A large Limburg delegation participated in the City Deal Kennis Maken Executive Dinner, hosted at ROC Mondriaan in The Hague. The evening brought together more than 60 representatives from universities, universities of applied sciences, vocational colleges, ministries, public institutions, national networks, and—most importantly—students. The focus was on exchanging ideas, experiences, and lessons learned from diverse educational and urban innovation programmes across different cities and regions.
On behalf of the SURD Research Center, we had the honour, together with Rob van Kan, to pitch the philosophy behind Limburg UniverCity. The programme contributes to a new narrative for Limburg by linking education, research, and practice to key transition themes, actively embedded in five Urban Living Labs across the region.
Limburg UniverCity positions the city as a living campus, where students, researchers, governments, and societal partners collaboratively work on real-world challenges related to circularity, energy transition, spatial justice, and social innovation. The strong interest and constructive discussions during the dinner confirmed the relevance of this approach and the value of long-term, place-based collaboration.
We would like to thank Christiaan Seemann and Roselinde Wijnands for the close collaboration, and City Deal Kennis Maken for the support, subsidies, and opportunity to further develop and scale this programme. SURD looks forward to continuing this collective innovation effort in the coming years, together with its many regional and national partners.
