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UUU Panel 2.2 – New professions and EU strategies

Berlin, Brussels, Bremen, 8 December 2020. The initiative United Universities of Europe organises panel debates on higher education and science policy. The 2nd of these debates examines “Vocations and Competencies in the Age of European Universities.”
In a first step, professionals, policy officers, coordinators of the newly formed European University Alliances (watch this conversation with them here) talk about their international, challenge-based, change-oriented work. A short intermission informs how UUU is poised to mirror and shadow the growth of these new structures, the European University Alliances (see here).
In part two, Peter van der Hijden, connoisseur of European science policy, points at the new professions being created in and around the Alliances and the re-skilling taking place in the universities, in their libraries, data management, admissions etc.. Eva-Maria Feichtner, Vice President for internationalisation at the University of Bremen, sees great chances in the university networks for academics and employers alike – creating a competitive international scientific education, as well as attractive career paths and staff journeys across the alliances. Her counterpart, Jörg Niehoff, policy officer at the European Commission, provides political context about role of higher education institutions in providing skills for the green and digital transformation, the EU transformation agenda for HEI, the experience from the Labour Market Relevance and Outcome partnerships and how all this translates into the context of the European University Alliances.

Guests:

Host:

  • Tino Brömme, ESNA European Higher Education News

TRANSCRIPT

     This is the second part of the United Universities of Europe panel discussion from Berlin. After the first half, we are now talking with Peter von der Hijden, our man in Brussels. Hello, Peter. We have been starting a conversation about the professions in the European University Alliance. When we noticed that they are structured like research projects in work packages with certain topical fields which reflect the tasks and the working fields and the professions in this alliances. Do you think that this University Alliances are creating a new group of staff, a new profession?

Peter van der Hijden Yes, I think so. Listening to the colleagues, the biggest change is the scope and extent, as Katrine said, and the speech. Now, what does it mean for the jobs? It is creating new jobs like directors, coordinators; the job of Tino, our kind host today, is a new job, you could say. But more exciting and more deeper for me is the transfer of the old jobs. And those old jobs are the people that I call the ‘gang of five hundred.’ And those are the five hundred Alliance task managers, and they do the real work of the Alliance. And those people have the job, they have a regular job in administration, education, research and innovation. They are, for example, programme directors, locally, they are responsible for the virtual campus, locally, they are responsible for H.R., for the library, they are researchers and teachers. But now all over sudden, they find themselves to collaborate in the Alliance task teams, and they are now building the course catalogue for the Alliance, what they used to do on their own. They are building the virtual campus for the Alliance, what they used to do on their own. They are working in H.R. on a tenure for the whole alliance. So you can move jobs between the institutions. They are working on open sience for their institution, but now in the task team for the entire Alliance. And this is a change for those professionals. It’s a kind of upgrading. It helps them to benchmarking to become better professionals. It also helps to integrate the members of the Alliance, to a certain extent, it’s a partial merger. But if you focus on the professional aspect, this is motivational, this motivates these people. They suddenly, and that’s the perspective that I want to give, when you work in an Alliance task team, for the library, for the H.R., for the student admission, you have a career perspective, locally, of course, but also in the Alliance. You may, at some point, shorter or longer term, go work in another institution as part of the Alliance. When the kids leave the house, you can go for one year to Finland or to Rome because you have a career in the Alliance, even hopping to other alliances, as we were just encouraged to do by the colleagues putting forward their vacancies. So for me, that is something motivating, and it changes the nature of your work. It makes you start dreaming, even if you never leave the place where you work. In YUFE, they call this the ‘staff journey.’ And I think it’s a good idea, Tino, that you put the ‘gang of 500’ in the limelight, next to our dear coordinators and Presidents, of course.

     Thank you, Peter, for this brief intervention.

And we come directly to Eva-Maria Feichtner, the vice president for international relations at the University of Bremen. Hello! I know you have to go at one o’clock, so we have to be quick with you. The interesting thing is, on one side, we have seen how the coordinators and the work package leaders and the project officers for the alliance are working. Now, we see your perspective as a Vice-President, responsible for the staff and for the management of the University Alliance. This keyword ‘staff journey,’ how does it relate to the jobs that these people have?

Eva-Maria Feichtner Well, let’s start from the idea of a ‘student journey,’ because I guess that’s more familiar to all of us. So we want students to move all over Europe, all over our different campi. And now our idea at YUFE was, it’s not only your studies, life is a journey, professional life is a journey. We’re convinced that if we want students to move around, the institutions can’t be solid. The people working at the institutions can’t be purely home based, they must have this experience themselves. So that’s what brought us to concentrating on this tough journey. So we are enabling our employees, enabling everybody working in the university environment, to go out, experience the building up of the European University, experience how their profession is carried out somewhere else, go and connect, go and meet with others and learn and develop.

We are thinking of that as a very physical thing. Right? We want people to go out on job shadowing projects and things like that. But we all know the pandemic has cut that short, pretty much brought it down to zero. And what we did, and I think that was pretty successful, is to quickly come up with training programmes, virtual training programmes that brought together people who otherwise wouldn’t have met in the same way. So as Peter pointed out, the librarian, the H.R. expert, they had the opportunity in a very low threshold way to meet, to connect. In a way, the pandemic has helped us to become more inclusive. I mean, just think for a moment, you just mentioned, well, the kids have left the house. They could go for a year somewhere. That’s the answer we get from many people whom we try to get moving here. They are saying, “no, I have three kids in school, what do you think? I’m not moving anywhere. And by the way, there’s a pile work”. And now I can go and tell them, “well, there’s a staff training tomorrow at two o’clock. It lasts for two hours. You can meet your colleagues in Finland, you can meet your colleagues in Spain. That’s your opportunity to experience Europe.” And people do. And people come back to us and say, “you know, that was great. And, you know, I’ll seriously think about going out now and taking up this burden of organising everything around, because I want to experience the real thing.” So we’re all waiting for the pandemic to be over to get back to a new normal that people can actually take up what they have started digitally now.

     We have time for one more question, Eva. We have been talking about ‘lifelong learning,’ these are people who leave university to become professionals, but maybe come back. How can the Alliances contribute to this?

Eva-Maria Feichtner  By offering lifelong learning to people in a more close-to-their job way than universities were doing that way back. So our dream is that our graduates go out and don’t forget YUFE, but come and visit every now and then, for professional development courses, for maybe taking up the role of a professional expert, advising our students, working together in challenge teams, or the like. So I think of professional development in its true sense lives from changing perspectives, in the same way we want researchers to take every now and then the position of a professional service staff member and vice versa. And we want people to go out from and come back to our Alliance. That’s what I think is the the truly enriching things we can work on.

     This is the old communist idea to send the intellectuals to the camps.

