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Aurora Winter School in VU Amsterdam: Use of Generative AI in Academia

Written by Aniza Pourtauborde on . Posted in News.

The Winter School ‘Generative AI in Academia’ is an Aurora winter course within the Digital Society and Global Citizenship hub at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. Open to students and faculty across all disciplines and nationalities, it focuses on integrating generative AI into academic work and research.

Hosted at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the programme teaches participants how to use models like GPT and Llama for tasks such as data analysis, hypothesis generation, and literature summarisation. The curriculum is divided into a lecture-heavy first week followed by a collaborative second week where teams design a formal scientific study. Beyond technical skills, the course emphasises ethical responsibility, addressing concerns like bias, fairness, and the transparency of AI-generated results. Students are ultimately evaluated through a project pitch and a written proposal, ensuring they can apply these transformative tools to their specific fields of study.

Bridging the Gap in the Use of Generative AI

This insightful video documents the experiences of both the participants and the teacher. This course, a collaborative effort within the Aurora network, was born out of a necessity to bridge the gap between researchers using Generative AI tools and understanding how to use them properly, systematically, and considerably.

Course coordinator Dr. Ivano Malavolta, Associate Professor in Software Engineering and Director of the Network Institute, is joined by two PhD students from the University of Iceland, and a PhD student from VU Amsterdam to discuss the transformative nature of the programme.

Key highlights of the discussion include:

  • The Power of Interdisciplinary Collaboration: Xin Chen (a sociologist) and Ahmed Hamdi Abdrabou Moghazi (a geologist) moved beyond their individual “bubbles” to co-design a project exploring the link between past climate change and human migration. In addition, Niels van der Heijden expresses the value of interdisciplinary composition of the participants.
  • Moving Beyond the Basics: The participants reflect on how the course shifted their perspective from randomly writing prompts to a systematic A-Z approach for gathering information, verifying data, and structuring research proposals.
  • Learning by Doing: Dr. Malavolta explains the deliberate design decision to combine theoretical lectures with intensive hands-on labs. This approach allowed researchers—even those without technical backgrounds—to use AI for coding, statistical analysis, and creating complex data visualisations.
  • Ethical and Technical Depth: The group discusses the intense first week of lectures, which covered everything from the technical machinery of Large Language Models (LLMs) to critical debates on the ethics and perceived risks of AI in society.

Aurora Micro-credential Coordination Committee (Aurora-MCC) Moves from Framework to Implementation

Written by Aniza Pourtauborde on . Posted in News.

The Aurora Micro-Credential Coordination Committee (Aurora-MCC) formally constituted itself in November 2025, marking an important step in translating the Aurora Guidelines for Setting Up Micro-Credentials into coordinated practice across Aurora.

Participants at the second Aurora-MCC meeting. Photo credit: Aurora-MCC, Raab 

The constitutive meeting chaired by Christina Raab from Universität Innsbruck, confirmed the committee’s mandate, composition, and operational arrangements. With this, the Aurora-MCC was established as a permanent, cross-institutional coordination body focused on facilitation, peer learning, and ecosystem-building rather than quality control.

Moving from Framework to Implementation

The committee’s work builds directly on the Aurora Guidelines for Setting Up Micro-credentials, published in 2025 as a living document aligned with the European Council Recommendation on a European approach to micro-credentials. These Aurora guidelines provide a shared European framework for the quality-assured design, implementation, recognition, and visibility of Aurora micro-credentials, while fully respecting institutional autonomy and national regulatory contexts. The Aurora-MCC ensures continuity between this strategic framework and its operational interpretation across Aurora.

At its second meeting in January 2026, conducted online, the Aurora-MCC discussed a proof of concept for the implementation of jointly offered Aurora micro-credentials. The discussion addressed overarching principles and workflows, including coordinated academic collaboration, issuing arrangements and digital and administrative processes. The proof-of-concept discussion served as a structured test case to explore how the Aurora guidelines can be applied in practice and how joint Aurora micro-credentials could be implemented in a scalable and interoperable manner.

