“ENHANCE – European Universities of Technology Alliance” will receive funding from the European Commission to strategically develop its cooperation. The European Commission announced the award on 07.09.2020.
The alliance, of which TU Berlin is the speaker, is one of 24 universities in the second call of the European University Initiative to be awarded 5 million euros over the coming three years. The seven partner universities of technology of “ENHANCE – European Universities of Technology Alliance” are Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden), Norwegian University of Science and Technology (Norway), Politecnico di Milano (Italy), RWTH Aachen University and Technische Universität Berlin (Germany), Universitat Politècnica de València (Spain),
and Warsaw University of Technology (Poland).
The networks formed through the initiative are intended to enhance the quality and attractiveness of European higher education and boost cooperation between institutions, their students and staff. The proposal of the seven ENHANCE universities pursues a joint strategy and promotes European values and identity.
The initiative is designed to significantly strengthen mobility of students and staff and foster the inclusiveness of higher education in Europe. More flexible study and research offers and fewer bureaucratic hurdles will make it easier for students, doctoral candidates, researchers, and staff to pursue their educational and career paths. The current health crisis, in particular, has shown how important cooperation and coordinated action are and what a great difference sharing innovative and creative ideas and solutions can make.
“We have set ourselves ambitious goals and I am convinced that the European University Initiative will elevate our cooperation with partners to a new level. We are already working closer together than ever before. Mobility, whether digital or analog, is as important as ever and we are determined to establish the best conditions to enhance the mobility of our students and staff within our network,“ says Professor Angela Ittel, vice president for strategic development, junior scholars, and teacher education at TU Berlin.
Overall, the seven partners have approximately 245,000 students and have exchanged more than 4,400 students and staff over the last five years.
With a vision to “drive responsible societal transformation by enhancing a strong alliance of European Universities of Technology, empowering people to develop and use science and technology responsibly and turn global challenges into opportunities”, the ENHANCE partner universities aim to use the three-year funding period to lay the foundation for structures which enable the seamless mobility of students, researchers, and employees of the universities.
The envisioned instruments will first be tested in selected bachelor’s and master’s programs. The implementation of innovative teaching and learning formats will enable all students to profit from international ENHANCE offerings, such as online courses, virtual student communities, or projects, workshops and summer schools.
Value-based teaching offered in collaboration with societal stakeholders will ensure that students learn to think critically and develop and apply knowledge and technologies for
the benefit of society. As an alliance of universities of technology, an important focus of ENHANCE is also on sustainable innovation and entrepreneurship.
The second round of the European Universities initiative attracted applications from 62 university alliances involving 380 higher education institutions. ENHANCE is one of 24
university networks comprising on average seven higher education institutions that are participating in the second call for creating a European Education Area by 2025.
