EduTalks

[MUSIC]

Hello and welcome to this special edition of the EduTalks podcast.

We have a live episode waiting for you.

[MUSIC]

Hello and welcome to the EduTalks podcast.

This series, the visionary sessions is already special,

but this episode today is even more special.

You could almost call this special education.

Today we're recording this episode with a live audience.

And this is first of all a warm welcome to all of you for joining in.

And we are sitting here in the learning and teaching lab in the middle of the campus,

looking out over the O&O Square, the heart of education.

It's been a little over a year since the vision on learning and teaching was introduced.

And today we're going to talk to the writers about the content of it,

and if any questions from the audience about this vision here.

But first of all, let's introduce them.

The three of them work together with a group of all sorts of stakeholders,

students, teachers, colleagues to shape this vision on learning and teaching.

And let's start out with the man that needs no introduction,

the University of Twente's Rector Magnificus, Tom Veldkamp.

Yes.

Welcome.

Thank you.

We have the Vice Dean on Education from the Faculty of BMS,

and also a full professor of Philosophy of Technology, Chano Aydin.

Thank you.

Welcome.

And the Director of the Center of Educational Support, not service, I've learned my lesson,

and the former Educational Director of the Leiden University College, Lieke Scheeuw.

Good morning.

Good morning. Welcome.

So let's start out with the vision itself.

We have 16 pages in this document that gives an outline of what education at our wonderful campus is like.

When did this whole process get started, first of all?

Maybe I can answer it.

Actually, already when I was appointed as a Rector,

there was the issue about vision on our master education.

And during the process in developing this,

there was a lot of interaction also with stakeholders.

Actually, there was a clearly felt need that we need an overall vision on education.

So it's in a way a step back.

Instead of focusing on our master education, we started to focus on our education in general.

So, and I think it's a more logical thing because it turned out we didn't have a clear vision.

We had a lot of documents touching upon elements of the vision,

but one integrated vision was lacking.

But now we have one.

Now we have one.

And how did the others get involved in this?

I think it was kicked off at the University Committee on Education.

And that's why we had a lot of discussions.

And both of them are a member.

And they were initially we asked Siano to take the lead on this process.

And then later Lieke joined.

And then, of course, other people were involved.

So it's actually, you could say it started off at the University Committee on Education.

And how long did it take before we now finally had this vision last year presented to us?

Maybe, I think less than maybe a one year, something like that.

Something like that, yeah.

I think a little bit over a year.

And then we have the Borromean knot, did I pronounce it correctly?

Yes.

Being interconnected with three rings that you had a nice description on Monday, Lieke.

How did you describe it again?

There's three, a Borromean knot consists of three rings that are interconnected.

And you cannot cut one loose without losing the hole.

So if you cut one loose, all three will fall apart.

Exactly.

And you go by the title, Learning by Interacting, with all sorts of elements

and different properties of how it's described and how it's emphasised.

There's rings, there's elements.

And I must say the nerd in me gets a bit of a fantasy vibe at that point.

Lord of the Rings, those sort of things.

That's why some of you already looked at it.

I have a card game with me today.

Each of you has a deck of four cards with part of my visionary quest.

You may look at it as you now have different elements of the vision

on learning and teaching.

And I had my wonderful friend AI generate fantasy game cards for it.

Now, what we're going to do to discuss the elements of this vision on learning

and teaching, we won't be able to discuss all 10 elements in the three rings today.

But what I will do, I have one card, Learning by Doing.

I'll play that.

Then it's over to Lieke on how you want to go about it.

Is there an element that you have on your deck that you think is very important

to get to this Learning by Doing?

Then we'll discuss about it.

- Okay, so now you want me to choose one of my four cards that's connected?

- I'll play this card if you put it in the middle.

Learning by Doing.

And what card do you reply with it?

- Of my four cards, I think Problem and Challenge-based Learning.

- Okay.

- Or Student Engagement.

I'll go with Problem and Challenge-based Learning.

- Why?

- Why?

Because that is a didactical method that forces almost students to learn by doing.

So that's our educational model, right?

Our students learn the theory, they go to the classes, they have the lectures,

and things like that.

But then in their projects or in challenge-based learning,

they actually apply that to real-world situations, life situations,

increasingly real as they progress through the program.

And I think it's a very strong learning environment for our students because you

understand how important the things are that you learn and you understand the

context in which you can use that knowledge.

And that will mean that it will settle much more in their brains and they will be able

to use it much easier in the future.

- Okay.

- Yeah.

And if you talk about Learning by Doing, I think that that is the strongest element

from our didactical approaches.

- To really tackle with challenges and problems to really put a foundation

in the education there.

- Yes.

- All right.

Let's get to the next card.

How do you want to reply to challenge-based learning, Tom?

- Well, I agree with engineering and design.

I think that's actually the more traditional approach with many of the programs here at

this university had before.

But it's now more enriched because it's not only solving a problem and learning,

so it's also learning by doing.

But at the same, the reflection element is important.

I think we actually, in the current education system,

reflection is even more important.

It's not only about the problem, but also about the impact in society

and relevance in society.

And that's also, if you scale it up, it's actually challenge-based learning is

even more challenging because you actually have stakeholders involved

in the process.

And then, okay, and then I can even play more cards.

I think that's a good step to add on to Likes story.

- Let's continue the game.

- Yeah.

- Yeah, I'm hesitant a bit, actually.

I consider teacher professionalization, but also self-development.

Self-development is the other kind of main ingredient of the vision,

but I go for teaching professionalization because both actually the engineering

approach and the design approach and the learning by doing is something also

that you need to learn.

So teachers also need to acquire kind of new skills, new competences to be able

to also teach their students learning by doing.

And again, the idea is that you have a kind of a symmetrical relation with your

students and also respond adequately to the environment in such a way that you

take a problem or a challenge as a starting point and then together,

in interaction with one another, try to kind of first understand what you're

dealing with and you already then have different kind of approaches and

perspectives and then together also try to contribute to this challenge,

to this problem.

And in the short and long run, of course, you also want to contribute to society.

And I think that's also main kind of characteristic of our vision.

- I think that's interesting because you are the scientific director of the

BMS Teaching Academy and we have Lieke here as head of CES and therefore also

CELT, the Center of Expertise in Learning and Teaching.

How do you feel that's part of the vision then, those departments?

I think those can help with professionalization.

- Yeah, exactly.

So just like I think in research, we continuously try to kind of improve our

skills, our competences, go to conferences, maybe find even coaches that can,

in one way or another, in different way, help us to develop ourselves.

The same applies to teachers.

So we want to teach a professionalization to become kind of an integral and

structural part also of teacher developments and an infra kind of

structure as the teaching academy can contribute to that.

So it tries to also have an eye for educational developments and then

sometimes tailor-made, sometimes more generic also respond to the needs and

demands of teachers and help them to kind of make the necessary steps to also

provide a state-of-the-art teaching that is required today.

- And I think that ties in very well with what CELT does.

We have our educational consultants who can, you know, assist teachers in very

many areas and ideas and thoughts that they have, help them structure a curriculum,

try out a new tool, work with the people in CELT if you find some technology

enhanced learning that you want to implement.

So I think it's a great combination and I think we also fully agree with Siano.

And we have to keep in mind that even if the material that we teach,

I think I said it on Monday as well, that, you know, gravity will continue to be

gravity, that won't change.

But the way we teach it can change and the students that we teach change as well.

So you have to adapt your teaching methods to the students that are always to your audience.

So I think the teaching academy in BMS and CELT can work very well together in that.

- Okay.

Then we're going to go around again and see how do you want to respond to the

teacher professionalization, Lieke?

- I'll go with reflexivity.

- That's interesting because we just spoke about reflection earlier on.

- Exactly. Yeah.

I think reflection is essential in any kind of learning that you do,

whether it's learning to ride a bike or learning something very complex that all

our colleagues do here that I have no idea about.

But reflect on your own behavior, your own learning, your own mistakes especially.

Learn to make mistakes, take a risk, you know, hit your head in the wall,

it's fine as long as you can reflect on what went wrong.

And I think that's true for students and we should offer an environment in which they

can make those mistakes and can learn from them, that's the most important thing.

But it also applies to our teaching staff.

They should also reflect on what they're doing and whether they're still teaching the

right material, whether the situation around them and the demands from the labor market

are changing, what the students demand, the programs demand, etc.

So reflection I think is essential for indeed self-development,

building inclusive communities and learning by doing.

- We'll go on to the next part.

- Yes, I play the building inclusive communities because I mean it's already

shared before.

I mean it's not about students, students and teachers, but also they can learn from

each other and also not only within the program but also outside the program.

So you build also links to society, other universities, other programs,

and I think that's also one of the main things how you can do, you develop your

reflexivity because do it on your own is very tough.

But a lot of students actually learn from each other.

Did you understand this?

Can you explain this to me?

That's sometimes more important than the teacher explaining it again.

And of course the reflection should go both ways.

Just like Lekke says, teachers should also reflect on the program.

Am I still doing the right things?

Are the students actually learning the things they should learn?

And the students change and that's the only way to get into the program is actually

actively work on these inclusive communities.

The students we have now have other views on the world than the students 10 years

and 20 years ago.

So the program should be adaptive.

And we see this, specifically since COVID, our society has changed.

The priorities of our students are different than the students before COVID.

How are they then?

Sorry?

How are they different then?

What sort of aspects do students now like differently?

Yes, I think they need more me time and also they are much more used to being

involved in online communities.

So there's a lot of interactions between students.

Some students really had to learn again how to interact physically with peers

instead of going online and doing lectures.

And the other thing is, of course, that society is changing.

You know, there's a lot of pressure felt by, let's say, the younger generation,

the formal fear of missing out.

And that's also why well-being and also stress-related issues are increasing.

It's not only because of the study program, it's actually the whole society and the

way they live in the society and perceive society, why our students are having,

in that sense, a tougher time with well-being than the students before.

It's also one of the elements that the well-being, I don't know who has the

specific card, but I don't.

We know which one you'll play after this.

Let's go to Tjano.

Yeah, that comes very easy, actually, because if you say inclusive communities

and reflexivity, then self-development becomes very, very important.

So I go for self-development, which is also the third kind of main goal of the vision.

So it's learning by doing, inclusive communities, building inclusive

communities and self-development.

And it also relates to reflexivity because one of the goals of self-development,

and you could say that reflexivity is kind of a means to realize that goal,

is that you continuously kind of develop yourself in a particular direction and

develop certain skills because we know that the world of tomorrow might be very

different than the world of today.

So also you need to work on yourself.

You need to make yourself resilient in a particular way.

And sometimes, and this is a possibility, maybe it's a cliche,

we say that the jobs that we have today may not exist tomorrow.

So you need to prepare yourself for tomorrow, which means that you need to

develop yourself in such a way that you can kind of quite effectively respond to

new situations and acquire knowledge, embody knowledge in a very quick way to

adapt to new situations and new contexts.

So that, and then self-reflexivity is very important.

It also relates to building inclusive communities.

And maybe I can say a bit more about that because when we start writing the vision,

actually we consider Vista's triangle.

But what we see in Vista is that he sees kind of the community tradition and

self-development almost as animus in a certain sense because self-development,

subjectivation as you call it, means that you need to detach yourself from,

yeah, your kind of tradition almost to become fully autonomous.

And we believe that self-development is only possible within kind of an adequate

community so that also helps you to develop yourself and the other way around.

So we see self-development and communities, so inclusive communities as

kind of necessary conditions for one another.

So that's really something that we deliberately chose as also a different

approach than Vista, for example.

Yeah, and it also relates to after finishing your studies, lifelong learning

because it gives you the tools and the attitude to actually do lifelong learning

in a much more effective way instead of, so lifelong learning is not going back to

and follow lectures or something.

It's actually very specific.

What do you need for your self-development to develop yourself to the new needs of society?

And I think this gives the students a foundation for successful lifelong development.

Yeah.

Let's see if the audience maybe has any questions about the topic so far on

visual learning and teaching.

Don't see anyone raising their head yet.

And we'll do a short intermezzo actually because it's time for some data-driven education.

We've let our specially trained machine learning algorithm analyze the visual learning

and teaching to see which words are most used apart from, of course,

function words like D and N.

And of course, the most used word is UT, University of Twente.

But which do you think is number two?

Is that students or learning?

Exactly as I frame it, so not student or learning by doing,

just the word learning or the word students?

I think students.