The Aurora-MCC currently works predominantly in an online format, enabling regular monthly meetings and continuous exchange. Through its ongoing activities, the Aurora-MCC is actively advancing the implementation phase of the Aurora guidelines, contributing to the development of a trusted, interoperable, and future-oriented micro-credential ecosystem within the Aurora.

For questions related to the work of the Aurora-MCC, the committee can be contacted via aurora-courses@uibk.ac.at

Aurora Students Gather in Reykjavík for the 2026 Student Conference

Written by Benedetta Toledo on . Posted in News.

Hosted by the University of Iceland (UI) in Reykjavík, the Aurora Student Conference 2026 marked the first in-person student event of the year. Over the course of three days from 12 to 14 January 2026, the conference brought together students from across Europe for an immersive experience focused on cultural exchange and collaborative learning.

Students from Aurora universities were fortunate to experience the northern lights (aurora borealis)

Open to members of the Aurora Student Council and Aurora Student Ambassadors, the conference aimed to strengthen intercultural exchange and cooperation within the Aurora network. The programme combined workshops on intercultural communication, public speaking and student engagement with informal activities designed to foster connection, including city tours, karaoke and peer-learning discussions.

The conference opened with the Aurora Student Council (ASC) meeting, during which ASC members discussed key topics such as the Student Rights Charter, the Code of Conduct and future student-led initiatives. The day concluded with an informal welcome aperitif at the university, offering participants the opportunity to connect in a relaxed setting.

Connecting Students Across Europe

On day two of the conference, participants were officially welcomed by the Institutional Coordinator and the Rector of the University of Iceland. The day continued with an open session addressing topics such as future communication strategies within Aurora, followed by an intercultural communication workshop. In the evening, students explored Reykjavík through a city tour led by local students and guides.


Reykjavík city tour with local students and guides

Day three focused on active participation and exchange. The programme included a student community engagement workshop, which highlighted the diversity of Aurora universities and their national contexts, as well as peer-to-peer learning and public speaking workshops. The conference concluded with a cultural exchange moment: students shared traditional food from their home countries, creating a vibrant space for informal dialogue and mutual discovery.

Aurora Student Council Board members present achievements of the student community in the last year

Overall, the Aurora Student Conference 2026 proved to be an intense and enriching experience, fostering open-mindedness, dialogue and collaboration among Aurora students, and further strengthening the sense of community within the alliance.

Joint Statement – A stronger Europe needs a properly funded Erasmus+

Written by rostanetek on . Posted in News.

07 January 2026

Aurora Universities has joined forces with 16 other European higher education organisations to issue a joint statement calling for an Erasmus+ budget of at least €60 billion for 2028–2034. The statement, published on 7 January 2026, urges the European Parliament, the European Commission, and Member States to significantly increase Erasmus+ funding to meet the programme’s ambitions.

Aurora is fully committed to the success of Erasmus+. The Aurora 2030 programme has made great progress on international cooperation and student and staff exchanges. However, the proposed budget will not suffice to maintain mobility and cooperation at scale, nor to broaden efforts and societal impact.

This joint statement, therefore, highlights the importance of securing funding aligned with Erasmus+’s ambitious objectives. This will allow the higher education organisations to secure one of Europe’s most tangible success stories, which will positively impact employability, innovation capacity and civic engagement across Europe.

Read the full statement here 

For more information, please contact Pim de Boer (senior policy advisor) or Ramon Puras (secretary general)

Aurora in 2026: New Year Message from Aurora Secretary General Ramon Puras

Written by Aniza Pourtauborde on . Posted in News.

Ramon Puras, Aurora Secretary General, meets 2026 with a message focused on major achievements in Aurora, future developments and gratitude to the Aurora community. 

Looking back on 2025, Aurora continues to be a shared space to experiment, learn, and rethink how higher education institutions serve society.

Some of our key achievements as a community:

As we move into 2026, we aim to build on this momentum to:

  • Further develop our Aurora 2030 alliance projects
  • Sharpen our educational roadmap
  • Expand collaboration with like-minded networks, such as the City Science Initiative
  • Deepen our work with the University of Sussex, made even stronger by the renewed academic collaboration between the UK and the European Union.

Most of all, we would like to express gratitude to the Aurora community.

To our universities’ visionary Presidents and Vice-Rectors.
To our fantastic Institutional Coordinators.
To our Aurora Student Council, who keeps us abreast of our students’ needs.
To our Aurora Central Office team, the motor of Aurora.
To all academics, staff and students involved in Aurora.

Their commitment and energy make Aurora what it is.

Our 10 years together in Aurora is coming up! We will be marking this moment during the Aurora Annual Conference 2026 at the University of Duisburg-Essen from 19 to 22 May.

Ramon Puras
Aurora Secretary General

With our universities: Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU Amsterdam), University of Iceland, University of Duisburg-Essen, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Universität Innsbruck, Università Federico II of Naples, Palacký University Olomouc, Université Paris-Est Créteil, Copenhagen Business School, Simon Fraser University, V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, South-West University “Neofit Rilski”, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice and University of Tetova.

A Broader Mind event at VU Amsterdam

Written by Sharon Feijen on . Posted in News.

On 15 October 2025, educators and academic leaders from across Aurora gathered at VU Amsterdam to explore an innovative approach to interdisciplinary education: the A Broader Mind Course. Organised by the Digital Society and Global Citizenship Hub, the event offered Aurora partners a unique opportunity to experience first-hand how VU Amsterdam prepares students to engage with complex societal challenges through cross-disciplinary thinking.
Developed by Prof. Govert Buis, the A Broader Mind Course challenges early-stage students to look beyond their primary discipline, guided by more advanced peers. Through diverse academic perspectives, students develop a holistic understanding of pressing societal issues: a mindset they carry throughout their academic journey.

From Concept to Collaboration

The day brought together teachers, students, educational advisors, researchers, policy staff, and programme directors to dive deep into the A Broader Mind methodology. Prof. Buis introduced the course’s pedagogical foundations, followed by a hands-on session where participants engaged with a concrete course assignment, experiencing the interdisciplinary approach from a student’s perspective.
The heart of the event was dedicated to ideation: working groups explored how A Broader Mind could evolve into a true Aurora-wide initiative. Participants discussed various implementation models: from flex mobility arrangements and local course variants to student exchange opportunities and joint programme development across partner institutions.

Building a Broader European Education

The event concluded with plenary feedback sessions where groups shared their visions for bringing A Broader Mind to their own universities, creating a roadmap for follow-up collaboration.
The A Broader Mind Event demonstrated how peer-guided interdisciplinary learning can make teaching more engaging, curricula more relevant, and institutional societal impact more profound. It marked an important step in the Aurora community’s shared mission to transform higher education across Europe, preparing students not just for their chosen fields, but for the complex, interconnected challenges of our time.

Aurora Showcased at CEEDUCON Conference in Prague

Written by Niels Hexspoor on . Posted in News.

On 19 and 20 November 2025, Palacký University Olomouc (UP) represented Aurora at CEEDUCON 2025, one of Central Europe’s leading conferences on the internationalisation of higher education. The seventh edition of the event, formerly known as CZEDUCON, brought more than 900 participants to Prague’s O2 Universum.  Over the course of two days, they participated in expert lectures, interactive sessions, and exchange among practitioners and policy makers.

The Czech National Agency for International Education and Research organised CEEDUCON, together with several other central European Agencies such as DAAD and OEAD. It serves as a key platform for advancing dialogue on global engagement in higher education. This year’s programme featured over 50 sessions and focused on themes central to Aurora’s mission. These included Internationalisation for All, strategic Global & Regional partnerships, Smart & Sustainable International Cooperation, and Alumni, Employability & Future Skills.

Representatives of Palacký University Olomouc participated in discussions, panels, and workshops. They shared their institutional experience and achievements, contributing Aurora’s perspective to the broader European conversation on higher-education cooperation.

