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As Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues transforming workplaces globally, particularly within the Information Technology (IT) industry, understanding its impact on IT professionals and computing curricula is crucial. This research builds on joint work from two countries, addressing concerns about AI's increasing influence in IT sector workplaces and its implications for tertiary education. The study focuses on AI technologies such as generative AI (GenAI) and large language models (LLMs). It examines how they are perceived and adopted and their effects on workplace dynamics, task allocation, and human-system interaction.

IT professionals, noted as early adopters of AI, offer valuable insights into the interplay between AI and work engagement, highlighting the significant competencies required for digital workplaces. This study employs a dual-method approach, combining a systematic and multi-vocal literature review and qualitative research methods. These included a thematic analysis of a set of 47 interviews conducted between March and May of 2024 with IT professionals in two countries (New Zealand and Sweden). The research aimed to understand the implications for computing students, education curricula, and the assessment of emerging professional competencies.

The literature review found insufficient evidence addressing comprehensive AI practice methodologies, highlighting the need to both develop and regulate professional competencies for effective AI integration. Key interview findings revealed diverse levels of GenAI adoption, ranging from individual experimentation to institutional integration. Participants generally expressed positive attitudes toward the technology and were actively pursuing self-learning despite some concerns. The themes emerging from the interviews included AI's role in augmenting human tasks, privacy and security concerns, productivity enhancements, legal and ethical challenges, and the evolving need for new competencies in the workplace.

The study underscores the critical role of competency frameworks in guiding professional development and ensuring preparedness for an AI-driven environment. Additionally, it highlights the need for educational institutions to adapt curricula to address these emerging demands effectively.

In the EDU-AI project (Adapting Computing Education for an AI-Driven Future: Empirical Insights and Guidelines for Integrating Generative AI into Curriculum and Practice), we investigate the application of generative AI by IT professionals, how students view this technology in higher education, as well as faculty adaptation and changing teaching strategies due to generative AI. This presentation will be based on a report from the EDU-AI project where we summarize ongoing research and discuss findings, related to higher education teaching and learning. These findings include adoption patterns with generative AI, generative AI advantages (such as increased productivity, enhanced learning, and innovative problem-solving), challenges with generative AI (such as ethical considerations, data biases, and potential misuse), and possible AI competence requirements in future labor market.

This research-to-practice full paper discusses students' views on the role of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in their learning. The rapid integration of GenAI in educational settings has prompted significant interest in its implications for learning and academic integrity. This study investigates the adoption and impact of GenAI tools among computing students at a university, focusing on how they are utilized for educational purposes and their ethical implications. Semi-structured interviews with nine computing students were used to examine GenAI's specific use and timing. Additionally, it explores students' perceptions of the trustworthiness of GenAI outputs and identifies the students' ethical boundaries concerning its use in academic work. The findings reveal that while GenAI tools might enhance learning efficiency and provide substantial educational support, they raise significant ethical concerns, particularly regarding academic misconduct. The study highlights the need for educational strategies to navigate the challenges posed by GenAI technologies. Finally, three recommendations for computing education are outlined. This research contributes to the ongoing discourse on GenAI in education by describing the student's reflections on GenAI.

This full paper addresses the concept of meta-narrative in computing and engineering education: the presence of an overarching meta-narrative which provides a sense of integration and some degree of connection and coherence to the elements under study. This meta-narrative should firstly provide a mechanism for discussing the fundamental entities under consideration, as well as the relationships between these and other, derived, concepts. Secondly, it should indicate what counts as valid knowledge, as well as legitimate ways of arriving at such knowledge. Thirdly, it should indicate how and where the concept of value arises in the content and practice of the subject. The meta-narrative should therefore provide a vehicle which encompasses the subject ontology, its epistemology and methodology, and its axiology (i.e., its ethics and aesthetics). In other words, the meta-narrative should provide a philosophy of that subject.

This Research-to-Practice WIP paper investigates how East Asian students studying in Sweden encounter various challenges. We discuss the discrepancy between our and previous findings and give recommendations. Background: Moving to and studying in a new country that is culturally different from their home country presents many challenges related to cultural differences to students. Intended outcomes: This research aims to offer insights into how East Asian students adapt their learning strategies in Sweden and suggest how the university can support their lives and studies. Research design: Six students were interviewed about their experiences studying in Sweden compared to studying at their home universities. Content analysis was performed to identify areas of interest. Findings: We report initial findings specifically related to academic and sociocultural issues.

This invited workshop aims to encourage the participants to do qualitative (or, with another term, non-positivistic) research in STEM Education. The workshop discusses different types of research, how they differ in nature and how various ways of doing research can give results of different natures. Particularly, the workshop will discuss qualitative research, which often is based on data in the form of words, for example collected through interviews or from the participants' own stories. The different stages of a qualitative research project (to collect data, to analyze it (or understand it), and to publish) will be discussed. During most of the workshop, the participants will work practically with data. After the workshop the participants will be capable of seeing the relevance of qualitative research projects and initialize their own projects. Some preparations are recommended before the workshop.

Computerisation and digitalisation are shaping the world in fundamental and unpredictable ways, which highlights the importance of computing education research (CER). As part of understanding the roots of CER, it is crucial to investigate the evolution of CER as a research discipline. In this paper we present a case study of a Finnish CER conference called Koli Calling, which was launched in 2001, and which has become a central publication venue of CER. We use data from 2001 to 2020, and investigate the evolution of Koli Calling's scholarly communities and zoom in on it's publication habits and internalisation process. We explore the narrative of the development and scholarly agenda behind changes in the conference submission categories from the perspective of some of the conference chairs over the years. We then take a qualitative perspective, analysing the conference publications based on a comprehensive bibliometric analysis. The outcomes include classification of important research clusters of authors in the community of conference contributors. Interestingly, we find traces of important events in the historical development of CER. In particular, we find clusters emerging from specific research capacity building initiatives and we can trace how these connect research spanning the world CER community from Finland to Sweden and then further to the USA, Australia and New Zealand. This paper makes a strategic contribution to the evolution of CER as a research discipline, from the perspective of one central event and publication venue, providing a broad perspective on the role of the conference in connecting research clusters and establishing an international research community. This work contributes insights to researchers in one specific CER community and how they shape the future of computing education