D4.2: Final PRACE Training Report
Creators: name: Leiponen, Tiina
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2019
Subjects: Deliverable
HPC
Research infrastructure
PTC
PATC
MOOC
Training

description: PRACE Training Work Package (WP4) of the PRACE Fifth Implementation Phase (PRACE-5IP) project is responsible for the training activities of PRACE. WP4 delivers an annually evaluated, extensive offering of face-to-face training from PRACE Training Centres (PTCs); on-demand training events; online training courses such as the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs); the training code repository (CodeVault) and the PRACE training portal itself. This deliverable is the final report of all the PRACE-5IP training activities during the project.<br> During the PRACE-5IP project, the six PRACE Advanced Training Centres were complemented by four PRACE Training Centres to the network, which have collectively been re-branded as a network of 10 PRACE Training Centres (PTCs). Together, the PTCs delivered 217 courses, 581 course-days with 5,221 participants. Overwhelmingly positive feedback was received from the participants. The jointly coordinated annual PTC programmes have seen new courses being introduced to the PTC programme on emerging fields such as Deep Learning and forward-looking workshops on future HPC technologies and Energy Efficiency. The PTCs have also devised the 2019-2020 programme, to be implemented in the next project, which includes new initiatives such as online PTC courses to complement the MOOCs and the continuation of collaboration with other parties.<br> All six PRACE Seasonal Schools in PRACE-5IP were selected via a formal selection process and organised as: the Autumn School 2017 in Gdańsk, Poland; the Spring Seasonal School 2018 in Bratislava, Slovak Republic; the Autumn School 2018 in Ljubljana Slovenia; the Winter School in Sofia, Bulgaria; the Winter School 2019 in Leuven, Belgium and Spring School in Stockholm, Sweden. The overall evaluation for the Seasonal Schools have been positive.<br> WP4 has continued the collaboration with the Centres of Excellence (CoEs) through jointly organised on-demand events and collaboration workshops. In October 2018 PRACE, EXDCI, CoEs, and FET projects jointly organised a collaboration workshop in Bruehl, Germany, during which the network of training coordinator contacts was formed, and the pursue towards common goal, collated HPC training offering in pan-European training portal, was established. The continuation of collaboration was further strengthened with FocusCoE project kick-off meeting in February 2019 in Frankfurt, Germany, where the mutual interest in deeper training offering and web portal development was addressed.<br> WP4 has co-organised the 2017 International Summer School on HPC Challenges in Computational Sciences in Boulder, Colorado, United States of America, from 25-30 June 2017. The 2018 International Summer School was held in Ostrava, Czech Republic 8-13 July 2018. In addition, PRACE organised three training workshops for student and other audiences during EHPCSW 2018 and planned five workshops for EHPCSW 2019.<br> All PRACE trainings are free of charge for both research and industry users. The success story of the PRACE training programmes hopefully continues and will continuously be further developed together with EuroHPC and other Research Infrastructure players, as well as CoEs to increase the accessibility and scope of HPC and future exascale computing community. This is possible with strong and continuous support and guidance from EC, both in philosophical and sufficient resource allocation level.