Eva-Maria Feichtner Well, that’s a peculiar way to think about it, but maybe yes, let’s dare to say yes.

     And why not? On the other side, the organisation bottom-up of the coordinators, who coordinate within the universities and between the members of the Alliance, is building up structure. It’s building up a creativity that hasn’t been there before. Well, Eva, I thank you so far.

     Let’s go over to Jörg Niehoff, who is a policy coordinator at the European Commission, and let’s apply a last different perspective on the question we have today. Because the European Commission is now taking the money and putting it into programmes to push forward certain developments. So Jörg, the Transformation Agenda, as it is called, of the European Commission, where is it going? What is the direction?

Jörg Niehoff  Yes, thank you to you and good morning to everyone. The Transformation Agenda is not yet there. So let me perhaps bring the context in here. Some of you might have seen that the Commission has published on the 30th September two communications that are relevant also for higher education institutions. Is the one on the European Education Area and the one on the European Research Area. And both put higher education institutions at the core of a transformation of the society. So what we want to do with the stakeholders, in particular the European universities and with the Member States, is to develop by the end of next year, a Transformation Agenda for higher education institutions. And that will not have the TGV speech that Nadine quoted before, perhaps rather long distance that a TGV can pass. And it is something that has to be co-created, co-designed with the stakeholders, with the policy makers at national level.

What we have identified in our communication, are four focus areas that we believe are important. The one is Connectivity among higher education institutions. That what we see also with European Universities, bring them in the context to work across borders on common challenges, but also connectivity with their local ecosystem, because that’s where you have societal impact, where you connect to the labour market, that is extremely important for us.

The second element is Inclusion. We want to have higher education institutions that are more open to a diverse student and research body. And, we had that before, also offer better opportunities for lifelong learning, which again makes it necessary to connect to the local ecosystem. Secondly, Digital and Green. I mean, if you look at all the big policies that we are currently driving, the green and digital transitions are at the core of these things. And I think Covid has made us much more aware of the need for digital transition. And there is also a dedicated communication on the Digital Education Action Plan. The green transition is equally important and there are again higher education institutions at the core of basically building the workforce and the skills and the competences that we need for the green transition. And that is something that I believe also European Universities can drive to a certain extent.

And the last one is Innovation in higher education, in education, in research, in driving transition. So what we expect to see by the end of next year, is somehow an alignment and agreement on what that Transformation Agenda should look like. What are the incentives that we need in terms of funding coming from different programmes, national, European, but also in terms of policy approaches that we need. And what we have learnt from other initiatives, like the HEInnovate initiative that supports the transformation of universities to become more entrepreneurial, more innovative, is that you need the bottom-up approach that we see here, but you also need some of the soft tools, self-reflection questionnaires that allow you to find a common direction where you want to go and the leadership that you need that drives that transition. So you need an understanding where to go, which is the direction, the leadership, and the commitment to drive that change. And today we look at European Universities, but I would really encourage all European universities to look at the other tools the DG EAC provides, be it labour market information experiences. I mean, a lot of the things that you are trying to drive, they also require that you have a better connectivity to the businesses to understand what are the requirements in terms of skills, transversal skills that you need for future jobs.

     HEInnovate instrument, how has it been adopted yet? How does it work?

Jörg Niehoff  It is something that has been going through a long, long way. It was designed together with the colleagues at the OECD at some point in time, and we have a number of building blocks. At the core, and that is accessible for all institutions, is the self reflection questionnaire that is also on the Internet that has been used by, I think, thirteen-hundred universities across Europe to drive their transition. I think more than twenty-thousand individuals have used that. So this is something that is not a benchmarking, but it is something that allows institutions with training programmes and etcetera to somehow position themselves: Where are we today in becoming or in being entrepreneureal innovative higher education institutions? And what are pathways for us to further improve on that? And of course, you can also use that in the context of European Universities. We have been contacted by some that want to use the tools as well.

The second is, that we are having, together with the OECD, country reviews, where countries approach us directly and say “listen, we want to have your support in analysing our system and showing pathways for development.” We are doing this, for example, currently with Slovenia, and we see that Slovenia is not only using this element ofhow to become more innovative with the educational system. At the same time they look also in labour market relevance of universities. So they are using two of our policies support mechanisms to have assistance in designing their master plan for higher education for the next years. And there we are closing a loop because, of course, the countries use our tools to find a way where they want to develop, that wwould inform the consultations for the Transformation Agenda, and so we somehow create a common directionality of where we go with the European system to make it overall more competitive and more powerful in terms of addressing the challenge that we have.

    Jörg, thank you so much. This was a very, very fast summary of the European policy supporting and instructing the European Universities. 

We can summarise that we have seen on one hand how inside the European University Alliances, the jobs, the positions, the professions of coordinators, project officers and work package leaders are creating a new network of professionals. We have also seen together with Eva-Maria Feichtner that the University management is trying to create interesting, attractive career paths so that the people who are steering and creating these University Alliances are well prepared and are learning all along the way. And also, we have seen the European Commission is supporting these efforts, is also pushing into a direction for creating new professionals that come out of the universities. So to help the universities develop their educational programmes and their research into a more European and more connected Europe. I want to thank all the participants for being today with us. I can only remind again of Dante, who said that we are here to acquire virtue and new knowledge. And that is what the European University Alliances are doing.

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Project News Video

UUU Panel 2 – Intermezzo: What is UUU?

Berlin, 8 December 2020. UUU director Tino Brömme, in an interview on the Crelle Market in Berlin-Schöneberg, answers what United Universities if Europe or UUU is about. The interview is part of the 2nd panel debate inquiring on “Vocations and Competencies in the Age of European Universities.”

Watch part 1 of the panel debate here, and part 2 here.

Guests:

  • Eva-Maria Feichtner, YUFE, Universität Bremen
    Vice President International and Diversity
  • Jörg Niehoff, European Commission, DG EAC
    Policy Coordinator University Business cooperation
  • Peter van der Hijden, higher education strategy advisor
  • Nadine Shovakar, Universität Potsdam, EDUC Project Manager
  • Katrine Moland Hansen, Universitetet i Bergen, Local ARQUS Alliance Coordinator
  • Magdalena Sikorska, Politechnika Poznańska, EUNICE Project Officer
  • Thibaut Skrzypek, EELISA, École des Ponts ParisTech, Work Package Leader
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Video

UUU Panel 2.1 – EDUC, EUNICE, ARQUS & EELISA

Berlin, Poznań, Bergen, Paris, Potsdam, 8 December 2020. United Universities of Europe: “Vocations and Competencies in the Age of European Universities” – UUU panel debate 2, part 1: Policy officers from four different University Alliances in four different countries describe their new positions: How does the need for international co-operation shape their professions? Which new skills do the need? Which special tasks and challenges have arisen? How do their new professions evolve?

