FASoS Future-Proof

The elections for the Faculty Council take place at a time when our academic community at FASoS is faced with serious challenges. Budget cuts and continued uncertainty over possible limitations on internationalisation loom large over the future of our Faculty, and of Maastricht University and Dutch academia more generally. Populist and far-right political parties question and seek to restrict academic freedom, including in countries, such as the United States, where the value of independent research and education, up until recently, were thought to be firmly rooted.  

Meanwhile, the well-documented pressures within academia – the high workload, fierce competition for research funding, and general push towards excellence in ever more aspects of our work – have not lessened. Notwithstanding the positive steps that have been taken as part of the Recognition & Rewards program, the reduction in workload that was aspired to come from diversifying academic career profiles has yet to materialise. Sustaining the quality of teaching and learning at FASoS, as the use of (gen)AI becomes ever more commonplace, adds yet another challenge for us to tackle in the coming years. 

We believe that the strength of our FASoS community lies in its diverse, international and interdisciplinary character and in our ability to jointly respond to challenges with a creative and open mindset. In a time of great external pressures, it is essential we stand together and foster constructive debates – within our Faculty, as well as with society-at-large. We must reinforce the FASoS community by strengthening ties: across departments, across teaching and research programs, across scientific and non-scientific staff, and from PhD to full professor. 

Taking this commitment as our starting point, we aim to highlight five topics in the next two years: 

• Recognition & Rewards: promote opportunities for diversification of academic careers, and in ways that result in a reduction, rather than an increase of workload. Creating ‘room for everyone’s talent’ within the organisation should offer meaningful recognition and opportunities for professional development for all.
• AI in education and research: promote a more fundamental discussion about how to safeguard the quality of teaching, beyond the introduction of genAI use tables and more controlled forms of assessment, and about how to sustain research integrity. 
• PBL reform: use the ongoing efforts to rethink PBL as an opportunity to increase room for creativity and flexibility in our teaching, to enhance research-teaching integration and reduce workload.
  
• Societal embedding of FASoS: promote a conversation about the societal position of our research and teaching and how to consolidate mutually beneficial relationships with (non-)academic partners, while safeguarding our independence and academic freedom. Through our teaching, we can foster the development of democratic citizenship. 
• Internationalisation: defend and strengthen our international and interdisciplinary community and promote effective means for constructive and open debate.