The report of 3 years of Secretariat managed by Parma

On 31 December 2021 the three years of the Secretariat managed jointly by the Municipality and the University of Parma will end. In these three years many things have happened, but above all the Network has had to deal with the pandemic that is still with us.

In the first year, the Secretariat dedicated itself to the organisation of two face-to-face meetings:

• Aveiro ( May 2019): How can Universities be an active Stakeholder in the development of Cultural activities in the City?
• Malaga ( November 2019) : Sustainable Tourism

The meetings were attended by 39 and 31 participants respectively.

The new Network Strategy 2020-2022 and the new Network Communication Plan 2020-2022 were also approved.

At the beginning of 2020, just as the meeting was being organised in Parma, the pandemic broke out and the meeting was cancelled.

During the summer, distance work began through online coordinator meetings and, above all, the organisation of a series of webinars, which ended in July 2021:

• #EUniverCitiesTalks n.1 (June 2020): Maintaining a cultural offer in times of social distancing.... a challenge for city & university - ZOOM Webinar
• #EUniverCitiesTalks n.2 (July 2020): Welcoming days and international student mobility in times of COVID-19 - ZOOM Webinar
• #EUniverCitiesTalks n. 3 (July 2021): Aveiro Tech City - ZOOM Webinar

In May 2020 Artevelde University of Applied Sciences in Ghent joined the Network

In October 2020, the Network's new website was launched, with the expectation that each partner would publish a news item, in rotation, every week.
The network's Instagram page was also launched and the group on Linkedin was reactivated. The newsletter has changed from a six-monthly publication to a monthly one.

In November 2020, as it was not yet possible to hold a face-to-face meeting, the City and the University of Lausanne proposed a series of workshops with the aim of developing a "Handbook on strategic city- university partnerships at European scale".

The workshops took place over 3 days, with a total of 182 participants;

Lausanne ( November 2020 - February 2021) ZOOM Meeting:

• Workshop 1: How city & university can address societal challenges
• Workshop 2: Strategic city-university collaborations: how to make them work
• Workshop 3: Student involvement in city-university collaboration: from ad hoc to a structural approach

At the end of 2020, the City and the University of Turku, together with Abo Academy, decided to leave the Network,

In May 2021, the Timisoara meeting took place, unfortunately still online:

 Timisoara ( May 2021) : Using University research to support the local government decision-making process

The meeting was attended by 38 people.

On 2 December 2021, in the Teatro Regio di Parma, Italy, the EUniverCities network proudly presented its Handbook for strategic city-university co-operation at the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the network.

The Handbook was presented in Parma during the meeting organised by the Secretariat

Parma ( December 2022) : A new student generation: new challenges for city&university

The meeting was attended by 82 people, including 28 students from all the Network Universities.

From 1 January 2022, the Secretariat will be managed by the University of Exeter for 3 years and the new Secretariat email will be: eunivercities@exeter.ac.uk.

 

Below are the numbers of the Segetariat's activities:

NETWORK MANAGEMENT
27 partners ( + 2 from 2022 )

84 fees managed

4 contracts managed (expert and newsletter)

6 Coordinators Meetings online

3 Coordinators Meetings in presence

COMMUNICATION
1623 emails arrived at eunivercities@comune.parma.it

691 emails sent from eunivercities@comune.parma.it

1 MS Teams website activated

1 Instagram page activated

70 posts on Instagram

137 Instagram followers

1 Website renewed https://eunivercitiesnetwork.com/

50 News published on the site

45 posts on Linkedin 109 members

10 Monthly Newsletters sent (from January 2021) 2 Semi-annual newsletters sent (year 2019)

MEETINGS

4 Meetings in presence

1. Aveiro: How can Universities be an active Stakeholder in the development of Cultural activities in the City?
2. Malaga: Sustainable Tourism
3. Parma: A new student generation: new challenges for city&university

1 Online meeting

1. Timisoara ( May 2021) : Using University research to support the local government decision-making process

3 Online workshops
Lausanne Workshop :

1. How city & university can address societal challenges
2. Workshop 2: Strategic city-university collaborations: how to make them work
3. Workshop 3: Student involvement in city-university collaboration: from ad hoc to a structural approach

3 Webinars #EUniverCitiesTalks

1. Maintaining a cultural offer in times of social distancing... a challenge for city & university
2. Welcoming days and international student mobility in times of COVID-19
3. Aveiro Tech City