The opening of the new academic year highlighted students' and lecturers' personal motivators. Incoming students were encouraged to be bold, forge their own paths and grow by trial and error.

Protest is a human right and an important way to hold the authorities to account. But how does the right to protest relate to academic freedom and the right to education?

'Academics who share their knowledge with the outside world on social media are often insulted or even threatened. Especially female academics and academics of colour seem to regularly be the victim of sexist and racist comments.' This is what Ineke Sluiter, Professor of Greek Language and Literature…

PhD defence

Conference, Penn-Leiden Colloquium on Ancient Values XIII

A memorial stone honouring professor and resistance hero Ben Telders was unveiled on 12 September at the site of the former concentration camp Bergen-Belsen.

Academics increasingly face threats, intimidation and abuse. The WetenschapVeilig platform has been launched to address this. Academics who are being threatened or intimidated can seek help from the platform 24 hours a day. It’s good that we now have this platform. But at the same time, it’s awful that…

Nadia Bouras will give the Annie Romein-Verschoor Lecture on 6 March. She will call for academic freedom for everyone.

The annual conference of the Global Transformations and Governance Challenges (GTGC) interdisciplinary research programme will take place in The Hague on 7-9 June. As a researcher at Leiden University, why should you be there? ‘Nearly every research study has a governance dimension, but academics often…

Would you like to share your expertise with a wide audience, and in a very convenient way? The Vraag het Leiden (Ask Leiden) video platform is looking for academics who can answer questions sent in by the general public, both young and old, by recording short videos.

Students at research universities and universities of applied sciences are positive about their lecturers’ expertise and the atmosphere within their programmes. Almost one-third report experiencing excessive academic pressure. These are the findings of the 2026 National Student Survey.

The Faculty of Humanities is launching the Programme Standards project with the aim of distributing the teaching effort more transparently and fairly. In June, the Faculty Council approved the Programme Standards project on the condition that it would include enough evaluation moments, a condition that…

Leiden University is pressing ahead with Open Science and Recognition & Rewards! This is the key message of the new Academia in Motion steering group.

The Institute for Philosophy has a new Academic Director: on 1 February, James McAllister was succeeded by Douglas Berger. We asked him about his plans.

Would you like to explore the next step in your career, or find out what your future options are? Do you have specific qualities that you’d like to develop further in your work? Or are you wondering whether you’re still in the right place or might like something different, but don’t know what or where…

All partnerships between Leiden and international partner universities are managed in a central database.

Leiden University offers researchers extensive facilities and support at every stage of their academic career. Here you will find more information on funding, policy, and publishing, as well as answers to questions such as: How do I arrange a PhD track? Which research grants are available? And what…

The University aims to be bilingual, and provides its information in Dutch and English wherever possible. This has consequences for the information provided on the University websites.

Conference, Workshop

Gert Oostindie, Emeritus Professor of Colonial and Postcolonial History, is this year’s Cleveringa Professor at Leiden University. He was appointed by the University on 4 October. In his inaugural lecture on 24 November, entitled Courage and Disregard, he will talk about (academic) freedom in relation…

Frank van Vree, Emeritus Professor of War, Conflict and Memory Studies at the University of Amsterdam (UVA), is the new Cleveringa Professor at Leiden University this year.

Several years ago, two amateur archaeologists from Brabant discovered over a hundred Roman coins near to Berlicum in the north of the province. After years of research, it now appears that the location, close to a ford in the river, was a site for offerings. Another interesting fact is that the coins…

A year ago, assistant professor Paz Gonzalez received a Comenius grant to start an academic journal for and by students. Now the first double issue of The New Scholar is a reality. ‘We want to show the faculty’s diversity.’

Research by The Young Academy on the length and intensity of the Dutch academic year has given us food for thought. Do our staff have enough time and space to conduct research? And do we ask too much of our students? The Ministry of Education, Culture and Science asked us universities to think about…

Would you be more likely to take the train for your next work trip, instead of flying, if you automatically got a first-class ticket? For many Leiden University academics, the answer is yes – according to research looking at what motivates academic staff to choose trains over planes.

Last week, Leiden University welcomed the rectors of the League of European Research Universities (LERU) to the autumn edition of the Rector’s Assembly. They discussed research, innovation and education policy within the European Union, the challenges and opportunities surrounding defence research,…

Organisations like the UN and the EU should be given more powers to combat transboundary problems. This is the message of a report published by the Swedish SNS Democracy Council, whose authors include Prof. Jan Aart Scholte of Leiden University. The researchers also wrote the following article.