Academic year 2017- 2018 opens in Martinikerk

Rector Magnificus Elmer Sterken officially opened academic year 2017-2018 during a ceremony in the Martinikerk on Monday 4 September. In his interactive address – which was interspersed with short internet polls – Sterken focused on the importance and impact of digitization for society, education and research. He called for IT to be used to ensure inclusion, activation and personalization in the education sector. The theme at the UG corresponded with that of the VSNU (Association of Universities in the Netherlands), which announced the universities’ intention to launch joint plans relating to digitization later this year. The Netherlands will serve as a guiding country in the field of new technologies in higher education.

Our Rector Magnificus concluded his address by saying:

“In personalizing education. ICT can be of enormous help. It helps us manage the learning process, give relevant feedback, and helps to keep learning costs low. With further adaptation of ed-tech, we can take giant steps in activating students and personalizing education. And in doing so we constantly improve the quality of our educational system for over 30.000 students.

My main message to our students is that your educational programs will change to the better due to ICT and the message to our lecturers is that modern education will look different and nicer in the nearby future. Honoured guest, the University of Groningen stands tall for the future. A solid reputation and 403 years of history give us the strength to take on the challenges of today and tomorrow.

We connect the past to the present as we do with people and their dreams, with lecturers and their students. Dealing with internationalization and ICT is one of the greater challenges for the academic world. And as you have probably noticed we like to be in the forefront of those developments. I wish you students and scholars a very productive and successful academic year.”

But new developments require extra investment. In his opening speech, Elmer Sterken called upon the government in The Hague to increase investment in education and research. Read the full text of the speech delivered by the Rector Magnificus here.

Google

One of the highlights of the festive opening ceremony was the speech delivered by Pim van der Feltz, CEO of Google Benelux and alumnus of the UG. He explained how technology and continued digitization will eventually make the world a better place to live . Van der Feltz gave students the following piece of advice:

“So what can YOU do to best prepare for that? I would recommend: learn to be curious, learn how to research and learn to learn. And that can best be done, by using your time here to study with all your heart and find your passion (which by the way is also my advice for the non-study time... that should be done with similar intensity! - but that is probably less necessary to say).”

Read Pim van der Feltz's speech in full here.

Alumnus of the Year

After Pim van der Feltz, Sterken introduced Merel Rumping, UG Alumnus of the Year 2016 and social entrepreneur. The alumna of International Relations and International Organization won the recent Alumnus of the Year election as founder and project leader of LegBank, a social business that wants to supply affordable, comfortable prosthetic sockets to vulnerable lower-limb amputees in low-income countries, starting with Colombia. Her arguments on the subject on Monday afternoon were highly compelling.

Poet-in-residence
The newly selected UG poet-in-residence Rachel Raetzer (21), student of European Languages and Cultures, then provided a short intermezzo by reciting her poem: We are the letter-eaters. The opening ceremony concluded with a speech by the German student Hanna Berretz, who gave an account of her experiences as an international student in Groningen.