Guests:

  • Magdalena Sikorska, Politechnika Poznańska, EUNICE Project Officer
  • Katrine Moland Hansen, Universitetet i Bergen, Local ARQUS Alliance Coordinator
  • Thibaut Skrzypek, EELISA, École des Ponts ParisTech, Work Package Leader
  • Nadine Shovakar, Universität Potsdam, EDUC Project Manager

Organiser:

  • Tino Brömme, ESNA European Higher Education News

See part 2 of the panel debate here; see the intermission here

TRANSKRIPT

     Guten Morgen, Europa! Good morning, Europe! Buon giorno, Europa! Benvenuti cittadini del mondo! – I must say, it is always a pleasure to start something in Italian because this is the language that gives me the most European feeling of all. Dante Alighieri was the first of all Europeans. I remember this line of his Odysseus who says to his crew: “Fatti non foste a viver come bruti, ma per seguir virtute e conoscenza.” Odysseus embarks to discover the unknown and says to his crew: You are not made to live like beasts, but to search virtue and knowledge. And this is exactly what European universities are doing nowadays, they are on a quest, on a new way to explore themselves.

This is the second panel discussion of United Universities of Europe. And we are trying to explore what’s going on in European universities who have joined into greater units, into alliances. One way to find out how they are, how they’re working, is to look at the people who work there, is to see how they’re working there. And for that, we have invited a number guests today. Some of them are policy officers and coordinators in these alliances. We start with Magdalena Sikorska from the EUNICE Alliance in Poznań, the Poznań University of Technology is leading this alliance. We will speak afterwards with Thibaut Skrzypek from the École des Ponts ParisTech who is a Work Package Leader of the EELISA Alliance. Then we are meeting Katrine Moland Hansen from Bergen who is the Local ARQUS Alliance Coordinator there. And then we’ll meet Nadine Shovakar from the University of Potsdam, not far from here, from Berlin, who is the Project Manager of EDUC, European Digital UniverCity Alliance. This will be the first half hour of our panel discussion where we find out what these coordinators are actually doing at work. Then we have a little break where we talk with Peter van der Hijden, a higher education policy advisor. And after the break, we continue to go deeper into the topic and talk with Eva-Maria Feichtner. She’s a Vice President of the University of Bremen. And after that, we meet Jörg Niehoff, Policy Coordinator for University-Business Cooperation in the European Commission. So this is the programme overall. And I would like to start right away with our first guest who is Magdalena Sikorska. Hello Magda!

Magdalena Sikorska Hello, everyone. Good morning

Good morning. So you’re speaking from Poznań, the leading institution of the EUNICE Alliance, right?

Magdalena Sikorska Right. Actually, we pronounce it “junis” or you can pronounce it “you-nice” or however you want to, but this stands for European University for Customised Education. And actually, I represent Poznań University of Technology, and we are the only Polish university that is the leader of its consortium. So definitely this is a great privilege. But also it entails a lot of challenges for us.

     Is it true that Poland also has given a special support, also financial support to the universities, to Polish universities in the University Alliances?

Magdalena Sikorska Yes, that’s true. We are supported by our government. All together there are 11 Polish universities that are a part of the Alliances among the first call of 2019 and 2020. So we are supported financially by our government.

     I understand that you are the Project Officer of the EUNICE Alliance. In what consists your work, actually, or the collaboration with your colleagues in Poznań for the Alliance?

Magdalena Sikorska Yes. So actually, the structure of the core people who are the creating team of EUNICE at our university is: On the strategic level, we have our Vice President for international cooperation, professor Pawel Śniatala who is the EUNICE coordinator. And we have created within our university structure a completely new unit that is basically dealing with the Alliance and it is dedicated to the European University. And at this point, there are two people working in this unit. It will be my colleague Anna Bashinska (?) who is there a Communication Officer for the Alliance, and myself, I am working as a Project Officer. So we are both working on this operational level of the alliance. But of course, this is just the core. And without getting different people from different faculty members, administrative workers on board, you will then be able to to implement the project. So that’s very important to work and invite over people from different different units, different departments from the university. And also important aspect is the financial department, because we as a leader, we are responsible for distributing money, for monitoring progress, for reports, also financial reports. So this financial aspect is also very important. So team working and cooperation, this is what is important in implementing such a project at the university.

     I’m not working inside. I am trying to imagine what you’re doing. So the main part is communication and project planning, or how can I understand this?

Magdalena Sikorska My task is to communicate and disseminate. We have just started, we had a kick-off meeting a few days ago with the European Commission. We just started the project on November 1st, so we are at this organisational stage of our Alliance at this point. We are getting and building the teams from faculty members, from different disciplines so that they are helping us with implementing the project. We’re working on different work packages, working on deliverables. But myself, I’m working more on this administrative level. So co-operating with all our partners from Spain, France, Belgium, Italy, Finland and then Germany. And so it’s important to communicate with everybody internally, but also externally. We have already created our website and we have many stakeholders contacting us. And you need to a find a good way to communicate and disseminate information about your alliance outside of it.

     Would you say that you have noticed the different working style of your colleagues in the other countries and other universities? Perhaps another way they approach problems than you do as a Northern European?

Magdalena Sikorska To some extent, yes. You know, our alliance is very widely distributed across Europe. We have people coming from north and the western part, there are different characters, a different pace of work, different approaches. The issue is also different academic calendars, because, for instance, during the summer time, some of the universities are closed and we had to work on some important issues that the Commission required from us. But we (in Poznań), as the leader (of the project), have to deal with these situations and have to somehow cope with that.

     Magda, the last question for now. What would you think is the most exciting or the most interesting new task that you have taken over now that you’re doing this job as a EUNICE Project Officer? Which of these tasks that you have is the most challenging, most difficult, most interesting?

Magdalena Sikorska I guess there are many of them. I would say that the team work is very important, solving problems, work management. These are all important aspects of your work because you need to deal with different challenges. Like, for instance, we work on this cloud and then everybody works there. And, for instance, one day you’ll deal with an issue but somebody has forgotten his password and cannot access it. But on the other day, you might be dealing with an issue of failure in a backup. And that’s a bigger issue. So that involves some kind of risk management and so on. At the end of the day, the added value of working within the Alliance is the work in the international environment. And that’s something that I really value in my work. Also, I think is important when you speak different languages, because we stress the importance of multilingualism in our Alliance. So it can be valuable when you are able to understand documents and facts in the other languages when you work with your partners from abroad. But we also stress in our Alliance that multilingualism is an important feature of our future EUNICE graduates because we believe knowing other languages will make you will be better for you when you apply for a job. So will increase your employability, being a graduate of such an Alliance.

     Well Magda, grazie per questa bellissima contribuzione. Thank you for this precious contribution.

