Research and Development Centres

Research and Development Centres:

Centre for Innovation in Education helps to overcome the challenges of fast-changing society and a largely traditional school system, which has become an obstacle for many countries. Under various terms - new educational paradigm, constructivist approach, inclusive learning, interesting school - lies an inspiring motif to find new ways and ideas to bring the schools to the 21st century.

Centre for Landscape and Culture aims at progressing landscape theory, problem-solving approaches and contributions to landscape and management and planning. The goal is to facilitate both the application of landscape research to practice, and the feedback from practice into research.

The Estonian Institute for Population Studies performs a role of a country leading unit in the field of demography. The mission of the Centre is to monitor, analyse and project the existing and emerging trends that shape the demographic foundation of a society. The Centre also contributes to the development of a national system of population and social statistics, in cooperation with the Statistics Estonia and other institutions.

Institute of Ecology concentrates on the study of the structural-functional organisation of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and their responses to changing environmental conditions. As a practical result, the data obtained in basic research is used to prognosticate the development of ecosystems, landscapes, communities and physiological changes in plants connected with natural processes, climate changes and human activities. 

The Institute of History, Archaeology and Art History carries out two large-scale research projects: “The Making of Livonia: Actors, Institutions and Networks in the Medieval and Early Modern Baltic Sea Region“ (IUT18-8, project leader Anu Mänd, duration 2014–2019) and “A Transnational Setting for Estonian History: Transcultural Entanglements, International Organisations and Transborder Migrations, 16th–21st Centuries“ (IUT31-6, project leader Karsten Brüggemann, duration 2015–2020). The staff also participates in several other research projects and in the TU Centre of Excellence in Intercultural Studies.

The Institute of International Social Studies (IISS) participates in numerous local and international research projects. Research fellows of IISS participate as experts in public discussion and as evaluators in policy planning.

Competence Centre:

Competence Centre in Health Promotion and Rehabilitation aims to further knowledge-intensive entrepreneurship in the fields of studying, developing and preserving local natural resources and the local population’s mobility and physical activity. Internationally recognized top specialists of health promotion and rehabilitation are involved in developing the centre. Different universities, companies and the public sector have participated in shaping the strategy and activities.

Development Centres:

BFM Production Centre provides students with state of the art facilities and equipment to concieve, develop, shoot and finalise film and TV productions in a professional environment. Our Production Centre is equipped with professional video, audio and post-production gear that allows students to create a wide range of film, TV and new media content.

Centre for Educational Technology investigates the development, adoption and use of technologies in several areas of society. Special focus is put on technologies in education (learning environments and technologies, digital competencies, game-based learning, location-based technologies for education), information environments and libraries (knowledge management, digital libraries and digital literacies), industry (ICT sector, healthcare, construction etc). In line with our research we focus on the human-computer or the human-information interface with a focus on ubiquitous, mobile, social and semantic technologies to improve user experience. Growing interest of our research centre is related with mathematics and didactics of mathematics.