StudyEU Amber Road Staff Week at Humak 

In late March and early April, the first ever StudyEU Amber Road staff week was hosted by Humak in Helsinki. Our sunny capital city welcomed participants from most of the partner universities across Europe, enabling networking and benchmarking best practices.  

Amber Road is an alliance, community and network of nine European universities of applied sciences, working together with the aim of one day integrating education, recruitment, RDI and societal engagement. 

We hosted our international guests from March 31 to April 4, 2025. The week was filled with interesting workshops, meetings and exploring the beautiful Helsinki. The goal for the staff week was to benchmark how international services, student services, communication and marketing, quality assurance and RDI activities are set up and managed at each partner university. In addition, the week aimed to identify common best practices and new ways of managing the services. 

“During the week, we explored many common interests, some common ways of operating as well as some challenges to overcome in order to operate smoothly together as a future European University Alliance”, says Manager of International Affairs, Kim Lindblad.

Encouraging international networking and partnerships 

During the week, it became obvious that all organisations shared common concerns of how to reach students in the modern digital era and how to engage both current and prospective students. In addition, we discussed the dilemma of how to nurture international activities, such as student exchange and mobility programmes, in our post-Covid digital era.  

In Amber Road, both student and staff mobility will be encouraged in order for students and staff members to get inspired by the alliance and take active part in its future cooperation. 

But encouraging international mobility is also reflecting one’s own actions; those taken by the teachers and other experts of each participating university. Hopefully, adults already in the working life can function as role models for students interested in taking the leap towards international experiences. 

“Before we talk about students, we need to look at ourselves and think about what we are doing as staff members”, Lindblad summarized. 

Cooperation continues 

The concrete outcome of the week were decisions regarding how to continue working together. Arrangements regarding the next joint staff week were decided and, next time, the network will meet up in Prague in early December 2025, hosted by the Pan-European University. Our Czech partner also confirmed that they are very pleased to host the first Amber Road Student BIP week (Blended Intensive Programme) at their campus in Ostarava, Czech Republic, in autumn 2025. 

We will also continue working on submission of common RDI applications and arrange interest group online meetings around the themes of the workshops carried out during the week in Helsinki. 

Student and staff mobility will be strongly encouraged throughout the alliance’s cooperation. 

As Lindblad says: 

“The goal of the network at this stage can be stated as to connect, communicate and light the spark to fruitful cooperation”. 

Thank you to the alliance for the wonderful week – see you in Prague! 

Institutions participating in the staff week at Humak’s Helsinki campus: 

Burgenland University of Applied Sciences, Austria 

Pan-European University, Prague, Czechia

University of Novo Mesto, Slovenia 

University of Teramo, Italy 

The Pontifical University of John Paul II of Krakow, Poland 

Hochschule Magdeburg-Stendal, Germany 

Read more about StudyEU Amber Road