     We switch now to our second guest, Katrine. Now we’re going into the far north of Europe to Bergen where Katrine is the ARQUS Coordinator. ARQUS is an Alliance that is already active over a year. And you are with the Alliance nearly a year, for 10 month, right Katrine?

Katrine Moland Hansen I started at the University of Bergen in Norway to take on this task of coordinating and leading our activities linked to the ARQUS Alliance.

     Katrine, you have been already working in an international environment before. Can you say what you did before and how you got into this (new job)?

Katrine Moland Hansen Prior to starting at the University of Bergen, I worked for the Norwegian National Agency, where I coordinated ERASMUS+ for higher education in Norway. And prior to that, I also worked for six years in Brussels dealing with policy issues with more in the business and trade area. So for me personally, getting to know the university in the past has been an important task this first year, and I’m still sort of getting to know the institutions.

     You told me what you found most challenging when you started this new job. It was working internationally, and working across disciplines and departments. Could you explain a little bit what you’re doing, actually?

Katrine Moland Hansen I think this is an opportunity in the Alliance that we get to work both international, of course, and and across different structures within the university. Nothing of this is new in itself, but the scope and extent of these activities are very new and the ambition of the ARQUS Alliance challenges how we work. So organisation-wise, it’s extremely interesting and it encourages new ways of co-operating internally at our institution as well as with our partners.

The thought of this, of getting to know the differences and similarities between partners, what has been a bit surprising to me, was also the extent of working with local structures and anchoring the alliance activities within our institution. We have now set up an internal structure to support efficient decision-making and management in a “matrix organisation.” The work is so extensive involving more than 50 staff, so it’s important to ensure a coordinated approach. And we have, amongst other things, set up a coordination group.

     One thing is also very interesting that ARQUS Alliance has pledged to reach out society, to connect with the – as Vanessa Debiais-Sainton (from the European Commission) put it – the innovative ecosystem. What does it mean in practical terms? How do you connect? What difficulties do you have?

Katrine Moland Hansen Of course, the pandemic situation hasn’t helped, but we have plans to develop a regional socio-economic network in one of our action lines. This could be an important resource both in our work in innovation and entrepreneurship, equality and education, of course, as for the relevance of our education and for our challenge-based programme, to name some examples. We have been in dialogue with potential partners, but it’s a challenging period to develop new partnerships. This comprehensive approach can be beneficial in oder to be more coordinated towards external stakeholders. Linking ARQUS to other initiatives at our institution, at local, regional, national and European levels is key here.

    Would you say that the Corona virus and the need to communicate so much online has slowed down your co-operation possibilities this year?

Katrine Moland Hansen We have had a lot of communication activities for digital channels such as this, but engaging more in informal settings is not so relevant now. So I think we have changed the focus a bit and then we can make up for that, once the situation changes. And so we focus more on the task that can be done in a digital way and at our desks, before moving on to do more outreach activities and informal settings.

      So the last question, adding to this, would you agree that being confined to the online and the digital communication is also an opportunity to think more about the communicative structures and to prepare them?

Katrine Moland Hansen Yes, I think that has been very important now. One of the few benefits of the situation is actually that we have been able to reflect a bit internally on how we work. And I think also it has made us be more innovative in working in different ways and new ways that we also can continue to do after this crisis. And I think we will come out stronger. For instance, the university as Bergen is leading a challenge-based education programme. And the idea was to have a physical school where to bring our students together. Instead, we had to reflect on how to do this in a way that will be more a blended format. So we will not travel and meet, but hopefully students at different institutions will be able to meet. And and we will still interact. So we have been able to sort of innovate the way we do it and ensuring that while the outcome will not be the same, it will hopefully be of the same quality, even though we can’t meet physically. So, I think it has allowed us to think in different ways how we work.

     Katrine, thank you so far.

     I would like now to invite Thibaut to join our round. Thibaut, hello to Paris! Thibaut is Work Package Leader at the École des Ponts in Paris. His alliance is named EELISA, which is concentrated on engineering schools. Thibaut, is it true that the École des Ponts is the oldest engineering school in France?

Thibaut Skrzypek ENSTA, which is also located in Paris, was created in the mid-18th century, 1741, for the École des Ponts. So the king by this time was not Emmanuel Macron but was Louis XV.

     Emmanuel Macron was in your building lately, I remember. Well, did you meet him?

Thibaut Skrzypek Last week he gave an interview in the media offices located in my building. So when I went to the trash bins, I saw plenty of police officers and security agents. I said, please don’t shoot, I will put the paper in the right bin, don’t shoot!

     Emmanuel Macron, whatever his other politics are, gave an European input to this European Universities Alliance initiative. This has been a good start in 2017 and now nearly 300 universities are organised in these 41 University Alliances and the École des Ponts is one of them. Thibaut, how has your professional practise changed from bilateral to multilateral since you are working for EELISA?

Thibaut Skrzypek My regular job, my usual practise, is just bilateral or mainly bilateral. So it means that only one border is crossed in terms culture, of working methods or local regulation. So with those multilateral projects like the European Universities, (I have) a lot of borders to cross, this multinational and it brings elements of complexity, of course, and it makes things a little bit spicier.

     Can you give a practical example?

Thibaut Skrzypek Well, the EELISA Alliance, which stands for European Engineering, Learning, Innovation and Science Alliance, is mainly focussed on building a “European Engineer,” the way to practise the profession of engineering. And the way the accreditation agencies control the education and diplomas are different from one country to another. So we must take care and look closely to those differences in order to target what is the aim of our Alliance, which is to design an integrated European Engineering Degree.

     Is your work package concentrated especially on this?

Thibaut Skrzypek So the École des Ponts is a member of the EELISA Alliance. The EELISA Alliance is coordinated by the Universidad Politecnica de Madrid. My institution is in charge of the Work Package dedicated to accreditation and education management. So it means that we therefore will analyse differences between the curricula, the requirements, and we will strengthen our common approaches and create new ones. We will design credential diploma supplements as intermediate steps in order to target EELISA Degree. And of course, we will have exchanges with our national authorities. For instance, I have this afternoon meeting with the French National Accreditation Agency, the Commission des titres des ingénieur (CTI). So the aim is to contribute to the removal of barriers for the practise of engineering in Europe. But I think also the objective is to strengthen the attractiveness of the European educated engineer around the world.

    Well, wouldn’t it be easier just to take the German engineering diploma and to adopt it in every country?

Thibaut Skrzypek I don’t know if this would be easy. But probably three years will be very short in order to reach this goal.

      So your task is, on one hand, to look at how engineering is taught in the different members of the Alliance, and also how the different legal systems are to create a diploma, or what is your work consisting of in detail?

