CHARM-EU & EUTOPIA join forces to make the university of the future more inclusive

After the event, we sat down with Agnes Sarolta Fazekas, CHARM-EU Work Package 6 Inclusiveness Leader and Catherine Gillo Nilsson, coordinator of EUTOPIA's work package on Inclusion from the University of Gothenburg, Cheyma Al Mehraj, Project coordinator for EUTOPIA's work package on Inclusion from Vrije Universiteit Brussel, and Lewis Beer, international partnerships officer at the University of Warwick. The colleagues have shared some fascinating views on the challenges and enablers of making the future university more inclusive.

- ABOUT THE ALLIANCES -

Can you briefly present the EUTOPIA alliance? What does it stand for?

EUTOPIA: EUTOPIA is the acronym for European Universities Transforming to an OPen Inclusive Academy. EUTOPIA is much more than a university network/Alliance. It is aligned in terms of a fundamental vision regarding the added value and contribution of academia to society. To achieve its mission, the project is divided into three parts: a long-term vision (whose horizon is 2050), a mid-term project and ambition (2025), and a short-term piloting plan (three years). We are currently implementing the pilot project. It started with six partners Universities (the University of Ljubljana (Slovenia), the Vrije Universitat Brussels (Belgium), CY Cergy Paris Université (France), the University of Gothenburg (Sweden), the University of Pompeu Fabra (Spain), the University of Warwick (United Kingdom). And now we have 4 new partners: Università Ca'Foscari Venezia (Italy), Technische Universität Dresden (Germany), in Universidade NOVA de Lisboa (Portugal), the University of Babeș-Bolyai in Cluj-Napoca (Romania).

Can you tell us more about EUTOPIA’s mission and vision?

EUTOPIA: The joint mission of EUTOPIA is to build a distinctive, daring, and driven Alliance of transformative and engaged institutions. EUTOPIA will produce challenge-driven research and teaching, prepare empowered European graduates, champion regional and international involvement, and support diversity, inclusivity and widening citizenship. Our goal is to promote and ensure that higher education is inclusive and accessible to all students. Therefore, we believe that to grasp the full benefits of its universities, Europe needs to open up higher education and foster an ambitious academic engagement with the most dynamic and transformative elements of social construction. It demands continuous cooperation between faculty, staff, students, and representatives from the public and private sectors. EUTOPIA's partner universities will pursue educational formats and processes designed collaboratively to achieve this.

Can you explain what values and principles are driving EUTOPIA’s actions?

EUTOPIA: The main principle of the project is to create learning opportunities for all groups of students, especially those who are disadvantaged because of their gender, race, ethnicity, migrant background, economic status, disability, etc. It requires higher education institutions to move beyond traditional exchange approaches and to implement well-coordinated practices and programmes that are explicitly and honestly designed to support the inclusion of all. We also can outline that the EUTOPIA pilot project is based on the main concepts of co-creation and participation to empower students.

Agnes, can you briefly present the CHARM-EU Alliance? What does it stand for?

CHARM-EU: In December 2017, the European Council decided to stimulate new networks of European universities that aim to improve the international competitiveness of higher education institutions. The CHARM European University (CHallenge-driven, Accessible, Research-based, Mobile European University) Initiative was born in January 2019, co-funded by the Erasmus+ project. It is designed to strengthen the mobility of students and staff and – and critically for our work – to foster European higher education's quality, inclusiveness, and competitiveness. To demonstrate this innovative model, CHARM-EU currently runs a Master's in Global Challenges for Sustainability, led equally by all five partner universities.

What is CHARM-EU's vision in terms of inclusion and diversity?