You think students?

I think learning.

You think learning?

I hope students, but I think it's learning.

But I do hope students because that's what we are doing it for.

Yeah.

So, raise hands if you think students is the most used word.

You think students?

The other thing is learning.

The audience is right.

It's learning.

Learning is the most important, well, most important,

most used word in this vision on learning and teaching.

Well, that shows that we actually wrote it ourselves, right?

So, this is not AI generated.

This is a lot of hard work that we put into it.

But does it go back to student-driven learning then?

Yes, certainly.

Yeah, so, yeah, that relates I think to all kind of components

and ingredients of the vision that, yeah,

the students also take his own kind of course of learning,

its own process in its own hands become responsible for it.

Of course, you gradually kind of you help the students to do

that by initially also setting goals.

But gradually you even want the students to almost,

of course, that is a very kind of radical form of student-driven

learning to even choose his own goals to contribute,

of course, larger kind of goals.

But the idea is that, yeah, the relation between student

and teacher is, as I indicated earlier, symmetrical.

So, we take also students as kind of as partners in an

endeavor that needs kind of different perspectives.

And sometimes the student perspective is as kind of

valuable often it is and innovative than the teacher perspective.

And I think it's also nice to stress that we call this

division on learning and teaching and not teaching

and learning what you see often.

Why is that then?

Because you have to have an idea about how people learn

before you can decide how you teach.

The learning is essential.

And the teaching follows the learning,

how you think that your students will learn.

Yeah, and maybe also the teachers learn.

So, that of course relates to the teacher professionalization.

Yeah, it's learning together.

Learning together, yeah.

That's interesting.

We counted, it was 72 times the word learning was used

in 16 pages as a standalone word.

The plural word students, 56.

And then we have teachers indeed.

Of course, that's also used in combination words like

teacher professionalization, but purely the plural word

teachers 11 times.

So, that's really, I see the student-centered part and this

learning-centered part as a core piece of the vision.

We'll go back to our card game.

In Dutch, we use the phrase playing open card,

but crudely translated, which means to come clean and

just show the cards you're about to play.

I would like to ask you to put all the cards on the table.

I don't know which. All of them?

All of them, and make sure all of you three can try and

see them a bit.

Of course, with a full table with microphone wires and

everything there.

And small letters.

And small letters.

They were fine for me.

Thank you.

Take from that what you want.

They are very nice cards, by the way.

You should check them out after.

Yeah.

As you've defined yourself, these are interconnected rings

and there's always going to be one connected to the other.

But I do want to ask if there's, for each of you, one card

you'd like to emphasize in a way forward with this vision

on learning and teaching.

What would it be?

Could be from your role as vice dean or as director or as

rector or something that you think is really, with these

sort of urgent times we're in now, are important.

So for each of you three, think it over.

Which do you think you want to pick as an important one to

really bring this vision further?

Well, maybe to kick off, I mean, somewhat longer term

vision, it's the digital unblended campus.

Because I think our teaching will change because it's too expensive.

I mean, we are faced already with budget cuts, but it seems

that society is also not willing to invest as much in teaching

and financial wise, but they still want the same output.

So one way to solve this, like I said, the new generation

is much more used on being in a digital environment,

is actually pushing towards a different kind of balance

between digital and physical learning and also do it

more together instead of every university by its own.

So I think in the long term vision, we are moving that way.

Think about every university has the same math courses.

Why do we have to duplicate everything?

Can we not work more efficiently together and then have

different ways of teaching math instead of just copying

the same way of teaching math between the different universities?

But that requires an open attitude instead of seeing each other

as competition.

You really work, then have to work towards one big university

in the Netherlands/Europe.

But that's again, it's a long vision, but I think we are pushed

in that direction.

And is it, you feel it's being pushed?

Do you also feel it's something that we as university really

want to do as well?

I think it has a lot of pros and cons.

We are pushed at the moment.

So I think the changes will be more rapidly than we would like to.

But then of course academic institutions are quite conservative.

So changes are not going very fast.

We tend to spend a lot of time having all kinds of internal

discussions and making small steps.

Sometimes you have to make big steps and that's tough.

Going to the others, what card would you pick?

I think, of course, I mean, if you talk about the Borromean

North, you cannot choose.