Thibaut Skrzypek I think, they are those two approaches. An approach from the institution of higher education. So we look closely to the requirements, to the courses, to the credits, to the internships – really the design of the curricula. And there is also the look from the local authorities and the professional organisations in terms of practises, of practise, of titles. We will have to look closely to those both aspects: from institutional point of view, the Unions of engineers, for instance, and from the side of the accreditation agencies and local authorities.

    Do you think a common European engineering degree will be more attractive internationally?

Thibaut Skrzypek I think so. I hope. There is this North American US accreditation label, which is called ABET, and it is widely, widely used around the world. I would like to have a European engineering degree or label like the US. We have the ENAEE organisation amongst our members, as a partner member of the EELISA Alliance, in order to have this European engineer, European educated engineer. And I think this kind of engineer has specificities in terms of science, in terms of connexion with the society. This is really a European specificity that we should be proud of.

     Alone the public debate about the development of this degree, is certainly modernising the way of thinking of how engineers are working. Maybe I’ll ask a last question, Thibaut. What special skills did you have to learn now for this new position as a Work Package Leader, as a coordinator for the Alliance?

Thibaut Skrzypek I’m sure that project management and delivery related to European Universities or Work Packages or so require new skills. Or rather a combination of skills. Skills that we already have within our institution, within our teams, like our budget and financial monitoring, electrical engineering instruments. It means different skills, so different people in different departments, and having them in the right tempo. So that is challenging, knowing how to mobilise colleagues, targeting their interests and having their added values as much relevant as possible. So I would say, fortunately, European Universities are finding a really positive echo within our teams and our institution. We have plenty of enthusiasm. But colleagues’ time, it’s a more delicate subject.

     Thibaut, thank you so much. I’m so happy, speaking with Paris is already gratifying for me.

      Well, let’s come back to a city not so far from Berlin, to Potsdam. We are being joined by our fourth participant in the first part of this panel discussion. It is Nadine Shovakar. She is a project coordinator for EDUC, the Alliance for the Digital European UniverCity. It is a word game, university as a “city,” exactly. It’s very nice. Nadine, on your career path, you are coming from the Austrian University Conference, the association of Austrian universities. And from there then you joined in Potsdam the European University Alliance. You made a step from Austria to Berlin or to Potsdam, to be precise. What were the first news that you noticed when you arrived, workwise?

Nadine Shovarkar I was going to say, how the food has changed, but yes, I’ll concentrate on the work. Welcome from my side also. As Tino was saying, I am Nadine and I work for EDUC, the European Digital UniverCity. What was new here? Of course, I mean, the biggest change, I would say compared to the Rectors conference, is that now I work at one university, I mean, as in the European project. But it is a different kind of institution than the Rectors conference. That was probably the first impression. I was welcomed very, you might say, French, we had a coffee first and some croissants with the Vice President, professor Schweigert. We are also coordinating the EDUC Alliance, professor Schweigert is the leader in that sense. And we had a nice breakfast with the head of the international office, my fellow project manager, Dr. Katja Jung. And I think, his strategic advise was also there. So this was my very first impression. And then, of course, the beautiful campus of the University of Potsdam. So but these are like my feelings. So it was a very nice start, I have to say.

     Well, I am calling from here from the suburb of Potsdam, which is Berlin, to hear what is going on in the capital of Brandenburg. We have been talking about your job and your challenges, your task that you have now as a project manager of EDUC. One key word that has come up with change management. So, apparently what you are doing is communicating and project planning in order to change something. How would you describe this kind of work and in particular for the Alliance?

Nadine Shovarkar First of all, you know, nobody likes change, in general. And this is a very big change management project. Actually it is a project that is supposed to be a structure later. We have like different lines of our development. One is to bring it from project to structure. The other one is to ‘talk for institutional change,’ as I would call it. So we are trying to find allies within all of our six institutions. Basically, we are trying to reach out and connect to as many people as possible. And as I was saying, nobody likes change, that’s true. However and luckily, the European Universities Initiative – I found at the University of Potsdam and also at our partners generally – has a very positive notion and positive feeling. So people are generally willing to be part of it. Then, of course, the next personal sort of feeling that I got is that everybody likes change when it is just like – “Oh, you were joking before! Yeah, let’s do that in European level, which means let’s take my way and make it European.” [laughs] So the real change is to profoundly talk. And that is also the part that takes time, to actually get to know each other and to see processes and to learn from each other, and then to possibly, in an efficient way, change processes, or align processes, or to see what you can do together. So we are working on all different levels, as Katrine was saying, within the university. We are going from the Senate, the President’s office. We are going to meet the students, we had a Facebook event to engage with them. We are also collaborating with staff on very different levels. The research office, like all sorts of different actors within the university, where, of course, as change agents, we are always trying to reach the ones who are willing, the ones who are already interested, and they help us. Because alone you can’t do anything and you don’t want to, also because it has to become a project of the university that the people want. You can’t come top-down and say, I want to change this for that. It has to come from within the university, which is, of course, always a balance of top-down. You come with ideas, you discuss with people.

Certain things will come from bottom-up as an example, maybe to not just talk in general terms. On Monday, yesterday, we launched a call for research seminars or workshops, which means that within the Alliance we have seven research topics and we are trying to find doctoral candidates and researchers to join and see what project they can develop within a week. These are very broad topics, like health, or European studies. So we are, on the one hand, within the Alliance, sort of in a top-down, but very broad way, deciding on these research topics, of course, keeping the university strategies in mind so it doesn’t come from nowhere. But then on the other hand, we send out a call to every researcher at the university to try to reach everybody and give everybody the possibility to partake, if they want to. Then at the same time, of course, like talking of the change agents or those who are motivated. We are also talking individually to those professors who are already very pro-Europe, very much like always into international projects. We always have sort of a approach to trying to include everybody and of course, trying to identify people who are especially eager to to contribute to this idea. So this is just one example of how we are trying to bring about the change.

     One technical term that always came up also with the other participants of our panel, is the term challenge-based. Apparently the European Commission has written it into the programme, but it would be interesting to know more what this actually means.

Nadine Shovarkar Yes, we are talking again about institutional change. We are trying to come from a few professors in each institution who already work like that, who are trying to get challenges from the society – it could be from companies, could be from NGOs, could be from the wider public – into the universities and work with them in their seminars or courses or whatever it is to make it a little more systemic. We try to include these challenges into the into our learning activities.
I think the other thing that is typical for the European Universities or special about it is that the challenge-based approach is combined with an international approach. So we have, for example, these courses, which are now often online and will later be blended. For example, University of Potsdam would have a course with he University of Rennes, the students would then also meet for one week and work on a project which ideally is a challenge. So it does combine these elements to work on concrete challenges which come from society and to also work on them internationally.
So I think that is basically the idea of the European Alliance, what makes it special. But it doesn’t mean that this doesn’t exist yet. And this is again, we are trying to connect and strengthen those people who already work like that. Because at each of our member universities, there are already people who do sort of what we do, but what is being fostered by the European Alliances. So it is nothing new it is a streamlining or an empowering process for people who work that way.

