All research projects
possess, produce or provide an educational content. The upward
distillation of knowledge leads to wisdom; the filtering down of
knowledge leads to know-how. The vital function of a University is
indeed the development and discovery of knowledge through research, but
it can be stated without much argument that the most important duty of a
University is to make the spin-off from this knowledge immediately and
freely available to the community. The imparting or
transfer of
technical knowledge, initially as research-oriented information or, after proper processing, as
know-how, calls for expertise at different levels. The Middle East
Technical University Project Team is specially equipped for this task of continuing
education in both English and Turkish. The members of the
Project Team have impeccable research credentials and extensive experience over the years
in teaching students, practicing engineers, technical managers and building contractors possessing
differing backgrounds of competence and technical responsibility.
It
is suggested that the dissemination of research results from the present
project be conducted in the following formats:
-
Individual
lectures, seminars, short refresher courses and training workshops on
the latest methodologies and techniques for the seismic assessment and
rehabilitation of buildings
-
The
preparation of desktop-published course material explaining and
illustrating salient items of the Turkish and other contemporary
earthquake codes; structural behavior during earthquakes; damage
assessment for urban and rural structures; rehabilitation techniques
as developed from experimentation and research, etc.
-
Broadcasting
of systematized knowledge relating to the seismic amelioration of
structures and buildings of different types by means of compact discs,
video films, the Internet and television channels [if
possible].
It is expected that after some trial runs, the continuing education activities
could develop into formal programs leading to evaluation of student performance
and possible award of certificates of proficiency.
