NEWS & EVENTS

Dear colleagues, students, and partners across ENLIGHT,

At the beginning of the month ENLIGHT held a very successful Mid-Year meeting in Galway. I would like to share some key outcomes and reflections from the Governing Board meeting held there.

Over the past months, ENLIGHT has demonstrated clear progress and growing maturity. The successful mid-term review confirmed that the alliance is delivering well and has the potential to become a model of good practice by 2027.

We see this progress across all areas:

• Expanding collaboration in education, research and societal engagement
• A growing and active community, with thousands of staff and students engaged
• Increasing impact through initiatives such as ENLIGHT Thematic Networks, emerging joint programmes and an increasing number of collaborative initiatives, including different European projects.

Our achievement is collective and it builds a strong foundation for what comes next. ENLIGHT is entering a new phase in which we are moving from experimentation to consolidation, from project-based activities to institutional integration. Our objective is clear: ENLIGHT should become an open higher education area and a fully embedded, strategic instrument within each partner university, supporting long-term collaboration and transformation. This requires stronger engagement across all levels of our institutions, especially faculty leadership and middle management.

To further deepen our collaboration and keep focusing on the impact we want to achieve we will prioritise:

• Enhancing institutional embedding, so ENLIGHT becomes part of everyday practice
• Scaling mobility, particularly through joint programmes and new cooperation formats
• Strengthening support for early-career researchers
• Developing our digital campus and other tools to support seamless cooperation

We must significantly enhance our visibility, ensuring that ENLIGHT is clearly recognised both internally and externally by all key stakeholders.

As a step towards enhanced cooperation, the Governing Board endorsed a refined governance model that strengthens coordination and supports long-term sustainability. It also reaffirmed a focused alliance structure, maintaining the current partnership while exploring new forms of external collaboration. In addition, the Board confirmed ENLIGHT’s commitment to a neutral, mission-focused position centred on higher education, research, and societal engagement. Together, these decisions provide stability and clarity as ENLIGHT moves forward.

It makes me proud that ENLIGHT is increasingly recognised as a key actor in the European higher education landscape, with active engagement in EU policy discussions and initiatives, a strong strategic position in relation to upcoming funding opportunities, and growing international outreach. Our ambition remains to make a meaningful contribution to the European Education Area and to strengthen Europe’s role in the global knowledge ecosystem.

Looking ahead, we share a clear aspiration to become a fully embedded, visible, and impactful alliance, a platform for excellence in education and research, a driver of innovation and societal engagement and a lighthouse for European cooperation, democracy, and global citizenship.

Achieving this will require continued and enhanced commitment from all of us. The success of ENLIGHT depends on your engagement whether you are a student, researcher, academic or administrative staff member participate in ENLIGHT initiatives, build collaborations across institutions, help embed ENLIGHT in your daily work and share and communicate your experiences.

With my sincere thanks for your continued commitment!

Anders Hagfeldt
President, ENLIGHT Alliance