CHARM-EU: In CHARM-EU, we see it as our social responsibility to foster an open, welcoming, and safe environment and create excellence in teaching and learning by removing barriers and supporting access and participation of all students and staff access and participation. In the current climate, intolerance, preconceptions, ignorance, and fear of differences are sometimes the common denominators. It is essential to prepare individuals to study and work in an interconnected world. As a 'test-bed' new university model, CHARM-EU offers an extraordinary opportunity to innovate and apply inclusion by design. We can draw on best practices and influence new inclusive practices within our partner universities, "showing" how to implement inclusivity rather than just "telling" people what to do. We were delighted that our work on inclusiveness was acknowledged in a recent report by COFACE Families Europe – a European network of civil society associations representing the interests of all families within Europe: COFACE Families Europe reflecting on CHARM-EU's work on inclusion | CHARM-EU

Why did CHARM-EU embrace inclusiveness as a core value?

CHARM-EU: We strongly believe in the power of diversity to enrich the learning experience, academic debate, and knowledge creation and production. Individuals from all backgrounds, lived experiences, circumstances, and access needs can collaboratively learn, work, and serve. We are committed to creating excellence in teaching and learning by providing the appropriate structures and services that remove barriers to success and support student and staff access and participation needs.

- THROWBACK TO THE INCLUSION WORKSHOP -

To summarise the outcomes of the workshop, Agnes, in your opinion, what barriers and solutions do we have to address in policy and practice across EU/Members States/CHARM-EU & EUTOPIA linked to inclusion and diversity?

CHARM-EU: Still, many structural barriers to higher education hinder individuals' full and effective participation from various backgrounds, lived experiences, and access needs. The solution is that higher education institutions should embrace the principle of inclusivity by design (i.e., taking a preventive approach rather than a retrospective approach). They should keep questioning what is not accessible or not inclusive and have a continuous reflection. Higher education institutions should also find solutions and establish measures to minimise financial barriers (i.e., scholarship/financial aids) that constitute a major obstacle to universal access.

As a solution, it is essential to reflect on the unconscious and conscious biases because of the many hidden factors in Higher Education and other social spaces. We need to be open and ask about what is not inclusive and who is included or excluded from negotiations and decision-making processes. Stakeholders should work together and have people whose own lived experiences provide insights into working towards a more accessible education and future. In conclusion, it is essential to create dialogues and collaborate, opening doors to various organisational units within and between our Alliances, such as CHARM-EU & EUTOPIA, to develop a more inclusive higher education environment within Europe. Inclusion is everyone’s business!

Dear Colleagues of EUTOPIA, you mentioned during the workshop that inclusion could not be reached once and for all. At CHARM-EU, we are implementing a DEI office to ensure continuity and appropriation of the inclusion process at the highest level of governance. What is your opinion on that?

EUTOPIA: It sounds like a great way to centralise the inclusion process and make it consistent. A DEI office will situate Diversity, Equity and Inclusion issues and strategies at the highest governance level of the Alliance and facilitate the continuous implementation of inclusion practices in every step of building the European university of the future. It also sounds like the CHARM-EU Inclusion team has worked hard to establish good working relationships with the different parts of the Alliance. The DEI office is not only centralised and top-down but also has a collaborative approach to working. This is inspiring and what we aim for in EUTOPIA: to maintain central inclusion processes that enjoy a healthy dialogue with all the other parts of the structure.

CHARM-EU Alliance has also discussed the importance of having a 'living strategy' for issues like this – in other words, a dynamic approach that evolves and adapts over time – and this relates to our point about how inclusion cannot be reached once and for all. We need coherent, centralised, connected inclusion processes, but we also need to ensure these are not set in stone. Inflexible structures are likely to become exclusive over time. We know this, and our students know it even better!

What is EUTOPIA's approach in terms of structure to support the process?

EUTOPIA: We, as the EUTOPIA Inclusion team, can suggest what needs to be done within the Alliance to ensure the continuity of the inclusion process and what needs to be done so that the principles underlying EUTOPIA and underlining its uniqueness and innovation - Co-Creation, Participation, Empowerment, Involvement - are implemented and taken into account.