     Well, there is there’s a new community of coordinators work package leaders and project officers only working for and trying to develop these European University Alliances. It is a totally new group of people working in a certain spirit and with a certain professionalism. So if you reflect upon your own, your own profession, what is special about it? Can it be defined in a job description?

Nadine Shovarkar In my personal experience, what especially is the diversity. As also Katrine was saying before, going into so many different fields and, of course, personally I am a little torn, because I don’t like the speed that comes mainly from the European Commission, like the kind of TGV train that we are on to try to bring about change. I used to work for in the (Austrian) Rectors Conference, and there are sometimes similar processes. There are 22 Austrian universities and we were trying to bring about change or have a new topic like e.g. the open publishing. Aand we would come up with a certain framework or help the universities to do it in a streamlined way within Austria. But this kind of project would go on or take maybe half a year, a year, until it comes to the working people, to processes.
So now, we are on a three year project and we are trying to see deliverables and trying to see concrete actions for very big topics. So this is also something special about the European Universities, which is also good, because the good thing is you might say the longer you talk about it, maybe nothing happens. And if you do it quickly, at least something happens. I don’t know. But this is something I feel is is special about the European alliance. Also fun as well.

    Thank you for your contribution. Thanks also to the other participants, Magda, Thibaut, and Katrine. We come to the end of the first half of our talk and we have found out in what the job of project manager or a coordinator in the European University Alliance consists.

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News Video

YUFE Townhall – Happy 1st Birthday!

MAASTRICHT, 7-9 December 2020. The YUFE Townhall was a 2.5-day umbrella event involving all of YUFE’s programmes and activities bringing together the entire YUFE community. Its focus was on European Higher Education and its links to wider society. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the event took place virtually.
Three of the YUFE Townhall sessions were open to the public. The first open session, the “Opening Ceremony”, gave an overview of what has been achieved by YUFE in it’s first year. The second open session, “What can European Universities do for you?”, asked a variety of stakeholders, including the European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, the DG of the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture, and the CEO of a triple-helix campus, what European Universities can contribute to society, with a focus on regional employability following the quadruple helix model. The quadruple helix model brings together science, policy, industry, and society. The third open session was a working session organised and hosted by the YUFE Student Forum.

PROGRAMME

Day 1 – Monday, 7 December 2020
14:00 – 15:00
Opening Ceremony

Open session

  • Moderated by Jan Hupkens, Senior Policy Advisor Internationalisation, Maastricht University ›

Welcome Speech by Chair & Vice-Chair of YUFE Strategy Board

  • Professor Dr Martin Paul, President Maastricht University & Chair YUFE ›
  • Jessica Winter, Student University of Bremen & Vice-Chair YUFE ›

Presentation on YUFE and achievements to date

  • Dr Daniela Trani, Director, YUFE ›

Q&A with questions from virtual audience

15:00 – 18:00
YUFE Strategy Board Meeting
Closed session

Day 2 – Tuesday, 8 December 2020
11:00 – 12:30

„What can European Universities do for you?“ A discussion on the impact of EUIs on employability and regional socio-economic development

Open session

  • Moderated by Jan Hupkens, Senior Policy Advisor Internationalisation, Maastricht University ›
  • Mariya Gabriel, Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth ›
  • Atte Jääskeläinen, Director General of the Department for Higher Education and Science Policy, Ministry of Education and Culture, Finland ›
  • Dr Astrid Boeijen, CEO, Brightlands Smart Service Campus Heerlen ›

Panel discussion about the impact of EUIs on employability and regional socio-economic development, followed by Q&A with a virtual audience

  • Dr Astrid Boeijen, CEO, Brightlands Smart Service Campus Heerlen ›
  • Menno Bart, Public Affairs Manager, The Adecco Group ›
  • Dr Daniela Trani, Director, YUFE ›
    Nina Kolaković, Assistant Expert, Rector’s Office, University of Rijeka ›
  • Sonia Synak, Student, Nicolaus Copernicus University in Torun ›

13:30 – 17:00

Work Package Open Hours: results, lessons and ideas from year 1

Closed sessions

18:00 –

Training and Working Sessions of the YUFE Student Forum

Open session

Day 3 – Wednesday, 9 December 2020
09:00 – 17:00

Work Package Open Hours: results, lessons and ideas from year 1

Closed sessions

More info here: yufe.eu/townhall-2020/

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Video

United Universities 2nd Panel Discussion

2nd panel debate of United Universities of Europe
“Vocations and Competencies in the Age of European Universities”

Part 1: Policy officers from four different University Alliances in four different countries describe their new positions: How does the need for international co-operation shape their professions? Which new skills do the need? Which special tasks and challenges have arisen? How do their new professions evolve? How do they think that they can make a difference?

Intermission: An interview on the Crelle market in Berlin: What is UUU? What is the objective of the UUU panel debates?

Part 2: Peter van der Hijden, independent policy advisor, speaks about the new kind of professionals that European University Alliances create. Eva Feichtner, vice president for internationalisation in Bremen, sees great chances in the university networks for academics and employers alike – creating a competitive international scientific education, as well as attractive career paths and staff journeys across the alliances. Jörg Niehoff, policy officer at the European Commission, will provide political context about role of higher education institutions in providing skills for the green and digital transformation, the EU transformation agenda for HEI, the experience from the Labour Market Relevance and Outcome partnerships and how all this translates into the context of the European University Alliances.

The panelists:

  • Eva-Maria Feichtner, YUFE, Universität Bremen, Germany,
    Vice President International and Diversity
  • Jörg Niehoff, European Commission,
    DG EAC Policy Coordinator University Business cooperation
  • Peter van der Hijden, higher education strategy advisor
  • Nadine Shovakar, Universität Potsdam, EDUC Project Manager
  • Katrine Moland Hansen, Universitetet i Bergen, Local ARQUS Alliance Coordinator
  • Magdalena Sikorska, Politechnika Poznańska, EUNICE Project Officer
  • Thibaut Skrzypek, EELISA, École des Ponts ParisTech, Work Package Leader

Organiser: Tino Brömme, ESNA European Higher Education News

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Event Video

UNICA Panels: Starting in the (post-)Covid Era

30 November 2020. Organised by the association UNICA and chaired by its President Luciano Saso, the online panel inquires which lessons can be learned so far from European Universities and what are their plans in the (post-)Covid Era?

Topics

  1. Research and education
  2. Governance models
  3. Communication and multilingualism
  4. Impact of the COVID pandemic

Participants Panel 1

Participants Panel 2

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News

EUTOPIA Week – A Self Discovery

EUTOPIA, 23-27 November 2020. EUTOPIA Week brings together students, researchers, subject matter experts and strategic partners from across the alliance network, every six months. This year they are hosting a number of additional online events, open to all, to provide unique insights and enable important discussions on topics impacting society today.

