking or cycling.

4. IADT Dunlaoighaire – HealthText – Provide simple medical information to parents and children via mobile phones.

5. IT Carlow – Infinite Loop – A game to educate people on the environmental impacts of expanding cities.

6. IT Carlow – Neurosynergy –  A neuroscientifically innovative brain fitness (IQ-EQ) game to enhance intellectual ('IQ') and emotional ('EQ') performance. 

7. IT Sligo – Amazed – A game to address the learning needs of young children through building and problem solving.

8. IT Sligo – Mediknight - Allow experienced medical professionals in the developed world to link to medical staff working in under-developed regions.

9. Limerick IT – 357 /// Games - Multi-faceted, multi-platform educational-gaming framework.

10. NUI Galway – Health4U - Provide control of malnutrition and under-nourishment functions in a restaurant to help eating habits.

11. NUI Maynooth – Engine Media - internal school network which connects to schools worldwide. 

12. Trinity College – Trinity Sight – Designing and building a simulator for Eye Surgical Training.

Before the announcement of the winning Irish Imagine cup team going to Cairo, a “Dragons Den” style event will take place with four of the candidates from last year’s Imagine Cup. After the Irish Imagine cup 2008 finals, the judges picked these 4 teams as they felt their ideas had commercial potential. The teams are from Sligo IT, Dundalk IT, NUI Maynooth and Carlow IT. The teams have attended training sessions in Microsoft Ireland, to help build out their business plan and will present next Thursday to 4 Business angels Kevin Dillon Atlantic Bridge Ventures, Tony Kilduff CMYpitch, Mick Fealty Slugger O’ Toole and Aaron Jackson Lightwell Ltd to see advise and funding to commercialise their solution.

Wish them all luck. Winners will be up tomorrow.

If you haven’t visited before, be sure to check out the Microsoft Student Experience website. A terrific source for videos,tutorials, templates and blogs.

You can also check out Microsoft Student TV and participate in global discussions that effect students from around the world

About MicrosoftStudent.tv

It's a web video series that seeks to ignite a global dialogue that:
1. Connects students worldwide
2. Inspires social responsibility
3. Drives success at school and beyond graduation

Thanks to Alfred Thompson-The Computer Science Teacher and his blog for making me aware of this.

I know-I know. I’ve have been unbelievably lax in getting these pictures onto the site. I’ve uploaded all of the pictures from the European Innovative Teachers Forum (ITF) in Vienna and put them in a new album called European ITF-Vienna. I thought I should pick out a few for the blog itself.

David accepting his 2nd Place for Content from James Bernard, Microsoft Worldwide Partners in Learning Director

Here are a few more of Navanna and Rose

Have you heard about DreamSpark? If not, it’s time to find out about what the buzz is about. In the past, DreamSpark was only available to 3rd level institutions, but it’s now available to all Students.

What does DreamSpark include?

What is it?

From the Dreamspark website FAQs: