U4 Rectors’ Conference in the light of sustainability and staff development

The annual U4 Rectors’ conference took place at the University of Groningen last weekend. The UG welcomed Rectors, Presidents, Cluster Chairs and cluster contact persons, as well as EU liaison Officers and Heads of International Relations from the member universities of the European U4 Network (comprising Ghent University, the University of Göttingen, Uppsala University and the University of Groningen). They had been invited to evaluate the ongoing U4 actions and set the agenda for the coming year. Among other things, the results of the peer review on Sustainability were on the agenda. There are various fields in which the U4 partners can join forces and learn from best practices.

The partners agreed that the universities would support each other in further developing their sustainability policies. Each university presented a frontrunner project and will help the partners to implement that project (for example setting up a Green Office). The U4 student network gave recommendations to the Rectors, on how students can contribute to a sustainable university and student life.

The U4 partners work closely together in the field of joint PhD programmes. The possibility of setting up a joint U4 certificate for PhD’s will be investigated. The coming years the emphasis will be on collaborating on PhD supervision and stimulating collaboration between research groups. During the conference the decision was taken that staff development and career paths, especially for post docs, will be a new theme within the partnership.

More information

• http://www.u4network.eu
• Contact: Jodien Houwers, Senior Policy Advisor International Cooperation