Ulysseus holds its first face-to-face Open Event with more than 50 students from six European universities
Ulysseus held today its second Open Event since the start of the project. This was a face-to-face event and took place only one month after the first anniversary of the start of Ulysseus. This gathering was dedicated to the Conference on the Future of Europe (CoFoE), a unique and timely opportunity for European citizens to voice their opinions on Europe’s challenges and priorities.
Ulysseus Open Event was opened by the Rector of the University of Seville, Miguel Angel Castro — who welcomed the students and the university representatives, academics, researchers and staff members from the partner universities of the Ulysseus alliance: University of Seville in Spain, Université Cote D’Azur in France, University of Genoa in Italy, Technical University of Kosice in Slovakia, MCI | The Entrepreneurial School® in Austria and the Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences in Finland.
“Today we can really say that Ulysseus is coming alive”, said the rector, whose speech emphasized the importance of the students in Ulysseus. “You are not only an essential part of our crew, but also the wind that pushes us all forward. Ulysseus aims at becoming the European University for the citizens of the future, and we will not be able to get there without your help”.
Finally, the rector of the University of Seville underlined the importance of Ulysseus cooperation. A way of working which “must serve to bring together all this knowledge to exchange our best practices, and to foster the development of new ones”.
After the opening session, one student of each Ulysseus’ partner introduced their universities and the group of participants in the two co-creation sessions organized for the event.
Position paper
The first group of participants was devoted to writing a position paper that will feed the Manifesto on the future of European universities that will be presented by the European Universities Community (EUC) to the Conference on the Future of Europe next March.
Ulysseus has lined up with the EUC, a grassroots project initiated by students from European Universities aiming to be the voice of European students, with the aim of contributing to the CoFoE. The position paper which was developed is aligned with Action 3 of the EUC initiative, the Manifesto on the Future of European Universities.
Developing a joint master’s degree
The second group worked on developing proposals for a Joint master’s degree in Energy, Transport, Mobility and Smart Cities. A joint degree is a diploma awarded by two or more universities offering a joint programme, which is recognised in various countries. With this initiative, Ulysseus involves the student from the very beginning in the bottom-up process of constructing the first Ulysseus joint degree.
Closing remarks from the day
The participants — who had jointly produced a position paper that will feed this Manifesto — read out their findings as closing remarks for the event. The session was closed at the core of the University of Seville, the Rectorate, with the reading of this position paper which represented a consensually agreed position of the participants.
Academic recognition meeting and visits to key research and innovation centres of the University of Seville
In parallel to the co-creation sessions, 40 representatives from the six partner universities of Ulysseus participated in key meetings and visits to key research and innovation centres of the University of Seville.
The Academic Recognition Work Group gathered at the Rectorate of the University of Seville. The work group held a kick-off meeting to work on the credit recognition for Ulysseus titles.
Last, but not least, a group of representatives from Ulysseus partner universities, visited key research and innovation centres within the University of Seville. First, they visited the Engineering School where they had the opportunity to visit various departments and to get to know key projects related to the areas of expertise of two Ulysseus hubs: Energy, Transport, Mobility and Smart Cities and Artificial Intelligence.
About Ulysseus
Ulysseus is one of the 41 European Universities selected by the European Commission to become the universities of the future. Led by the University of Seville together with five other universities in Europe (the University of Genoa, Italy; Université Côte d’Azur, France; the Technical University of Košice, Slovakia; MCI | The Entrepreneurial School®, Austria; and Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences, Finland), the project will allow students, researchers and graduates to move freely between universities, carry out internships in companies and start high-impact research projects.