We have shown that the principles of equity and inclusion are already provided for at various levels but that the experience of the people who make up the higher education space is still far from bearing witness to inclusion. Our findings show that without the principles of inclusion, we cannot think of the university of the future, especially one that can produce sustainable knowledge, high-quality outcomes, and innovative performance by activating its full potential. One suggestion would undoubtedly be that in addition to student representatives, we should have one or more experts on all management structures (Governance Board; Executive Board; Quality Board). The principles of inclusion must be present at all levels. As we said on 24th March 2022 at the conference,

• We need to train employees to know how to communicate and equip them with tools to implement the policy measures for inclusion (our toolkit and roadmap). Experts should do the training from experience.
• We need to monitor inclusion at different levels with the help of other bodies.

- PRACTICES & STRUCTURES -

Agnes, please tell us more about the structures and practices fostering inclusion and diversity within the CHARM-EU Alliance?

CHARM-EU: We work hard to transform mindsets to create a comprehensive understanding of inclusion principles. Within CHARM-EU, the inclusiveness team advises on policies, organisational structures, and educational methodologies. We co-create our inclusivity processes: we workshop with staff and brainstorm and gather feedback from students.  An inclusive protocol during the Admissions Process of CHARM-EU Master's supports the engagement of underrepresented groups and those who have faced barriers in their educational journeys. We administer CHARM-EU Grants to minimise financial barriers.  Working closely with students, we conduct Individual Needs Assessment Processes and identify necessary accommodations and recommendations. Importantly, we support CHARM-EU teams in implementing them.  We offer tailored Inclusivity tips and "quick wins" for CHARM-EU educators to create an inclusive teaching and learning environment and other ideas such as how to establish an inclusive and warm welcome within our CHARM-EU modules. We can also highlight that we need to comply with the legislation of five EU member states. It's exciting and challenging.

We find it very interesting and inspiring how EUTOPIA involves students in constructing this inclusive framework. Can you tell us more about that?

EUTOPIA: Students shaped our work and were included very early, basically from the start. Then, the pandemic made it more challenging to engage directly with students for a long time. However, we spent this time constructing a EUTOPIA Inclusion Framework that reflects our policies and practices so that we would have something accessible for the students to engage with. In the last six months, we have put this into practice. We recruited students from diverse student communities across the Alliance. We are currently conducting four focus group sessions with them. In each session, we asked the students to share their experiences and review approaches to inclusion, processes and practices, and the proposed Eutopia framework for Inclusion and Diversity. We have also set up a digital platform via Discord for the students to share their thoughts and reflections on the above and engage in conversations between the facilitated physical/virtual focus group sessions. The main goal is to implement a co-creation methodology to co-create the Eutopia framework and strategy for inclusion with students and experts by experience.

What challenges and solutions are you identifying when integrating inclusion on a broader level within your Alliance? Where do you currently stand in the process?

EUTOPIA: The biggest challenge for us is to maintain dialogue with colleagues across the Alliance to establish and integrate inclusion processes, practices, and the framework across the Alliance, while we are still developing it and co-creating it with students. It is challenging to have a coherent discussion of inclusion across a complex project with many work packages and diverse cultures. Designing an alliance-wide strategy on inclusion that is positive but also critical of the status quo (which an inclusion strategy needs to be) is challenging. 

Our solution is communication: we maintain connections between projects and discuss the known issues in good faith; we don't expect an immediate or definitive solution to these complex problems. Getting to know each other’s inclusion work, strengths, weaknesses, and gaps is also crucial. In the continuation of our efforts and work on transforming EUTOPIA European University into an open and inclusive academy, we are moving from a separate work package to a more transversal Inclusion effort, which means that we will be integrating inclusion strategies and developing inclusion measures in all work packages and across the Alliance. 

One of your outputs is a framework/model showing what an inclusive university looks like in terms of policies and practices. At this stage of your work, and from your perspective, can you tell us what it looks like?

EUTOPIA: At this stage, we can say that it will include an agreed common co-created approach and framework for inclusion, with a manifesto on strategy and policy measures for inclusion.  There are currently four main components: core principles, a roadmap to inclusive practice; a large set of case studies showcasing our current practice; and our future vision.

What we are saying at the moment is:  

• this is what we agree on;
• this is what we have in common;
• this is how we are different;
• this is what's happening now, and this is what we want to happen in the future.

