The recent State of the Union address by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, followed by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s speech to the European Parliament, put an intriguing idea on the table: a closer relationship between Canada and the European Union, potentially including a new form of associate membership.
A column by Ramon Puras, Aurora Secretary General
Many LinkedIn wizards have already commented on the political, economic, and geopolitical significance, and they have valuable points! But listening to this discussion, I keep coming back to another question:
“What does this mean for universities, and what can we build from the bottom up?”
For those of us working in higher education, research, and innovation, closer ties with Canada are not just an interesting geopolitical concept. We can make them tangible through students, academics, and professional staff working together.
At Aurora, we have decided to do exactly that with our Canadian partner, Simon Fraser University (SFU). We are not starting with grand programmes or building giant research accelerators (yet!). Instead, we are connecting people through joint projects, educational activities, and shared institutional challenges. These may look like small steps, but together they help build lasting connections between institutions and societies. And this is anything but easy.
An obstacle marathon
Anyone involved in transnational university collaboration knows the experience. Even within Europe, we encounter national regulations, incompatible systems, institutional procedures and different interpretations of what is and is not possible.
Hello, Fifth Freedom!
We talk about the free movement of knowledge, researchers and innovation across Europe, while many barriers remain in practice. Add another continent and regulatory environment, and the complexity only increases.
So why make the effort? Running a university is already complex enough, isn’t it? For me, there are at least three reasons:
- Our societies: Universities help sustain open and equitable societies. They are places where people question, debate, create knowledge, encounter different perspectives, and learn to work across differences. Connecting universities across borders strengthens these values and the societies built upon them.
- Our knowledge communities: Education, research and innovation all become stronger when students, academics, and professional staff can work across borders. Europe and Canada can combine complementary strengths, learn from each other and address shared challenges together. This is not only about major research programmes. Joint courses, student mobility, collaborative learning, research projects and professional exchange all contribute to a stronger knowledge community…
- Our next generation: Perhaps foremost, our students should have the opportunity to study, learn, research, create, and innovate across borders. International cooperation should not be an abstract political concept for them, but something they experience as part of their education and their lives.
If we want future generations to build societies grounded in democracy and equity, we need to give them opportunities to practice that collaboration.
From ambition to practice
Political ambition alone will not remove the obstacles. That requires continued attention from all of us:
- For European and national policymakers: keep supporting, and not only financially, the instruments that make collaboration possible. Erasmus+, Horizon Europe and other European initiatives provide important infrastructure for cooperation. National barriers that make transnational cooperation unnecessarily difficult also need continued attention.
- For university leaders: continuously open pathways for collaboration and recognise the people who work to break down institutional barriers. There will always be plenty of people within our institutions who can explain why something is “not possible because of A and B.” We need, however, those who ask: “What would have to change to make it possible?” Value them!
- For faculty, professional staff and students: keep your eyes on the prize and keep pushing. That includes my own tribe, the Secretaries-General (and the like).
Our individual contributions may be small. Together, however, they create a resilient network of people and institutions able to cooperate across borders.
And perhaps from the European perspective, our ambition should reach further. Canada can be an important step towards a wider knowledge community, connecting Europe with countries and institutions that share our commitment to openness, equity, research and education.
“Ursula Von der Leyen and Mark Carney can help open the political door… it is up to all of us to build the pathways through it.”