Strengthening Stakeholder Engagement

The UP Aurora Office prominently highlighted Aurora in two sessions, also featuring Aurora associate partner Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice (UPJS).

Selma Porobić, Aurora Institutional Coordinator at UP, chaired a panel “Advancing Strategic Global & Regional Partnerships: Insights and Lessons from European University Alliances”. It featured contributions from Silvia Ručinská (UPJS), as well as Magdalena Sikorska (EUNICE Alliance) and John Gardiner (Ulysseus Alliance). The discussion drew on experiences from the FOREU4ALL Topical Group – Internationalisation and Global Outreach, chaired by Selma, Magda and John.   

The panel featured three concrete case studies of best practices:

  • Aurora  – a regional cooperation model focused on structured outreach and capacity-building in the CEE region;
  • Ulysseus – showcasing global strategic programmes and multi-continent partnerships;
  • EUNICE – presenting global gateway initiatives and innovative formats for inclusive stakeholder collaborations.

Additionally, Niels Hexspoor, Aurora Engagement and Impact Leader at UP, led an interactive workshop that explored how European university alliances can create inclusive and future-proof student communities in “Next Gen Student Communities: Futures Thinking for European Universities”. In the workshop, participants were challenged to imagine different possibilities for inclusive student engagement.

UP’s active presence at CEEDUCON 2025 was a great opportunity to demonstrate Aurora’s commitment sharing and learning with other higher education professionals to shape the future of European higher education—foregrounding openness, inclusivity, and strategic partnership building as shared priorities across Europe.

From City to Countryside, From Laboratory to Practice: Palacký University Hosts Dual BIP on Sustainability

Written by Niels Hexspoor on . Posted in News.

At the end of November 2025, Palacký University Olomouc hosted two Blended Intensive Programmes (BIPs): Cultivating Futures and From the City to the Country. Participants from across Aurora took part in a week of lectures, workshops, and field activities. These focused on sustainability, urban resilience, and cultural heritage.

The programme was coordinated by the Faculty of Arts with support from the Faculties of Science and Law and CATRIN. It was led academically by Assoc. Prof. Pavlína Flajšarová, and organised by Marie Sieberová.

The week began with sessions on natural resource management, circular economy, and biotechnology, followed by a field visit to the Molitor House and the Cathedral District. Subsequent days covered urban archaeology, urban heat islands, and nanotechnologies, along with structured spaces for sharing research and building international cooperation.

Then, a full-day excursion to the Lavender Farm in Bozděchov and Úsov Castle placed environmental topics in cultural and historical context. Additional workshops addressed plant physiology, examples of green urban development, and environmental law.

Throughout the programme, students engaged in training for the Three Minute Thesis (3MT) competition, aimed at improving skills in communicating scientific research clearly and concisely.

The week concluded with the 3MT final. Under the guidance of Suzanne Whitby and Prof. Toby Wikström, students presented their projects to a jury.

Winners:

  • 1st place: Grigor Vrhovac (Universität Innsbruck)
  • 2nd place: Livia Hökl (Universität Innsbruck)
  • 3rd place: Julia Kianzad (University of Duisburg-Essen)
  • Audience Award: Xin Chen (University of Iceland).

After the competition, a closing lunch provided space for informal exchange and reflection. The event demonstrated the value of interdisciplinary learning and cooperation across Aurora institutions.

Building the Future of Flexible Learning: Aurora’s Shared Approach to Micro-credentials

Written by UIBK on . Posted in News.

Micro-credentials are rapidly transforming higher education in Europe. As certified, small-scale learning units with clearly documented and assessed learning outcomes, they offer a flexible, inclusive, and responsive way for learners to acquire relevant competences. Within Aurora, micro-credentials play a vital role in shaping the inter-university campus of the future – one that is modular, transdisciplinary, and accessible across borders.


Christina Raab from Universität Innsbruck presents the Aurora Guidelines for Micro-credentials

The newly developed Aurora Guidelines for Micro-credentials provide a shared framework for designing, issuing, and recognising these qualifications across partner universities. Grounded in the European Council’s Recommendations and driven by Aurora’s mission for societal impact, these guidelines aim to harmonise practices and strengthen collaboration throughout the alliance.

