Education is a key to maintaining a high standard of living, especially in a country like Switzerland that does not have a large supply of natural resources. Through education citizens can acquire general knowledge, enhance their ability to make judgements, better understand everyday events and independently make decisions within society. Moreover, education is essential for ensuring companies’ innovativeness, continuity, success and ability to create added value. There is a constant interplay between these factors and the modernity and digitalization of our times. Amidst this digital transition, with machines performing more human tasks, we are increasingly faced with the question of what we can do to equip the Swiss workforce for the challenges of the 21st century. Finding an answer to this question requires a creative interdisciplinary dialogue between actors in the areas of education, research, innovation and economics.

The Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences and the board of digitale21 are committed to promoting an equitable dialogue between public and private stakeholders from areas such as science, education and economy and finding solutions together to ease the transition towards digitalization for the Swiss people. The main goal of our symposium is therefore to provide a platform for an exchange of knowledge, to develop recommendations and to establish cooperation and future projects that are relevant to society and science.

Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences