How is academic freedom restricted by the academic community itself? This was the central question at a debate at Leiden University on 14 November.

Education

On Tuesday 25 November, Leiden University is holding the first of four sessions on ‘Building Academic Freedom’. Students and staff are invited to a conversation about today’s hot-button issues.

How do you get fit after these challenging times? How do you actively start a healthy lifestyle? Healthy University Leiden would like to address these topics during the upcoming from #COVID to #GOFIT Week, which will take place from 21 to 25 June 2021.

Research

Around seven per cent of children have difficulty learning their mother tongue because they have some form of developmental language disorder (DLD). World DLD Day on 15 October called attention to this disorder. Development psychologist Neeltje van den Bedem explains why this is important.

Editors: Irene Hadiprayitno and Rizal Shidiq (Leiden Institute for Area Studies, Leiden University, the Netherlands)

The winner of the Leiden University Thesis Prize has made an original and substantial contribution to argumentation theory. This is what Annetje Ottow, President of the Executive Board and member of the LUF board, said at the online ceremony for the University’s thesis prizes. The winner of the first…

Facility

The collection guides of archives and collections of Leiden University Libraries (UBL) have been made available via the portal Collection Guides. This has greatly improved the findability, visibility and ease of use of these collection finding aids.

A study programme all about cities and their issues. Three years ago, the bachelor's programme Urban Studies was a newcomer in The Hague. By now, the first theses are being written. André Gerrits, programme director, talks about the programme’s success: 'The intake of first-years has increased from…

This year too, the faculty year was opened in the Hortus Botanicus. In the centuries-old garden, staff and students met with drinks and snacks.

Organisation

ICT, Security

The Schoof cabinet has presented its budget. As expected, higher education is facing severe cuts. In the coming period, the Executive Board will regularly look at the consequences of what it deems an irresponsible policy.

While humanities once mainly involved books and archives, nowadays we can’t imagine life without AI. Next semester a new faculty-wide course will be introduced, taking you along with this development. University lecturer and course coordinator Yann Ryan tells us more about it.

Leiden University has taken 17th place in the UI Green Metric, a global sustainability ranking for universities. Over 1,400 universities from all around the world took part in the ranking.

In the new Annual Report 2022 we report on not only research and teaching at Leiden University but also ICT, real estate, personnel, finance, impact and knowledge transfer and more.

In a confidential meeting, the University Council (UR) and the Executive Board (CvB) have discussed security within our buildings, partly as a result of media reports on this topic that appeared during the summer. The University Council has shared concerns expressed by staff and students concerning…

On the second floor of the Sylvius Laboratory, new labs are being built for researchers of the Faculties of Social and Behavioural Sciences and Humanities. After a successful tender construction has recently started.

Generative AI presents journalists with new options for image use but also raises ethical questions.

We hebben 6 van de 9 grenzen overschreden die bepalen of menselijk leven in de komende generaties nog mogelijk is op aarde. Kunnen we het tij nog keren?

When asked about the mission of the Leiden Jewish Studies network, Jürgen Zangenberg, Professor of Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity at Leiden University, and one of the organizers of the event says: “We try to keep the network as broad as possible, and to attract as many people from the outside…

The Leiden interdisciplinary research programme Global Transformations and Governance Challenges (GTGC) and the Embassy of Ireland are jointly organising a special book launch in The Hague. On 13 November, Gerry Finnegan, author and a former director of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), will…

It has been preying on people’s minds: the outline agreement and its proposed cuts to higher education. Although the content is not yet set in stone − the outline agreement will be developed into a coalition agreement − we are certain that Leiden University should also expect substantial cuts.

From research on the first human ancestors to leave Africa to mathematical models in random disturbances. For Leiden researchers have been awarded a prestigious Vici grant by the Dutch Research Council.

Researchers from Leiden have developed a promising TB vaccine that users can self-administer via a special patch. This could be beneficial for countries with limited health services, says PhD candidate Malene Neustrup.

The Dutch Research Council (NWO) has awarded Vidi grants to 14 Leiden researchers. This grant of a maximum of 850,000 euros will enable them to start a new research group and develop their own line of research over the next five years.

Fraud and plagiarism in assessment can unfortunately be seen everywhere, even among our students. In relation to this, as an examiner you have an important role in safeguarding academic integrity.

Practical information and tips for hosting an assessment, including registration procedures, permitted aids, fraud prevention, surveillance and facilities for students with disabilities.

Bachelor, Master

From health to migration to climate: 25 interdisciplinary research and education initiatives received a Kiem grant in 2024.

Leiden University has a new FNV representative: Thecla Meyknecht. Employees can come to her with questions and problems related to the workplace. ‘All managers should receive targeted training in which they learn to be proud of their human capital.’

Without academic freedom, we might not have antibiotics, nor a deep understanding of human behaviour. Literary criticism, climate models, and ecological restoration would be severely limited; just like ethical reflection on artificial intelligence, justice, trauma, parenting, faith and hope. All these…

It is exactly one year ago that the university had to close, bang in the middle of the academic year. Suddenly, on that third Monday in March, we found ourselves at home, working and studying online – many of us from that cramped attic or student room. The momentous coronavirus year in pictures.

Aprovechando la conferencia Spinoza, Nanne Timmer, Universitair Docent LUCAS, le hace unas preguntas a la escritora y Premio Reina Sofía Gioconda Belli sobre su poesía y su lugar en la Nicaragua de hoy.

Over 200 staff from Leiden University discussed student well-being with one another and students at the Staff Symposium on Student Well-being. In various workshops and lectures, lecturers, student advisers, student counsellors and other staff members discussed how they could contribute to our students’…

Leiden University has had a turbulent week. There have been protests inside and outside our buildings that have evoked reactions, and students and staff have felt unsafe. We want with this message to look back at the past week and look forward to the future. What happened and how do we now want to move…

The LUCAS Impact Committee, consisting of Jan van Dijkhuizen, Rick Honings, Casper de Jonge, Angus Mol, Thijs Porck and Aafje de Roest, has offered this year’s LUCAS Public Engagement Award to Dorine Schellens and Peter Verstraten.

On this page we've bundled the best practices which will be presented during the Education Market of 19 June 2025.

You can find here questions and answers about the new mobility policy and what this means for the commuting allowance, the home-working allowance, the contribution to internet use, domestic business travel and the kilometre allowance via the Individual Choices Model.

Ten years ago, a new reward system was introduced in Dutch prisons: the only way prisoners could earn extra ‘freedoms’ was through good behaviour. Jan Maarten Elbers concludes that this system does little to encourage behavioural change and can even be counterproductive.

Leiden University will not enter into any new research partnerships with companies in the fossil fuel industry that are not intensively and demonstrably committed to achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement. Current projects can, however, be completed.

Giving lectures, marking exams, essays or theses, supervising students and PhDs, doing research and, as if that wasn’t enough, also trying to raise the necessary funding. There is a limited number of funds for academic research and a large number of applications. Many of our researchers therefore experience…

What can we expect from the teacher coaches in the coming year? University lecturers Astrid Van Weyenberg and Maarten van Leeuwen talk about their plans.

In 2024, the Herta Mohr building was brought into use. The Faculty Office was the first group to be housed in the new building. Towards the end of 2024, a workplace satisfaction survey was conducted among these staff members. With the relocation of LIAS to Herta Mohr in September 2024, the building…

We talk too little about silence, thinks university lecturer Gerlov van Engelenhoven. He has been awarded a Veni grant to investigate the role of silence in protest movements. Does silence sometimes really say more than a thousand words?