A European Approach for a Changing Learning Landscape

Micro-credentials have emerged as important instruments to support lifelong learning, upskilling, and mobility within the European Higher Education Area. They allow learners to engage in small-scale learning experiences while ensuring that the acquired competences and knowledge are quality-assured, portable, transparent and stackable.

For Aurora, micro-credentials are more than just short courses. They are building blocks for a European inter-university campus:

  • Gateways to flexible participation across institutions
  • Tools for harmonising recognition and mobility
  • Foundations for socially impactful, transdisciplinary education.

The alliance’s decision to develop shared guidelines stems from the need to remove structural and technical barriers, align institutional practices, and ensure that learners can benefit from high-quality, jointly recognised opportunities – regardless of where they begin their studies.

These guidelines fully align with the 2022 Council Recommendation on a European approach to micro-credentials, as well as the principles of the European Qualification Framework (EQF), National Qualifications Frameworks, and the European Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance (ESG).

Designing Micro-Credentials for Quality, Transparency, and Impact

Aurora micro-credentials follow a set of shared principles to ensure comparability and quality across universities:

  • Learning outcomes-based design: Each micro-credential integrates subject-specific and transversal competences, drawing on frameworks such as the Aurora Competence Framework, LOUIS, BEVI, and seizmic
  • Standardised size and structure: Typically 3 to 10 ECTS credits, documented according to the standard elements defined by the European Council Recommendation
  • Quality assurance: Each issuing university applies its institutional QA processes, guided by ESG standards and national regulations
  • Levels of Aurorisation: Micro-credentials must reach at least Level 2 – meaning they are aligned with an Aurora Educational Hub, an SDG, and at least one key competence, ensuring a clear connection to Aurora’s mission and pedagogical standards.

Together, these principles ensure that every Aurora micro-credential is robust, comparable, and recognised across the alliance and beyond.


Aurora Academic Matchmaking Retreat where the Aurora Guidelines for Micro-credentials were presented

Collaboration Across Borders: How Joint Micro-Credentials Are Built

Joint micro-credentials are co-designed within Aurora’s Educational Hubs, where academics collaboratively develop content, align learning outcomes, and agree on assessment methods. “Joint” may also simply refer to the fact that participating students can come from all Aurora universities. While co-creation in the development process is the intended goal, it is not an absolute requirement for every joint micro-credential. Each participating university quality-assures the components it teaches, while one or more designated universities act as the official issuers. Because not every partner institution is equally positioned or technically equipped to issue micro-credentials, issuing responsibilities are assigned based on regulatory and technical feasibility. This collaborative model – anchored in mutual trust and transparent procedures – allows learners to combine learning units across institutions and receive a single, high-quality, jointly recognised credential.

To ensure consistency and support continuous development, Aurora’s Micro-Credential Coordination Committee (Aurora-MCC) – formally established in November 2025 – serves as a central body for coordination, expertise, and peer learning. Rather than enforcing compliance, the committee fosters a shared ecosystem, promoting visibility, interoperability, and alignment across work packages.

Digital Solutions for a Seamless Learning Experience

Technology is central to Aurora’s micro-credential ecosystem. The Aurora Virtual Campus serves as the central platform for publishing, accessing, and promoting Aurora micro-credentials. The corresponding courses will be displayed in the Aurora Joint Course Catalogue, enhancing visibility, transparency, and open participation for Aurora students and staff.

Aurora universities currently issue micro-credentials in two primary formats:

  • Digitally signed (e-sealed) PDF certificates, and
  • Secure digital badges, compliant with EU interoperability and data protection standards.

Looking ahead, the alliance aims to adopt European Digital Credentials (EDC) and digital wallets, enabling learners to securely store, manage, and share their achievements across Europe.

These digital solutions reinforce learner ownership, transparency, and employability -supporting a truly borderless learning experience.

