The Paradigm Shift: From Rules to Models in Natural Language Processing
International Summer School
Alicante, Spain, 15, 16 and 17 June 2026
https://summer-school.gplsi.es
Second Call for Participation
Natural Language Processing (NLP) has witnessed a clear paradigm shift: the transition from rule-based approaches to data-driven language models. While rule-based approaches dominated NLP for many years, during the 1990s and early 2000s they gradually gave way to statistical and machine-learning methods. It would be fair to say that data-driven models--and, most prominently, Deep Learning (DL), including more recently Large Language Models (LLMs)--have taken the world by storm. Deep Learning models are now used almost everywhere, across nearly every discipline, and Natural Language Processing is no exception. DL has proved highly promising so far, delivering improvements for almost every NLP task and application. However, as observed on numerous occasions, the outputs of DL models are not always ideal, with some studies reporting cases in which machine-learning approaches do not necessarily outperform the 'old-fashioned' rule-based ones.
The overarching theme of the summer school will be this paradigm shift, with lectures and practical sessions reflecting the latest trends at both theoretical and practical levels. More specifically, the programme will combine lectures focusing on theoretical foundations with hands-on practical sessions.
Specific topics will include an Introduction to Large Language Models (LLMs), Explainable AI in LLMs, Datasets and bias in LLMs, Building foundational LLMs for low-resource languages, Machine Translation for Low-Resource Languages, LLMs and sentiment analysis, Model and hyperparameter optimisation and Eye-tracking and gaze data for NLP and language models, among others.
The summer school will be ideal for both newcomers and experienced professionals in NLP, computer science, data science, cybersecurity, corpus linguistics, language technologies, and related disciplines, offering a unique opportunity to deepen expertise and engage with the rapidly evolving world of LLMs.
Panel discussion
A panel discussion on the future of NLP methods and LLMs is scheduled as part of the summer school. The panel composition is available here: https://summer-school.gplsi.es/panel/
Venue and dates
The summer school will take place at the research institute of Informatics of the University of Alicante and will take place on 15, 16 and 17 June 2026.
Keynote speaker
Roberto Navigli (Sapienza University of Rome)
Lecturers
The list of summer school lecturers includes:
Tharindu Ranasinghe (Lancaster University)
Salima Lamsiyah (University of Luxembourg)
Cengiz Acartürk (Jagiellonian University)
Hansi Hettiarachchi (Lancaster University)
Juan Pablo Consuegra Ayala (University of Alicante)
Robiert Sepulveda Torres (University of Alicante)
Alicia Picazo Izquierdo (University of Alicante)
Isuri Anuradha (Lancaster University)
Damith Premasiri (Lancaster University)
Ernesto Luis Estevanell (University of Alicante)
Maram Alharbi (Lancaster University)
Summer school Directors
Tharindu Ranasinghe (University of Lancaster)
Salima Lamsiyah (University of Luxembourg)
Summer School Chair
Ruslan Mitkov (University of Alicante)
Advisory Committee
Manuel Palomar Sanz (University of Alicante)
Rafael Muñoz Guillena (University of Alicante)
Andrés Montoyo Guijarro (University of Alicante)
Organising Committee
Raúl García Cerdá (University of Alicante)
Alicia Picazo Izquierdo (University of Alicante)
Ernesto Luis Estevanell (University of Alicante)
Maram Alharbi (Lancaster University)
Registration
Registration will open in early April 2026. In the meantime, please see the registration fees here: https://summer-school.gplsi.es/registration/
Related events
The summer school will follow the second international conference _Natural Language Processing and Artificial Intelligence_ (NLPAICS'2026) which will take place in Alicante on 11 and 12 June 2026 (https://nlpaics2026.gplsi.es). Those who register for both events will benefit from a discounted registration fee.
Further information
Further information will be provided in subsequent calls. Alternatively, interested parties can email summer-school@dlsi.ua.es for more information.