With the start of 2023, the European University for Well-Being has invited a new partner to join the Alliance: The University of Santiago de Compostela (USC) is one of the oldest universities in the world in continuous operation. Founded in 1495, its two campuses are both located in cities that have been designated World Heritage Sites by UNESCO, Santiago de Compostela and Lugo. With this unique cultural heritage and its distinction as the best university in Spain in the environmental sciences in 2022, as well as its leading role in health sciences and expertise in teacher education, which includes integrated research capacities, USC is expected to make valuable contributions to all four of EUniWell’s Research Arenas. “The University of Santiago de Compostela underscores sustainability and excellence as essential major defining features of EUniWell. We very much look forward to getting to know and working with our new partner, and are excited to see what new perspectives USC will bring to our Alliance,” said Professor Dr Beatrix Busse, EUniWell Chief Development Officer and Vice-Rector for Teaching and Studies at the University of Cologne, which manages and coordinates the Alliance.
Professor Dr Axel Freimuth, Rector of the University of Cologne, emphasized: “There are few other projects at our university that bring so many people across Europe into contact with each other. The expansion of our Alliance is another step towards our goal of creating a strong and sustainable European University.”
The University of Santiago de Compostela already maintains close collaborations with several EUniWell members and is fully aligned with European values and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Notably, USC introduces a new perspective to the Alliance from a peripheral region which, with its high life expectancy and low birth rate, represents, in a sense, a strategic laboratory for the study of what European society will look like in 2050. “We want to make a tangible contribution to the development of EUniWell as a truly integrated and fully-fledged European University that has a significant societal impact within the EU and also reaches out to peripheral regions with small towns, dispersed populations and predominantly rural areas to support these regions in developing their potential,” said Professor Dr Antonio López Díaz, Chancellor of the University of Santiago de Compostela.
EUniWell is one of currently 44 European University Alliances, funded by the EU Commission with the aim of achieving a European Education Area in which learning, studying and researching across national borders is a matter of course. he Alliance pursues a holistic, knowledge-based and action-oriented approach to well-being, in response to the call of the Council of the European Union to the Member States to promote the ‘Economy of Wellbeing’, a virtuous cycle between society, economy and the environment. In doing so, EUniWell focuses not only on the scientific examination of Well-Being, but also on effective sustainable and social development for the participating cities and institutions. As tenth member of the European University for Well-Being, the University of Santiago de Compostela joins the Universities of Birmingham, Cologne, Florence, Konstanz and Murcia, Linnaeus University, Nantes Université, Semmelweis University, and Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv.
Media Contact:
Professor Dr Beatrix Busse
Vice-Rector for Teaching and Studies, University of Cologne
beatrix.busse
uni-koeln.de
Press and Communications Team:
Eva Laurie
Communications and Transfer Officer
European University for Well-Being (EUniWell)
University of Cologne
+49 221 470-76661
eva.laurieuni-koeln.de
More Information:
www.euniwell.eu