Not so long ago, blockchain was primarily associated with crime and high energy consumption. But that doesn’t have to be the case, and the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences and the Utrecht University of Applied Sciences have also recognized this. They will continue in the next school year her two blockchain-focused courses.
Dutch universities of applied sciences are positive about the blockchain
Dat, publisher Noordhoff writes in a blog article. The editor spoke to Pieter Leek, lecturer and minor blockchain coordinator at the Hogeschool van Amsterdam (HvA), Bernhard van der Biessen from the Hogeschool van Utrecht, and Maarten de Borst, co-author of the book Building digital trust. .
“There’s a lot behind blockchain, and it’s spawning surprising projects,” says Leek. This is how students learn how to deal with budgets, because every transaction costs money. There is also a strong emphasis on privacy and ethics. Because every transaction is public, participants need to think about what to include on the blockchain and what not. The legal aspects are not neglected either.
HvA students are currently working on a system for linking festival tokens to the blockchain. The coins are purchased via an app. Some projects are so well set up that other students will continue them for the next six months, for example with a blockchain that can trace Wolle back to its origins. Each individual project lasts half a year.
Practical cryptotechnology projects in the real world
Hogeschool Utrecht (HU) takes a slightly different approach. Here, the projects of the minor are still of a practice-oriented nature, for which the university of applied sciences works together with companies such as Rabobank or Quantoz.
For example, there was a collaboration with Rijkswaterstaat on an identification system for materials. The nature of the customers immediately shows how important crypto and blockchain are today. The “surge of crime and high energy consumption” is unjustified, says van der Biessen.
Maarten de Borst is co-author of the book Digital Trust, which teachers can order free of charge. The authors also work with school environments. The contributions of the teachers will be considered in a next edition. The blockchain industry is evolving rapidly, so even as the authors wrote, there was a risk that some information would be out of date.