Anna, staff member at the University of Szeged in Hungary, was one of the over 300 participants who attended the 2023 Annual Summit in Lund, Sweden. From June 12 to 14, she attended workshops, meetings and conferences designed around the topic “Building Bridges between Education and Research”. Here is what Anna had to say about her experience in the 2023 Annual Summit:
My EUGLOH Story:
Fun. Inspiring. Unique. These are words that always return again and again when a EUGLOH event is being discussed. And for a reason.
First of all, I would like to say that as someone relatively new to the Alliance, I arrived at the Annual Summit (held June 12-14) with as great expectations as a Dickensian protagonist. However, as opposed to the distinguished gentleman in the all-time classic, my hopes were never crushed, but rather upheld. Surpassed, even. I haven’t been working with EUGLOH for long, but my new colleagues were never anything but kind and patient with me, treating me as an equal. Now I have a first-hand experience with how open this alliance – this community – is. And what a fertile soil it is for new ideas and initiatives.
We started Monday off with a separate slot for each working group to discuss challenges and ideas. As a member of the working group focusing on Communication and Dissemination, we set out to explore some of the multiple challenges we face when it comes to sharing information. By the end of the last session, we realized (once again) that we are all in this together; we share the same values, we are not fighting our obstacles alone, and even that those obstacles can be reframed as opportunities if we tackle them as a team.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, we chose different tracks according to our main interests. Being a former English Studies student myself, I’m too in love with humanities to miss the chance to listen to Track 1: Art & Health, although the other two tracks (Agenda 2030 and the Future of Education in Europe: tools to fulfil the vision) sounded extremely exciting as well. On this particular track, we discovered how arts can be a tool in the hands of educators and facilitators and how, in addition to enriching our lives, they can contribute to our mental and general health as well. An intriguing topic, especially in these post-Covid, war-torn days, when diseases, anxiety and depression rear their ugly heads on a daily basis, posing serious threat not only to mental, but also to general health globally.
The speakers were from different areas within the Alliance, sometimes presenting research that had already been conducted by interdisciplinary and international teams. Is there even a better way to prove how great EUGLOH is in sparking teamwork across disciplines and borders?
One thing I really loved about the summit were the extracurricular activities, especially the visit to the Lund Skissernas Museum, which is a collection of scraps, drawings and sketches, an incredible homage to the artistic process itself. While strolling through the half-finished artworks of my favourite (and next favourite) artists, I realized how awe-inspiring it is to see something in the making – something that is meant to be magnificent, but that might seem small and insignificant at the moment. It’s like a glimpse behind the curtain.
But the Museum of Scraps was not only a sight to see, it also reminded me of the unique process I am part of. EUGLOH is an extraordinary Alliance and after the Annual Summit, I’m even more excited to be part of the team building something bigger than me – bigger than all of us. Part of something that has been forged in an extremely difficult time of the EU, and that is, I firmly believe, capable of addressing the challenges of this time.