Highlights of 2025 at Leiden Law School
2025 was a year to remember at our faculty. We celebrated our 450th anniversary, launched new degree programmes and welcomed many inspiring speakers, yet we also felt the weight of budget constraints. Our year in a nutshell:
January
- The 2025 Meijers Lecture was about ‘Courage in Law’. Afterwards, various academic prizes were awarded to students and staff during the New Year’s Reception.
- The popular lecture series Sustainability & Law once again attracted many participants and considered issues such as the climate, greenwashing and sustainable aviation.
- Marloes van Noorloos was appointed Professor of Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure.
February
- Our 450th anniversary officially got underway with a celebratory toast. Dean Suzan Stoter gave a speech in which she spoke of the importance of both the past and the future of the university.
- A new report written by Esther van Ginneken and Yara Abbing called for better security and living conditions in women’s prisons, also to help reduce the vulnerability of prisoners.
- Leiden research commissioned by the Research and Data Centre (WODC) showed that most children placed in care will not return home.
- The LTC Hub went live on 6 February: a new platform for collaborating and sharing knowledge and innovation within the faculty.
- The Atelier pilot introduced a new cross-curricular, small-scale teaching format aimed at active participation of students and skills development.
- A series of brief lectures to mark our 450th anniversary, called 450-talks, was launched. The theme for these talks was ‘The House of Thorbecke’. Wim Voermans gave the first 450-talk on 10 February.
- Stefan Sagel was awarded a ‘Gouden Peer’ in labour law by Mr., a platform for legal professionals.
- Danny Mekić won the Felipe Rodriquez Award for successfully suing X.
- Vanessa Mak was elected a member of the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities (KHMW).
March
- Niels Blokker bade farewell to Leiden Law School; in an interview he reflected on changes in education at the faculty and what has remained the same.
- During the Legal Tech Challenge, students work on digital solutions to make legal services more efficient and accessible.
April
- The department of eLaw celebrated its 40th anniversary.
- Elke Moons was appointed professor by special appointment of the chair ‘Crime Statistics’.
- Rik Rozendaal won the EAERE thesis award for his thesis.
May
- In an interview to mark his retirement, Reinout Vriesendorp emphasised his passion for teaching and the importance of good education above prestige.
- Kartica van der Zon was appointed professor by special appointment of Family Law, Law of Persons and Juvenile Law at the University of Groningen.
- An experiment was held with alternative assessment methods (pass/fail and ‘unessays’) in the honours programme to encourage critical thinking and more in-depth study.
- Former lecturer at our faculty Wim Timmermans was appointed Knight in the Order of Orange-Nassau.
June
- On 4 June, Carla van Baalen was awarded the Thorbecke Medal. The professor emeritus received the award in recognition of her remarkable and varied oeuvre in the field of parliamentary history.
- The report Damaged by Disgrace described the impact of being forced to give up newborn children and the adoption of babies in the Netherlands.
- On 19 June, the KOG was transformed (inside and outside) into a real festival venue for our summer celebration: LAWLANDS. We enjoyed live music, fabulous food and drinks, fun activities, plus more serious activities such as lectures and quizzes.
- The four faculty-wide research focus areas were launched at the Faculty Research Day.
- Rick Lawson was appointed new president of the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights.
July
- The 450 artwork of student Jill Stoelinga was hung up in the Kamerlingh Onnes Building.
- Kees Waaldijk bade farewell to Leiden University, but left a special Fund for future research in the area of sexual orientation and gender diversity law.
August
- The Advanced Master International Children's Rights celebrated its 10th anniversary with a special symposium.
- The Institute of Air and Space Law also celebrated an anniversary: 40 years of research and teaching in the field of air and space law.
September
- The new Faculty Council held its first meeting with fresh plans to represent the interests of students and staff.
- The first lectures of the new degree programmes Economics & Society, Public Sector Economics, and Cybersecurity and Cybercrime were held.
- During the opening of the faculty year, teaching prizes awarded by the collective chairs of the faculty study associations (JSVO) were presented to Dirk Visser, Michiel Smit, Willem Leppink, Cyril van der Net en Barbara Mooij from the course IP Copyright and Michael Berkel from the course Negotiation & Mediation. Tycho de Graaf was awarded the prize for the best teacher of a course at Leiden Law Academy.
- To mark our anniversary year, we celebrated the opening of the faculty year together with the alumni event Leiden Revisited.
- The recently renewed bachelor’s programmes got underway.
October
- In her Cleveringa Lecture and workshop, Hélèn Landemore called for randomly selected citizen assemblies. ‘‘When you exclude voices ... you actually condemn yourself to ignorance and bad governance.’
- Eduard Fosch Villaronga and Hilde Wermink were awarded a Vidi grant.
November
- At the bachelor’s graduation ceremonies, students celebrated their achievements together with family and lecturers. In academic year 2024/25, 1003 bachelor’s students graduated, 1016 master’s students, and 322 Advanced Master students.
- Egbert Jongen was awarded a Netspar Theme Grant to examine how employers and policymakers can help older workers to remain healthy and continue to work longer, also after the retirement age.
December
- The ‘Gouden Peer’ for intellectual property law was awarded to Dirk Visser.
- The 450-anniversary book was launched during the Happy Holidays Drinks.
Disclaimer: Are you a member of staff and is there something you feel should be added to this list of achievements? Please, email your suggestion to communicatie@law.leidenuniv.nl.