Stockholm University has a clear profile as a campus university, and it is encouraging to be able to once more look forward to a living campus. That being said, I hope that we can learn from all our new-found experiences. Wouldn’t it be good if our newly acquired knowledge of digital education could lead to more flipped classrooms and a development in teaching and learning, adopting seminar-based activities which encourage meetings between teachers and students and between students?
I also hope that the change in our meeting and conference culture will endure. It is important to have certain meetings in the flesh – creative discussions suffer in particular and important development work has been halted. But more routine meetings work excellently in a virtual form, and in particular those which would entail unnecessary travel can advantageously be moved online. In the midst of the temporary halt in travel due to the pandemic, Stockholm University has decided on a new, robust travel policy, based on our new climate roadmap. Testing whether or not a journey has added value ought to be a guiding principle of our work in the future.
Let me finally wish everyone a marvellous summer and a well-earned rest – see you again on campus in the autumn!
This article was written by Astrid Söderbergh Widding, President of Stockholm University. It appears in the section ”Words from the University’s senior management team”, where different members of the management team take turns to write about topical issues. Words from the University’s senior management team appears in every edition of News for staff which is distributed to the entirety of the University staff.