Next Steps: Harmonisation, Visibility, and Future Readiness

Implementation of the guidelines will progress through several key actions:

  • Mapping existing micro-credentials and aligning them with Aurora standards
  • Increasing visibility through the Aurora Virtual Campus and shared catalogue
  • Developing shared workflows for issuing, recognition, and interoperability
  • Establishing a regular review and peer-learning cycle under the Aurora-MCC.

By 2030, micro-credentials are expected to become a core element of Aurora’s inter-university campus model. They will support personalised learning pathways, enable digital and physical mobility, and strengthen the alliance’s mission to foster research-driven, socially impactful education across Europe. Aurora also plans to expand micro-credentials into non-formal learning spaces and diverse learner communities, promoting access, inclusion, and lifelong learning.

Reflections: Opportunities and Challenges Ahead

The movement toward micro-credentials brings immense promise. They empower learners to design their own pathways, support cross-institutional collaboration, and encourage institutions to adopt more flexible, outcome-based approaches to teaching, learning and recognition. They also help connect formal and non-formallearning in more seamless ways.

Yet challenges persist. Aligning institutional regulations, recognition procedures, and digital infrastructures remains complex. Equally important are the cultural aspects: varying understandings of learning, hesitations around new practices, and the natural pull toward familiar institutional traditions.

Overcoming these challenges requires openness, trust, and a shared commitment to innovation. For Aurora, the path forward is clear: building a flexible, interoperable, and learner-centred ecosystem that supports Higher Education’s transformation in an era of continuous change.

Throwback to the Spark Social Programme Experience With Four Students From Universitat Rovira i Virgili

Written by Aniza Pourtauborde on . Posted in News.

Last spring, four students from Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV) travelled to Reykjavik, Iceland, to co-create solutions to global challenges related to educational innovation and digital sustainability. 

From left to right: Natalia Rodríguez, Laia Daura, Mireia Mei and Ruth Prats, during their visit to Reykjavík, Iceland

Promoting Transdisciplinarity Within The Spark Social Programme

Every year, the University of Iceland organises Spark Social, an Erasmus+ Blended Intensive Programme (BIP), offered to students from Aurora universities across Europe. The objective of this blended programme is to gather Masters to third-year Bachelor students under one roof, to co-create social entrepreneurship projects that respond to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Four students were selected from URV to be part of the programme:

  • Mireia Mei, student in the Interuniversity Master’s Degree in Health Data Science
  • Ruth Prats, student of the Bachelor’s Degree in Advertising and Public Relations
  • Laia Daura, student of the Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology
  • Natalia Rodríguez, student of the Bachelor’s Degree in Audiovisual Communication and Bachelor’s Degree in Advertising and Public Relations.

A Blended Programme Fostering Creative Solutions

After several virtual sessions between January and April 2025, the programme culminated in a five-day stay in Reykjavik, Iceland, where the teams worked to define and test solutions to real challenges. The methodology used was a combination of transitional thinking and design thinking, which fosters creative solutions to complex societal problems, social innovation through empathy, collaboration and prototyping, and in this case, international and interdisciplinary teamwork.  

GEN NEXT: Education for a new generation of active citizenship 

Natalia Rodríguez and Ruth Prats were part of the team that created GEN NEXT, an educational project focused on motivating adolescents between the ages of 12 and 15 through critical thinking to become active in the local community. Using a card game called A Can of Worms, young people explore different issues such as the environment, health and urban culture, and propose actions to improve their city. The project is completed with field research, urban observation and participation in municipal budgets, all fostering a culture of responsibility and real civic engagement. 

aqua.ai: Making visible the invisible impact of AI 

For their part, Mireia Mei and Laia Daura worked on the aqua.ai project, a proposal that addresses the environmental impact of technology. Focusing on the hidden water consumption of artificial intelligence systems, the project aims to develop an environmental awareness-raising package for governments, schools and institutions. This includes a browser extension that quantifies the water impact of digital queries, as well as educational materials on the subject. The objective of the project is to inform citizens and encourage change in the design of sustainable digital public policies to ensure that technological innovation does not work against the planet.