In September, Filomena Parada, Auxiliary Researcher at CeiED, spent slightly over one week in Helsinki, at the EWE – Engaging Working Environment (see photo), at the Department of Education, Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Helsinki. The EWE is where most researchers (doctoral researchers and post-docs) from Minds Hub work. Minds Hub is the research group Professor Katariina Salmela-Aro (Full Professor, Department of Education, University of Helsinki) leads at the University of Helsinki. Among the main aims of the mobility was the strengthening and expansion of Filomena’s professional collaboration with Professor Katariina Salmela-Aro and her Research Group. Professor Salmela-Aro is a leading international scholar in the fields of motivation, productive development and wellbeing, critical life transitions, and related interventions. She is involved in several international networks and funded projects, and Minds Hub researchers have extensive expertise in data collection and analysis using digital technologies and complex modeling procedures. These fields and research approaches are closely aligned with Filomena’s interests and research priorities, which she had the opportunity to present during the mobility.

The Minds Hub Research Group is part of one of the Learning Research and Educational Psychology Research Community. The Research Group's focus is on examining students' school careers and development across compulsory comprehensive education to higher education and subsequent transition to working life by understanding how digitalization, diversity, inequality, and stress affect youth development. Their work is illustrative of the leading role the Faculty of Educational Sciences has in the research and teaching of educational sciences and teacher education. The research conducted at Minds Hub and by the members of the Learning Research and Educational Psychology Research Community is characterized by its multidisciplinary and wide-ranging pedagogical nature, and by a dynamic, inspiring, and international environment invested in promoting state-of-the-art research and teaching. This environment provided Filomena with ample opportunities for learning and the opportunity to strengthen or make new collaborations and contacts that will contribute to CeiED’s affirmation.