Interesting discussion of the links between education and research

On Tuesday the 22nd of May, STINT, the KTH Royal Institute of Technology and Umeå University presented a seminar entitled “Implementing Linkages between Education & Research.” The seminar involved around 70 participants from higher education institutions in Sweden and abroad, the Swedish Government Offices and the Swedish Higher Education Authority (UKÄ).

Higher education should be based on research. Nevertheless, education and research tend to diverge in Sweden. Teaching is often regarded as having a lower status than research and therefore the most prominent researchers are frequently not involved in bachelor-level education.

STINT’s Teaching Sabbatical gives Swedish teachers the opportunity to teach at higher education institutions in the USA, Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan. Upon returning, many of these teachers report that education is given far greater priority abroad than in Sweden. In the light of these international examples, STINT wants to contribute to a better balance and more synergy effects between education and research.

The ongoing inquiry on governing and resources [styr- och resursutredningen (STRUT)] also highlights the issue of the relation between education and research. One of the aims of the seminar was to contribute material to the investigation. Anders Steinwall, representing the inquiry, participated in the seminar and asked a number of questions that were addressed in presentations and group discussions.

The issues discussed include how the link between education and research can be defined, as well as factors affecting this link. These questions resulted in interesting discussions, and the seminar concluded when participants were given the opportunity to provide concrete examples of how they link education and research in their work. These examples will be collated and made available to all seminar participants, as well as to other actors in the Swedish higher education and research system.

The seminar follows on the summer school organised by STINT and Nanyang Technological University (NTU Singapore) in Singapore in August 2017 to discuss how education and research can be linked. At the summer school, 24 participants from Sweden and Singapore together examined this issue and collected examples.