They are all interconnected.

So they cannot do without each other.

But also because I do not have my glasses on, I take the closest

one, but it's also not completely kind of random.

I'll go for multi-inter and transdisciplinary because I do think

that if you take as a starting point grand challenges, big

problems, and we are facing grand challenges and big problem.

I mean, and this is also what makes I think the UT unique is

that multi-inter and transdisciplinary is just kind of, yeah,

you cannot do without.

At the same time, it's quite a challenge to do multi-inter and

transdisciplinary work.

It's something that you really need to kind of also learn to

do and our kind of unique position at the UT is that we have

both an engineering faculty and a social science faculty, large

social science faculty.

So it is also possible to do really kind of balanced multi-inter

and transdisciplinary work because we have both expertises

here and lucky students you could say because they can profit

from both approaches and of course more than two.

I mean, they are also within the faculties and between the

faculties a lot of other kind of disciplines and this does not

mean that a disciplinary approach is irrelevant.

That remains also important, but it becomes even more important

if it's kind of able to interact with other disciplines and

other and then I mean again, we cannot kind of face and tackle

the problems, large global problems that we are facing with

and the main aim, the final aim of the university is making

the world a better place without multi-inter and transdisciplinary

work, something really that we need to invest in.

And then Ligge?

Yeah, I had the same problem as Ciano.

Any of the three that are in the Baromeo not, I can't pick

one, that's just impossible.

So I'll go with students and teacher well-being.

As Tom already said, we're facing huge budget cuts and I know

it's putting a lot of pressure on our teaching staff.

They have to do a lot of work and then the Dutch tracks have

to come in and all kinds of other exercises.

We have to do more with less or the same with less is a big

challenge.

So we really have to look after our teaching staff and make

sure that they can handle this and they have to deal with

students who are also struggling in a world that is changing

rapidly.

It's changing every day.

There's conflicts, there's wars, there's natural disasters,

there's political instability, changing geopolitical factors

a lot more.

So the grand challenge is basically what Ciano was talking

about and we see that our students suffer from that.

There's so much uncertainty for them for their future and

that affects the way they study and they question what they

study and whether it's relevant.

Will they be able to get a job?

Will they be able to find a house to live or place to live?

Where will they live? Climate change.

And I think that that's a part where we really have to pay

attention.

So both to our teaching and also support staff, I should

say, because they are essential in our teaching process as

well to ensure that we can continue teaching with the same

aims, but perhaps in a different manner, but also make sure

that our students are equipped to deal with everything that

the world will continue to throw at them.

I think I see a question popping in from the audience.

Can you shortly introduce yourself?

Yes, my name is Marika, Marika Poldervaart and I'm partly

responsible for supporting the implementation of the vision,

although we do not want to drop it on everyone because it

comes from bottom up.

I have both a commercial break and a question because we

were talking about student well-being, teacher well-being

and next week, I don't know when this podcast is going to

be broadcasted, but next week on the 19th, we're having a

great event in the U hotel on campus in the context of the

Slimmer Collegiar, which is an experiment that is organized

by OCD and it's especially about making the study year, our

college years, more efficient for both teachers and students.

So that's all in the context of the vision.

But my question is whether there is something in the vision,

if you can name something in the vision besides the things

that were already mentioned, that really is inspiring for

other universities as well.

What happens in Twente that is, yeah.

So what's really unique about our university?

Student engagement.

Because I mean, this goes beyond the programs.

We really stimulate students to do a lot of student activism

activities, either in study programs, but also we have

the student union.

We're the only university in the Netherlands who have

the student union.

Gives them opportunities to organize, to have real world

experience in managing parts of university and of course

to kick in.

I mean, the main event every year for the new students is

organized by the students, for the students, and then our

staff is only supporting this.

So the students here are really in the lead in a lot of

activities to the student teams.

Solar team is an example.

These are typically, I think, related to student engagement.

So that's both within the programs and outside of programs.

So it's a integrated approach.

But I think this is a unique aspect of Twente, although

it's not well known.

Yeah.

How do we make it more known?

Yeah, I don't.

Yeah, that's another thing.

I mean, we have a lot of secrets for the rest of the country.

Yeah, again, we are not like other universities shouting

all the time what we are doing.

