“We want to build on existing collaborations and also develop new ones in education, research, utilization and operational support”, says Vice-chancellor Eva Wiberg. “We believe that it can strengthen both national and international competitiveness”.
Cooperation between the higher education institutions already takes place today in various forms. Now the Vice-chancellors at the six higher education institutions want to develop the collaboration further in order to make better use of the potential that exists. Based on the agreement, the parties want to clarify their intention to establish structures and processes for developing new, as well as, utilizing existing collaborations in education at undergraduate and advanced levels, postgraduate education, research utilization and innovation and operational support.
The higher education institutions have identified a number of priority areas for collaboration, such as competence supply and competence development, efficient administrative support processes and increasing the opportunities for students to study at several of the higher education institutions.
According to the Vice-chancellors, the agreement is not about a merger, but the purpose is to strengthen the alliance’s as well as the individual higher education institutions' profiling, competitiveness and attractiveness.
Also present at the signing were representatives from the County Administrative Board of Västra Götaland, the County Administrative Board of Jönköping County and Region Västra Götaland. Regional Development Director at Region Västra Götaland, Helena L Nilsson, has followed the development of the collaboration and sees research and education as crucial for the region's development. ”We congratulate that the agreement is in place and we feel involved. It is interesting that our vision The Good Life speaks of the “West Swedish University”, which is based on collaboration between independent universities and colleges. Sometimes visions become reality.”
Steering group and coordination group are appointed
To support the development of Lärosäten Väst, a steering group will be formed consisting of the Vice-chancellors, a group of heads of administration and a coordination group. An administrative resource is linked to the coordination group and financed jointly by the parties. The chairmanship will rotate annually and is initially held by Eva Wiberg, University of Gothenburg.
Lärosäten Väst consists
- Chalmers University of Technology
- University of Gothenburg
- University of Borås
- University of Skövde
- University West
- Jönköping University
Priority areas for cooperation
- Efficient administrative support processes.
- Competence supply and competence development at undergraduate and advanced levels, within e.g. care, teacher training and engineering.
- Enabling main supervision in postgraduate education.
To increase the opportunities for students to study at several of our universities during their education.
- To synchronize the course curriculum at advanced and doctoral level in selected areas, in such a way that it increases the students' opportunity to choose courses/course modules from all parties.
- To identify areas for sustainable international cooperation.
- To identify some multidisciplinary research areas where collaboration can be stimulated.
