CONNECTING WITH SOCIETY

Societal Engagement

We deliberately choose to change the description of the Vice-Chancellor function "Service" to "Societal engagement" because it encompasses a broader and deeper understanding of the institution's role in society. It implies a proactive engagement with and responsiveness to the needs and challenges of society at large. Inspired by a recent internal report with 20 concrete recommendations on social engagement at UAntwerpen, we will sharpen the existing vision around social engagement and translate it into a set of achievable strategies and measurable objectives. We will develop a framework and communicate it so that it is clear to everyone what social engagement at the university stands for. Depending on the objective, we will carefully choose which of the many bottom-up initiatives can be given room to grow and which ones we will not support.

In addition to a dedicated Department of University & Society, it is important that social engagement is integrated and embedded in all sections, faculties and departments. In this way, more synergies can also be created and cooperation and interdisciplinarity can be encouraged. Staff efforts in this area should therefore be explicitly appreciated and supported.

Science Communication

UAntwerp has made huge leaps forward in Science Communication in recent years. We are strong in Citizen Research and are known for it. Our researchers and university management are increasingly explicitly present in the media, which has strengthened our reputation as a research-intensive university. In the coming period, we want to empower, enthuse and support researchers even more to take the lead in societal debate and broadly disseminate and translate their knowledge to different audiences. People should rightly be proud of their achievements as well as those of colleagues and act as ambassadors to the outside (and inside) world. The university must give them the opportunity to professionalise in setting up, executing and evaluating social engagement initiatives (both in research and education, etc.) and possibly also open up this professionalisation to external partners. We will work more efficiently on the database of researchers' areas of expertise so that external partners can find the right person more easily.
We remain committed to events for a wide audience that make the university's "thinking and doing" very tangible, such as Science Day. At the same time, organising such events requires a lot of time and often money, so we need to use limited resources strategically. We need to be selective in where we present and evaluate the various initiatives.
Science communication should always take place in close cooperation with the departments of Research, Innovation & Valorisation Antwerp (RIVA) and Marketing & Communication. Much is already invested in content such as podcasts or short films following the academic awards and the AHA!-awards. We need to distribute this content more widely, use it in multiple places and reuse it more often. We will also actively look for partnerships with different media to integrate UAntwerpen and its research in, for example, television productions (e.g. Team Scheire, Ze zeggen dat, factcheckers).

University Fund

The University Fund is already highly professionalised but there is still a lot of room for growth. We need to become more "top of mind" as our target. We set ambitious goals to raise more funds from donations, legacies and chairs. We want to build a real community that includes our staff, students and their parents and alumni. The cooperation with RIVA and Marketing & Communications will also need to be strengthened here to really build the fund into a successful platform where society and science meet.
We also need to think creatively about new forms of partnerships and sources of income such as, for example, sponsorship of premises or buildings, co-working facilities, etc., while always keeping our mission and value framework in mind.