So that's part of our culture to be a little bit more modest.

So very humble.

Maybe too humble.

At the same time, and in this digital time, I think sharing

and I really hope that the more online presence will increase

and give a lot of insight.

Also, a lot of students just sharing their experiences to

others actually might stimulate a lot of students to come

here, if they fit in, of course.

Some students just like to learn.

That's fine.

But if you want to have more activism, please come to Twente.

You're welcome.

And I think if I interpret Marijke's question a bit differently,

what is different about our vision, I think is that we have

the baromea not at the center.

That we really thought about why are we teaching?

What is our purpose in teaching these students?

And other visions that I've seen also include some of the

other aspects that we have, but that why so centrally at

the center of it is I think what sets our vision apart.

Yeah, and maybe for me, of course, student engagement is

I think, I mean, that's the starting point.

But the reason why I came to the UT is, and I already mentioned

it kind of implicitly, is this connection, this relation

and collaboration between on the one hand, social behavioral

management sciences and on the other hand, engineering sciences.

Because I mean, of course, we are a technical university,

but just to be a bit less modest than we are, usually are,

I think we are a better technical university because of

this kind of two approaches and that we try to also not

detach them from one another, but really see that they need

one another. You cannot do kind of good engineering if you

do not also take into account kind of the social environment

and what is going on there and how people respond to it

and all kind of ethical kind of political issues.

And that's kind of quite a luxury that we have here.

And I think we could also make that stronger to the outside

world that we really have something unique and special here.

So that's what that was, at least for me, the reason why

I really wanted to come here and work at the University of Twente.

And the campus.

And the campus.

I'll just throw the campus in.

Yeah, yeah.

That's fantastic.

It's fabulous.

We're nearing the end of this episode, but I'm curious

with all the elements, indeed, with the ideas, of course,

to bring this vision further.

Is there some element that you would like maybe to have

the input from this audience on, on how we can bring this further?

Yeah.

Go ahead.

Now, maybe it is a bit political sensitive, but I will mention

it because I was looking at it actually all the time, international

connections, because I mean, of course, there is the whole

political debate about international students, but I do think

that and this is just part of and already implied in what

we said.

So the University of Twente cannot kind of exist in a vacuum.

So it is part of a larger milieu, larger ecosystem.

And although, of course, we take all kind of practical issues

into account, but we do not want to make distinctions that

are irrelevant.

So we believe in equality and we believe also that kind of

diversity.

So we are talking about inclusive communities could really

contribute also to what we are doing here.

So although it is kind of a difficult balancing because

sometimes you have practical kind of issues and considerations,

but also you have to know your own principles.

And I think it is an ongoing debate.

So the larger audience also should I think contribute to

that debate and we could also learn from them.

So how to deal with the whole international kind of

internationalization debate is something

that I think also others could help us with and contribute

to. Is there anyone in the audience who wants to respond

to that?

We have one.

Can you shortly introduce yourself as well?

Yes, Jes from the UT, obviously.

Yes, internationalization I think is important, but sometimes

I think it's a little too narrow if we only focus on

internationalization.

What I think is valuable for the education is sort of a

diversity of thought in the groups, amongst the teachers

and sometimes internationalization doesn't give you a diversity

of thought.

If you take sort of the high socio-economical layers of Germany

and the Netherlands, it's not very diverse in thought.

So but for the education, I think the diversity of thought

is more important than diversity of nationalities or whatever.

Yeah, but I agree.

Yeah.

Yeah, I agree.

But I mean the point is that we do not want to make, for example,

borders that are actually for what we do irrelevant, kind

of relevant in the sense that we discriminate on the basis

of that.

But we do believe that if you talk about also diversity

of thought, if you look outside your own country, chances

are that you will find more diversity of thoughts.

And so that's a bit kind of the line of thought.

That leads us to some final Q&A with the audience.

Any final questions to our guests?

Yes, you're back.

Yes, we're back.

Yeah.

So yes, to implement this, we need, you know, you want

a high interaction between students and staff and we think

that's needed for one of, it's one of our rings that we want

to disconnect.

But at the same time, we are in a financial, you know, bit

of a pickle.

And I do believe, I agree with you Tom, that there could

be a way across it if we go to a more blended environment

type, so we sort of make cheaper what can be very well

made cheaper and then spend that time and money on what

it is there.