Programme and timetable 

What’s happening?

The University of Warwick (UK) is hosting the second EUTOPIA Week online with a series of workshops, panel debates and open forum Q&As. High-profile speakers participate in important topical discussions relating to Higher Education and the wider global operating context. A number of sessions will be open to the public and they promise to offer impressive academic and professional expert insights into the hot topics facing our society today. Some sessions are only open to University Presidents and senior leaders, Work Package leads, students, staff, academics and researchers from the six partners of EUTOPIA. There is also an online ‘Pub Quiz’ on Wednesday, where fellow delegates can get together and test their knowledge. And finally, there are Warwick Esports games and events for more fun throughout the week.

Full schedule

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News

CHARM-EU Days for a European Green Deal

CHARM-EU, 23-24 November 2020. This event will explore the future of the European Higher Education landscape and its role in addressing complex and interlinked societal challenges.

Climate change and environmental degradation are an existential threat to Europe and the world. In addition, the world is facing unexpected challenges caused by the COVID-19 scenario. To overcome these challenges, the European Union (EU) developed a new growth strategy: the European Green Deal for the EU and its citizens. Whilst all EU actions and policies will have to contribute to the European Green Deal objectives, the higher education sector – as one of the main contributors in educating those who will shape our society – must to play a key role in achieving these goals. Considering this complex scenario, CHARM-EU Days will be an occasion to reflect on how European Universities initiative can contribute to supporting the European Green Deal.

The CHARM-EU Days is a unique opportunity for participants to reflect and discuss the potential of European Universities in shaping the present and the future of our society by reinforcing its commitment with the EU’s Green Deal action plan.

Source: www.charm-eu.eu

Programme

HOW CAN THE EUROPEAN UNIVERSITIES INITATIVE CONTRIBUTE TO SUPPORTING THE EUROPEAN GREEN DEAL?

The CHARM-EU Days is a unique opportunity for participants to reflect and discuss the potential of European Universities in shaping the present and the future of our society by reinforcing its commitment with the EU’s Green Deal action plan.

Top 3 Reasons you can’t miss the CHARM-EU Days

  • Obtain a better knowledge and reflect on how to support the Green Deal through the creation of a new university model.

  • Exchange ideas on how the European Universities initiative can contribute in shaping the present and the future of our society.

  • Connect with a variety of stakeholders and fins new opportunites of collabroation and how to get involved in the CHARM-EU Community.

Day 1 – 23 November 2020
9:30 – 10:00 Opening Session
Presented by: Michele Catanzaro (Live from the University of Barcelona)

Welcome words: Adrienn Király, Head of Cabinet of Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, European Commission.

Introductory remarks

  • Joan Elias, Rector. University of Barcelona.

  • Vanessa Debiais-Sainton, Head of the Higher Education Unit, European Commission.

  • Patrick Caron, Vice President for International Affairs, University of Montpellier.

  • Francesc Almendros Viladerrams, CHARS-EU Student representative, University of Barcelona.

10:00 – 11:15 European Universities Initative and the Euroepan Green Deal

The aim of this panel is to reflect how the European Universities Initiatives can actively contribute to the achievement of the Euroepan Green Deal strategic plan. Speakers will discuss how a new university model can help address these global challenges. In particular how to link European Universities initiative and the European Green Deal agenda. Moderator: Michele Catanzaro.

  • Henk Kummerling. Rector Universiteit Utrecht.

  • Cláudia Cavadas, Coimbra Group Executive Board member and Vice-Rector for Research and 3rd Cycle Studies at the University of Coimbra.

  • Marie Wittamer. CIVIS Executive Director.

  • Monika Skadborg, European Student’s Union (ESU)

11:15 – 11:30 Virtual trivia (Kahoot! game)

A 15 minutes trivia on general questions, including Covid-19, H2020 and European Universities. The winner will receive a CHARM-EU branding kit. Check out our website for the Terms & Conditions.

GREEN CLUSTERS SESSIONS
23 NOVEMBER FROM 12:00 CET

12:00 – 13:30 Cluster 1 I Towards Transdiscipliary Networks to Solve Global Challenges

The dynamic session invites you to join and network with transdiscipliary CHARM-EU Knowledge Creating Terms (KCTs). We will work together to define „problems spaces“ central to the European Green Deal. These will inspire and inform CHARM European University’s Moderators:

  • Jake Byrne, Trinity College Dublin.

  • Gemma O’Sulllivan, Trinity College Dublin.

  • Jan Haarhuis, Utrecht University.

The second part of this session will be via icebreaker.

13:45 – 15:15 Cluster 2  Mobility: Sustainavle mobility solutions

The mobility cluster will focus on the sustainability dimesions of mobility within Eropean Universities Alliances both form a practical and a conceputal point of view, starting from concrete examples leading to more general (abstract) considerations. Moderator: Niamh Burke, Trinity College Dublin.

  • Nathalie Modjeska, Montpellier University.

  • Simone Hackett, The Hague University of Applied Sciences.

  • Tessa Schutte, Utrecht University.

  • Marenthe Middelhoff, Utrecht University.

15:30 – 17:30 Cluster 3I Inclusiveness: Ensuring that no one will be left behind

An inclusive Green Deal for Europe means for uns, that plicies & implementation have to be inlusive and open. Many people are excluded from mainstream policies & implmemnentation becaus eof their gender, ethnicity, age… sexual orientation, disability or poverty, etc. No one can ve left behind. This session offers principles for inclusive design that considers the greatest extent of people.

Day 2 – 24 November 2020

10:00 – 11:30 How external stakeholders can engage with the European Universities to address the European Green Deal?

This session will debate the role of business and society as part of a new university model that will protect the enviroment and boost the green economy. Moderator: Michele Catanzaro.

  • Carole-Anne Sénit. GLOBAL GOALS Project I Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development. Utrecht University.

  • Jeroen Spierings, Head of Indistry Marketing, Ricoh Europe.

  • Celia Belline. CEO, CILcare.

  • Carlos Montero, Chief Technology Officer, Suez Spain.

  • Estibaliz Saez de Cámara, Head of Sustainability of the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU). Advisory Board member of the Sustainable Developmement Solutions Network – Red Espanola de Desarrollo Sostenible (REDS).

