History illustrates that idea exchange is a catalyst for societal progress. The Pax Romana, Mongolica, and Americana facilitated this exchange, uniting diverse people across the Mediterranean, Eurasia, and the world. This convergence of ideas within a civilisation sparks innovation that benefits all. As people with different thought processes interact, their ideas give birth to new ones. While not all ideas succeed, a few emerge victorious from the multitude of experiments, symbolising progress and innovation. The safety of the Pax Mongolica, for instance, opened up a vast superhighway for people, ideas, and goods to flow from East to West and West to East. As caravans brought horses, porcelain, jewels, silk, paper, and gunpowder along the Silk Route, they also brought new ways of thinking and doing. From the Far East came brilliant ideas like paper-making and printing. From the Islamic world came unheard-of approaches to maths, astronomy, and science. Thanks to today’s caravans and ships - emails, the internet, Zoom, and the planes and trains that connect us in real-life meetings and conferences - we are able to flit around the globe and make the sort of connections that will lead to ever richer innovation. Where will this innovation lead us in the 2020s? That is the magic of innovation; you never really know where exactly it will lead. But since we know that it leads to progress that has been unprecedented and was hard to imagine in the past, it is easy to believe (if not picture!) how it will lead to improvements in the future.

The internationalisation of education has become controversial in the Netherlands, with calls to limit the number of international students and higher education courses in English. These negative attitudes reflect the success of Dutch international education, with 122,287 international students accounting for 15% of the total (Nuffic, 2023). Although programmes offered exclusively in Dutch have declined in recent years, the number of English-only bachelor’s programmes has been relatively stable since 2018. While growth rates have slowed, political debate on limiting international students continues. A proposed Education Bill requires two-thirds of content for standard bachelor’s degree programmes to be in Dutch.

In this article we will look back on the InnovaT project and highlight some of the key insights and lessons learned during the process, accumulating into an outlook on how to design higher education that is well equipped for the future. The InnovaT project was an initiative aimed at enhancing innovation in teaching and learning approaches, fostering modernisation in Higher Education Institutes (HEIs) in Chile and Peru. This project was co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

BUas is participating in a European Erasmus+ programme to design the sports venue of the future. This collaborative initiative involves partners from three countries - the Netherlands, Portugal, and Turkey - working collectively to innovate and validate sustainable sports facilities. There is a growing emphasis on how new sports centres in neighbourhoods and rural areas contribute to inclusion, social cohesion, mutual respect, and sportsmanship. Highlighting these aspects is crucial for fostering a sense of community through sports engagement. Sports is a powerful tool to unite people as it is accessible to many people of all ages and sports venues are places where people come together. Therefore, it could enhance social cohesion and inclusion.

BUas has joined the KreativEU University Alliance (Knowledge & Creativity European University), a decision that is going to shape our strategy for the coming decade. European Universities Alliances (EUAs) are collaborative networks of higher education institutes across Europe. They are established under the European Universities Initiative (EUI), which is part of the broader Erasmus+ 2021-2027 programme. The EUI aims to foster strategic partnerships among universities to enhance education, research, and innovation. By doing so, it seeks to improve the quality and international competitiveness of the European higher education sector. The initiative also emphasises community engagement and societal impact, positioning European Universities as models of best practices in these areas. Overall, the EUAs are designed to drive cooperation, enhance the global competitiveness of European education and research, and contribute to the innovation potential within Europe. The European Commission supports the creation of these alliances by providing financial backing, to form 60 EUAs involving over 500 institutes by mid-2024, of which 50 EUAs are already financed. The final call for Erasmus+ funding, which was published in autumn 2023, represented the last opportunity for institutes like BUas to join an EUA.

Leisure & Events Management students at BUas can opt for the ‘Urban Life & Placemaking’ (ULP) track. ULP uses events and leisure activities to help students develop and enrich cities, making them liveable and loveable. It encourages student participation in city event design and social interventions. ULP has an international perspective, learning from examples abroad and exposing students to the experiences of people with very different backgrounds. As part of ULP, students spend a semester (30 ECTS credits) in a European city with a small group of peers. This part is known as ‘Living in the City’ (LITC).