But that then requires that we cooperate.

And because of the financial pickle, we all sort of tend

to withdraw into the smallest units because then we're

now sort of in a financial competition on campus between

small units.

We shouldn't be, but that is the sort of the situation

we're in.

So I'm very curious on if there is a strategy to get past

that to get to that, what could be a solution?

Yeah, one way to do it is actually to give the program

directors a little bit autonomy and actually designing

and also monitoring the program.

So what is actually done, which courses are offered and

by whom.

So then, and of course, then I expect them to operate on

behalf of the program, not behalf of the faculty they

are actually based from to make sure that the collaboration

between the faculties continues.

And I think it's also important to be, it's not only the

activities you do in your program are relevant.

So for example, I think we do too many testing and examinations.

Just cutting back on that will also give you time actually

to really focus on what is really important is the interaction

with the students.

In the end, it's about the learning outcome of the project

and not about what we actually, and that's tested at the

moment a lot, what we teach the students instead of what

they learn.

I think that we can still make big steps, but it's tough.

I know, I mean, traditionally we are trained and the way

we operate is actually making exams, but what we teach

has been understood, but we don't always check whether

they actually learned what they should learn.

Okay.

I mean, that's, I think.

Yeah.

Looking in the audience for any final Q&A.

No.

Yes.

Yes, maybe from, I'm Niels, from the Center for Educational

Support, maybe from a different point of view.

I'm a communication science alumnus and I graduated in 2012.

How much has the education changed for students since then?

Because we adopted a new educational model and now we're

looking at the future of education.

So in a practical sense, how much is education for students

going to change?

Yeah, I personally can't tell you because then we should

actually check how much it has changed.

But I do know that when the TOM model was introduced, I was

then a Dean of a faculty at ITC, this really created a lot

of, let's say, yeah, discussions because things were really

changing and people had to collaborate who were not used

to collaborate.

So, I mean, so this shaking up is always good to do.

I'm not saying we should shake up for shaking up, but it's

good people are, should look outside the routines and think

a little bit outside the scope of their programs or of their

topics. And that's still in a master education.

We can still do a little bit more shaking up because that's

still very traditional.

Not much has changed in the master education.

Yeah, because sometimes from fellow students from back in

the day, I get questions like how much has the education

changed? And of course I can tell what the situation is right

now, but I was just curious about the future based on this

vision. I think maybe what has changed is that we became

more and more aware of the fact that our education is part

of a larger kind of ecosystem so that we really also want

to respond and interact with what is going on kind of outside

of us. And maybe one example is challenge based learning,

which is also something that we are integrating more and

more in our education, which takes us a starting point that

you take a problem, an issue, challenge that we even sometimes

do not completely understand and then try to use your tools,

your kind of skills and competences together to deal with

that. And then of course also communication, but also

inter and multidisciplinarity becomes very important.

So that awareness I think is something that has changed

our education.

And I think if we look to the future, I think flexibilization

is going to be a big thing, not only within programs, but

also cooperating with other universities.

So I'm going to take that course at that university and

let's contribute to my degree here.

For example, digitalization that Tom was already talking

about and the student centeredness that actually is at the

core of Tom, I think will further continue because our

students just change and they're more focused on their own

development and their own well-being.

And that means that we may have to change our educational

model as well to compensate for that.

It's also a result of Corona where students could learn

at the moment that suited them best.

So some of them are evening people and will listen to a

lecture, an online lecture in the evening, a recording,

rather than having to be in a classroom here at nine o'clock.

But I won't absorb what's being said.

So I think that kind of flexibilization is definitely part

of the future of education.

Thank you Niels.

We're there.

It's time to close off this recording.

Thank you all first of all for joining me with the recording

of this podcast.

Can I have a short round of applause for them?

Thank you for listening to the special series of EduTalks.

This podcast was produced by the video team in collaboration

with the Strategy and Policy, Center of Explanation Learning

and Teaching, Technology Enhanced Learning and Teaching

Teams, and the BMS Teaching Academy.

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Do you have ideas or you want to be featured in the next

episode? You can contact us through EduTalks@uTwenty.nl.

Thank you very much.

[APPLAUSE]