We will continue to work in this line with what EUTOPIA does with inclusion and as a strategic and dynamic resource for ourselves as we take this Alliance forward and include more partners and stakeholders.

- FUTURE OF HIGHER EDUCATION & COLLABORATION -

What needs to change in the future of higher education in terms of better realisation of inclusion (systems, relationships, decision-making processes, culture, for example)?

EUTOPIA: Legislation is a necessary precondition for a better realisation of inclusion. We need a holistic approach that embraces policies and practices from widening access and admissions to participation in learning and teaching processes and structures. Co-creation and capacity building are other keys regarding staff and students' diversity and inclusion issues. We need to rethink, revitalise, and develop institutional systems, decision-making processes, and academic cultures to ensure equal rights and opportunities for all its members. Alliances should join forces and co-create with students and society in mainstreaming inclusion efforts across European Universities. In concrete terms, we need:

• more co-creation, breaking down barriers between institutions and their members (staff and students)
• more critical self-reflection and honest dialogue about problems
• more top-down mandates, incentives, and resources to do these things

CHARM-EU:

It would be great to witness within the next ten years that CHARM-EU, EUTOPIA, other Alliances, and general higher education sector and institutions are systematically building on the policies and practices they are currently doing. They will keep meaningfully involving people with various backgrounds, lived experiences, and access needs and listen to them in the procedures, the design, the delivery, and the brainstorming. They are the ones who can tell us how we can do better in monitoring what was achieved and how we should go forward with our ambitious goals.

How do you envision collaborating between CHARM-EU & EUTOPIA or other further alliances? What can you take from it, and how can it benefit Alliances?

EUTOPIA: Joining forces and collaboration across alliances is crucial in realising inclusion and diversity in the European higher education area. Continuous dialogues and exchanges across Alliances could initiate a mutual learning process and establish other infrastructure for capacity building within the field of inclusion and diversity.

We envision that CHARM-EU and EUTOPIA could:

• share best practices (i.e., CHARM-EU's mainstreaming of Inclusion across work packages; EUTOPIA's co-creation and showcasing activities)
• model critical self-reflection by sharing challenges and problems to learn from these as well
• host a whole day joint DEI symposium or an Erasmus+ Staff Training initiative (2-3 days) in the next phase of the European university initiative

CHARM-EU: It is incredible to witness what the European University Initiatives have brought. Since the establishment of the Alliances, a concrete takeaway is that we are now opening doors, creating dialogues with each other within and between Alliances. We are meeting with colleagues we never met because of the new collaborative model of mainstreaming inclusion within every corner of the university environment. With colourful collaborations, such as within CHARM-EU Community and between CHARM-EU and EUTOPIA Alliances, we can do something together beyond our Alliances. We can learn from each other more effortless than before, open up the different professional bubbles, mix our knowledge and expertise, share our voices, and advocate together toward a more just, inclusive higher education environment. The way forward is a meaningful collaboration. Working towards inclusion and diversity, putting into action the 'No one is left behind' happens by taking a step by step approach every day. It also contributes to tackling global societal challenges that not only one group of people or one group of experts are working on but together. In a nutshell, colourful and joined collaboration is critical, as all voices and expertise are needed for the future. CHARM-EU and EUTOPIA have started this from 2nd July 2020, and we're just getting stronger to enhance a more inclusive higher education across Europe and beyond.

- AS A CONCLUSION AND WAY FORWARD -

While the CHARM-EU Governance Forum showcased many challenges that European University Alliances will face in the future, it also perfectly demonstrated that cooperation is a critical tool that will help us overcome obstacles and challenges inclusion, diversity, and many other aspects. After EUTOPIA Digital Inclusion Conference on 2nd July 2020, where Agnes shared CHARM-EU's approach to inclusion and diversity, this discussion at the CHARM-EU Governance Forum was a remarkable continuity of collaboration between CHARM-EU and EUTOPIA Alliances. It is a very encouraging sign and a necessity for years to come to make the university of the future more inclusive.