Service packages procured by the Ministry of Education and Culture for higher education institutions

The Ministry of Education and Culture has made an agreement with CSC on supplying service packages for educational, scientific, cultural and administrative needs.

These services support the operational preconditions of Finnish research and the structural development of higher education institutions. In addition, cooperation and IT system interoperability are promoted in education, science and culture. The interoperable solutions can be used by all higher education institutions. Under this agreement, services for researchers are for the most part free to their users.

Service packages purchased purchased from CSC in 2017 (in Finnish)

The Ministry is purchasing the following service packages for higher education institutions:

• Higher education and research information network Funet
• Information management and architecture services for higher education institutions
• Analytics and data infrastructure services for the Ministry of Education and Culture
• National data infrastructure services for science and culture
• Scientific computation services for higher education institutions
  
  Funet network services provide all Finnish higher education institutions with uncongested and reliable data connections in both Finland and internationally as well as network services that support research and education. The Department of Science and Education will pay at least half of this network's costs on a centralised basis. The rest of the costs will be covered by funding obtained from higher education institutions and other member organisations. The information management and ICT steering group of higher education institutions steers the Funet, information management and architecture services
  
  Information management and architecture services for higher education institutions maintain and manage an overall view of higher education ICT services, the reference architectures for studying, teaching and research support and administration, the information model for higher education institutions and other separately agreed shared architectural descriptions and definitions of interoperability.
  
  The Ministry of Education and Culture's data infrastructure services disseminate information from higher education institutions and research institutes to the authorities as well as produce reports on the state of Finnish higher education institutions and research for the needs of the Ministry. Another aim is to streamline communication over organisational boundaries on the basis of data reserves as well as promote the use of information about higher education institutions and monitor its impact.
  
  The services of the national information infrastructure for science and culture include expert consulting under the Ministry of Education and Culture's Open Science and Research Initiative (ATT) as well as development, implementation and infrastructure services. Projects that have been granted separate funding are monitored through an annual agreement structure. The service architecture development, policies and the use of resources and services are guided with the steering structures of the ATT and National Digital Library (KDK). The content of the work is guided by the ATT steering structure, particularly its working committee. The long-term preservation service for research data related to the ATT services is also developed as part of this service area.
  
  Scientific computing services for higher education institutions comprise the maintenance of a high-performance computing environment developed for research needs as well as expert services related to computing applications and methods in order to take full advantage of the environment. The service package bolsters the preconditions for high-quality scientific research in Finland. The operations and development of the services utilise end-to-end architecture-based design carried out with higher education institutions. The Computational Science Forum monitors the content and development of the services.
  
  The content of the service packages and their objectives are set in sections 3.1-3.5 of the agreement.
  
  Research and Higher Education institutions ICT steering structures include steering groups, specialist network and collaboration forums, that  are shown here.