The 2026-2031 institutional plan you can read here
(at the moment only available in Dutch, the English version will be updated here as soon as possible)
President of the Executive Board, Alexandra van Huffelen: “Today's complex challenges often require an interdisciplinary approach. Precisely because of our broad range of scientific disciplines, Radboud University can play a significant role in this process, both for science and for our environment, at regional and at international level.”
Identity
The university aims to contribute to knowledge, understanding and progress. Bert van den Brink, Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy, Theology and Religious Studies: “We are guided in this process by scientific curiosity as well as societal challenges. We attach great value to caring for one another and promoting social and cultural emancipation. This attitude is in line with our origins in the Catholic emancipation movement of the early 20th century. We are an open yet close-knit community, where everyone is welcome, where we want to engage in respectful debate and there is plenty of room for personal development.”
Comprehensive university
Radboud University is a comprehensive university with a critical and integral perspective, which inspires leading education and research. We offer multidisciplinary opportunities that are closely linked to our cutting-edge research and prepare students for their future careers.
Rector Magnificus José Sanders: “That is why we make it easier for students to take advantage of our breadth and immerse themselves in multiple disciplines, through minors or thematic tracks. We are also raising our profile on five interdisciplinary research themes. Scientists across the full breadth of our university can contribute to these themes from their own discipline, enabling us to make a greater impact. This is how we reinforce our existing strengths as a comprehensive university. We do this by connecting even more: with each other, across disciplines and with the outside world.” We help put forward newly emerging themes as hotspots, to keep our research constantly evolving.
Profiling research themes
Extra attention will be given to five interdisciplinary research themes: the functioning of the brain, values-driven AI and digitisation, foundations of space and matter, sustainable health, and inequality and emancipation.
Jan Smit, Dean of the Faculty of Medical Sciences: “Mental health and cognitive resilience are important for everyone, and both are under pressure. To fundamentally understand how the brain works, we need knowledge from all corners of our broad university, from molecule to human and society. From doctor to behavioural scientist. Our Radboud campus brings together doctors, psychologists, natural scientists and others to work on these themes. They inspire each other, learn from each other and achieve more through collaboration.”
Evelyn Kroesbergen, Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences: “AI is rapidly changing our society, in both positive and negative ways. For young and old alike, AI often seems to be a godsend. But it also raises fundamental questions. How is it impacting our privacy, how sustainable is it, and how does it affect what – and how – we learn? With the Values-driven AI theme, we connect technical innovations on our campus with insights from psychology, natural sciences, health, education, ethics and law. We can only have significant impact if we work together.”
Catalyst for the region
For more than a century, Radboud University has acted as the beating heart of an innovative and powerful regional cooperation network, and developed talent. With an independent critical eye, the university will prioritise collaboration in order to contribute to societal issues; be it collaboration on chip technology, healthcare, the energy transition, first-generation students, or projects with schools on democracy and populism or with municipalities on social inequality.
Professionals from organisations and companies in the region can access the latest knowledge generated by our researchers through courses. Our university researchers can in turn learn from these professionals. The university will also be strengthening its start-up culture to promote innovation, entrepreneurship and new talent. Through such initiatives, the university aims to strengthen its visibility and engagement in the region and beyond.
Academic community and campus
Radboud University forms an engaged and committed university community on a compact, green campus where students and staff feel at home. The university encourages connective forms of dialogue rooted in values such as knowledge, inclusiveness, veracity, responsibility and freedom. It also has a long tradition of lively discussions – sometimes at the cutting edge – and reflections on the boundaries of societal debate and engagement.
Radboud University sees the campus as the place where learning, working and living come together, where personal development is encouraged, and where everyone can be themselves. The university aims to create more student housing for Dutch and international students and, which is why it plans to offer housing providers additional opportunities to realise student housing on campus.
Agile and resilient
In the interests of high-quality education and research, the university will also be organising things differently in the coming years, so as to ensure that available resources are spent in the most optimal way. Gerben Smit, General Director of Radboud Services: “By simplifying our processes, standardising services where doing so is helpful, customising them where needed, we can improve the quality of our professional services, keep the workload manageable for our staff, and safeguard the support of our teaching and research. This foundation will help us respond flexibly and responsibly to trends, and become resilient enough to withstand societal tensions and financial pressures.”
Establishment
The Connected for Impact institutional plan was formulated thanks to the contribution of many students, staff and relations of the university. It was adopted by the Executive Board following a positive recommendation from the University Joint Assembly (student and staff participational body) and the Supervisory Board. To make it possible to realise the objectives of the institutional plan in the coming years, staff members are currently working hard to elaborate concrete plans.
The video below uses concrete examples to illustrate what the various ambitions mean.