11:30 – 12:45 Creating a research and innovation agenda o the European Universities: a look into the Horizon Europe perspective and the European Green Deal

In this session, participants will have the opportunity to discuss the link between the Horizon Euope, the European Universities Initiative and the European Green Deal, future of the research and innovation dimension in achieving greener future. Moderator: Michele Catanzaro

  • Apostolia Karamali, Head of Unit, DG for Research and Innovation

  • Domènec Espriu, TORCH Project Manager

  • Kristof Vlaeminck, Senior External Funding Officer – Una Europa Coordinator subgroup Research and Innovation – Forum of European Universities

  • Agostino Inguscio, Ecological and Social Transitions, Healthy Planet Directorate. European Commission

  • Inês Prates. Policy Officer. European Commission.

  • Barbara Koch, Albert-Ludwigs Universitat Freiburg. Member of EUA Energy & Environment Platform

12:45 – 13:30 Closing session and final remarks

Rapporteurs from the clusters sessions
Moderator: Michele Catanzaro

  • Cluster 1 Towards Transdisciplinary Networks to Solve Global Challenges. Jan Haarhuis, Utrecht University

  • Cluster 2 Mobility: Sustainable mobility solutions. Brendan Tighe, Trinity College Dublin

  • Cluster 3 Inclusiveness: Ensuring that no one will be left behind. Agnes Sarolta Fazekas, PhD – Leader of CHARM-EU WP6 – Inclusiveness

  • Tim Savage, Senior Advisor, CHARM-EU. Trinity College Dublin

  • Vanessa Debiais-Sainton, Head of the Higher Education Unit. European Commission

Source: www.charm-eu.eu

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News Video

4EU+ Open Session and Round Table

Prague, 16 November 2020. The Annual Meeting of the 4EU+ Alliance was be held as an online event, organized by Charles University. It consists of three main parts:

In the morning, various stakeholders from the 4EU+ Community explore selected topics of central relevance for the Alliance during the micro think-tank sessions. In parallel, the 4EU+ Governing Board holds its regular meeting with the 4EU+ Management Committee and Vice-Rectors/Vice-Presidents of member universities.

Charles University Rector Tomáš Zima officially takes over the position of the Chair of the 4EU+ Governing Board from the President of Sorbonne University Jean Chambaz at the General Assembly.

4EU+ Academic Council will be officially inaugurated as a Governance Body of the Alliance.

The Open Session of the Annual Meeting, organised with the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic, starts at 16:00. All the partners and friends of the 4EU+ European University Alliance are invited to join. Main outcomes of the micro think-tanks sessions are being shared, successful Flagship projects are being presented and a round-table discussion on the topic “4EU+ as a prototype for synergy between research and education” is being held.

The detailed programme of the Open Session:

Welcome by the Rectors, Ambassadors, European Commissioner, Members of the Czech Government

    • Welcome by CU Rector Tomáš Zima

    • Welcome by the Minister of Foreign Affairs Tomáš Petříček

    • Greetings by the Deputy Minister of Education Václav Velčovský

    • Greetings by the ambassadors

    • President of Sorbonne University Jean Chambaz: achievements of 4EU+ in 2020

    • Rector of Charles University Tomáš Zima: Priorities of 4EU+ under the GB Chair of CU Rector Tomáš Zima

    • Greetings by the European Commissioner Mariya Gabriel

Reports from the micro think-tanks sessions by student co-chairs

Topic 1: Just Wishful Thinking? The claim of synergy between research and teaching in 4EU+ Janathan Juarez Altuzar (HU)

Topic 2: 4EU+ and Europe: Can 4EU+ make us better Europeans? Can 4EU+ strengthen Europe? And should it? If yes, how? Eliška Černovská (CU)

Topic 3: Mobility, connectivity, exchange: Which mix of modes cooperating within 4EU+ works best? What can be gained by certain modes? And what is lost? Bret Doerksen (UM)

Key topic: 4EU+ as a prototype for synergy between research and education

  • Presentation of one successful project per Flagship

    Flagship 1: Urban Health Case Challenge
    Flagship 2: Cooperative Network Philotrans
    Flagship 3: Joint master degree in Mathematics and Applications
    Flagship 4: Extension of competences and knowledge-based education of natural hazards and environmental change

  • Round-table discussion with representatives of the European Commission, Rectors and students, moderated by Tomáš Zima, Rector of Charles University

    • Vanessa Debiais-Sainton, Head of the Unit Higher Education, DG EAC
    • Apostolia Karamali, Head of Unit Academic R&I and Research Organisations, DG RTD
    • Bernhard Eitel, Rector of Heidelberg University
    • Henrik C. Wegener, Rector of the University of Copenhagen
    • Student representatives: Mike Gudbergsen (UCPH), Julia Kostro (UW), Bérangère Poncet (SU)

Original links: YouTube | 4EU+

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News

UTwente invests €4.4m in ECIU

The Executive Board during the University Council meeting in September. Today, the meeting took place over Teams. Foto: Frans Nikkels

TWENTE, 4 November 2020. The UT Executive Board has decided to allocate in total 4.415 million euros to the ECIU University project. Their investment plan was approved by the University Council today.

The ECIU University is a new European university involving all thirteen ECIU (European Consortium of Innovative Universities) partners, including the University of Twente which coordinates the project. Its main objective is to develop a virtual university based on challenge-based education, research and innovation. In challenge-based education, multidisciplinary teams of learners (students and professionals) work on real life societal challenges. Next to the challenges, online micro modules are being developed and offered by all partners. The first learners will start working challenges in the autumn 2020.

The ECIU University project started ten months ago, and runs for three years in total with the aim to secure long term funding by then. To run the pilot, a total of five million euros was granted by the EU to the ECIU consortium. The UT has received 762.000 euros from this funding, but in order to start up the project, pre-investments are needed from every alliance partner.

The Board has presented a business plan for the ECIU University pilot, which will last three years. In 2020, the university will invest 715.000 euros for the creation and start-up of ECIU University at UT level. For the coming two years, the budget has been set to 1.825 million and 1.875 million euros. Most of these costs amount to personnel costs in order ‘to not add to work pressure’, states the investment plan.

The plan was extensively discussed during the online University Council (UC) meeting this morning. While the Council was overall positive about UT’s involvement in the project, they raised some concerns. Mainly, the UC stated that clear goals and evaluation criteria were missing in the current plan. They also expressed their worry of ECIU University becoming a standalone project and leading to increased workload for UT employees.

‘This is not a standalone project, not at all,’ responded Victor van der Chijs. ‘It is engrained in the implementation of Shaping 2030. It is part of innovation of our own organisation. The entire project has been set up so that we don’t increase workload. It is increasing work, we are doing something additional, but we can hire additional staff. You ask for clear strategy on how to incorporate the project. What you saw was investment plan, not the project plan. We are still developing the project plan and strategy. You will get such a plan with time-based criteria early next year. That is a promise.’

After a closed discussion, the Council was asked to vote on the matter. With eleven votes in favor and four against, the investment plan was approved. More detailed plans on how to incorporate the ECIU University within the UT should be presented by February 2021.

Source