University of Liège Strategic Plan 2022 · 2026

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he world is undergoing radical and, historically speaking, very rapid change. The University of Liège, like any 'living' organism, is indissociable from its environment. Since its beginnings, it has adapted to the contexts in which it found itself, be they happy or painful. It has accompanied the prosperity of the flourishing steel industry. It has played its part in weathering the ensuing crises, and in developing the skills needed to make the necessary conversions. Throughout its history, it has been able to fulfil its main missions: to create and transmit knowledge, and to participate in the life of the community. But beyond that, it has remained a part of history, a part of its own destiny, by making a solid commitment to the environmental, social and technical challenges facing society, while respecting the values of a public university. 

In an increasingly unstable, uncertain and dangerous world, it is vital that it continues to play this role. And to do this, it is essential to lay out a strategy. This, however, is a bit of a paradox. Because the more uncertainty there is, the more difficult it is to pre-define what we are going to do, and the more likely it is that we will not be able to do what we have planned. As Field Marshal von Moltke famously said, "no battle plan survives the first contact with the enemy". But it is essential to have a plan, and to know how to adapt it. We do not want to just go along with whatever is happening, we want to act, steer our future, help define a desirable society, and participate in its construction. Because today we are training that society’s citizens and the future economic, political, cultural and social leaders.

To do this, we need to visualise a trajectory that starts from our analysis of the present and links it, through a coherent set of transitions and transformations, to a vision of a possible and desirable future. This is the purpose of this plan, which sets out our strategic ambitions for the institution as a whole and includes the entire university community: students, teaching, scientific, administrative and technical staff, as well as our alumni and partners. It has been devised by the rectoral team and shared with the deans of all the faculties, the administrator and the directors of the administrations. It has been further developed for presentation to the Board of Directors. It will serve as the framework for our roadmap for the duration of our mandate. But we have drawn it up with an eye to around 2030, not of course because we think we will be re-elected, but because it is with this kind of time horizon that the challenges facing our university and the major transformations underway can be thought through most effectively, between short-term over-reaction and excessive foresight. 

Anne-Sophie Nyssen, Rector

Scientific, Supportive, Caring and Committed to the Challenges of Our Time

We live in a time of climate disruption, the weakening of ecosystems as a result of the increased extraction of the earth's resources, growing social inequalities and the growing power of digital technologies. Left to their own devices, these phenomena, whose consequences are already taking a heavy toll on many human and non-human lives, are worsening, generating additional threats. These include the exacerbation of conflicts over vital resources and the proliferation of regressive political logics, every man for himself, the selective protection of some and the abandonment of others. Because, as we now know, this destructive dynamic is rooted in a certain model of society - the unbridled 'modernisation' promoted by the great powers of the 20th century. The 'transitions' we have to achieve require more than technical solutions, however ingenious we may be in this area: they imply profound transformations of an ethical nature, affecting our way of life, our relationship with the earth and its other inhabitants, our sensibilities, the values that guide our actions and, consequently, the meaning we give to our collective choices.  
No real transition will take place without the reactivation of a strong sense of the common good and the general interest. An impossible challenge for some, it is a reason for hope and a living reality for others, as shown by the renewed impetus (present even in scientific literature) for societal projects that link ecological contract, technological sobriety, social justice, solidarity, democratic deepening and shared well-being. Perhaps it is precisely this sense of ethics that, in contrast to indifference, ignorance and resignation, gives us the courage to act, the capacity to imagine desirable possibilities, and the desire to build science and technology that can support the change we dream of. 
Because putting transitions on a viable and desirable trajectory calls for enlightened, responsible and value-driven policies. The University of Liège, through its strategic plan, recognises that it has a dual role: not only to promote rigorous and relevant knowledge, creative sciences and techniques that are attentive to their present and future, local and global consequences, but also to contribute, through the diversity of the knowledge it cultivates, to the deployment of an ethical reflexivity that conveys meaning and shared values, while respecting pluralism.   
In its research mission, ULiège opts for a renewed vision of academic freedom. The latitude enjoyed by researchers must benefit creative knowledge, capable of exploring what is possible; critical knowledge, capable of questioning and reshaping its own methods and models; responsible knowledge, which takes the time to discern the implications of socio-technical choices; relevant knowledge, capable of responding to the real needs of society.  ULiège has also chosen to ensure its regional and international influence through strong commitments to trans-disciplinary cooperation, sustainable open science, scientific integrity and quality assessment - all challenges that have now been clearly identified by the most demanding scientific communities, and which are also the levers for restoring public confidence in academic scientific research.  
In its teaching missions, it reiterates its full and unreserved support for the objectives that the legislator has set for public universities: to support students in their role as responsible and active citizens in professional, social, economic and cultural life, through training at the highest level in the challenges of transitions; to promote their autonomy and self-fulfilment; to develop scientific curiosity, a critical sense and an awareness of individual and collective responsibilities and duties by encouraging systemic approaches; to open up equal opportunities for social emancipation through inclusive and lifelong learning policies. As key levers for the transitions to which we aspire, these objectives are also benchmarks for the technological and pedagogical development of our education and training programmes. 

Finally, in its mission to serve the community, ULiège intends to consolidate the reciprocity which, as a public service, links it to society as a whole. As an academic and administrative working community, and as an educational community, it is committed to developing practices that are increasingly in line with the democratic contract: participation, transparency, inclusion, equity, the fight against discrimination and systemic violence, solidarity and the well-being of everyone, whatever their status. As a place to live and work in specific areas - cities and campuses - it is developing its infrastructures as laboratories for the ecological transition. As a community where fundamental and applied scientific knowledge is developed, it focuses on openness, sharing and participation - encounters with other forms of knowledge, real-life experiences and artistic practices. Beyond the simple one-way 'popularisation' or 'transfer' of knowledge, its ambition is to make a different contribution to the public understanding of science.  
Faced with the colossal present and future challenges, the actions and commitments that keep the dream of a world that is habitable for all alive do exist. It is now up to us to create the scenarios we want and give them a chance of a future.

T

he Institutional Strategic Plan is organised around the 2022-2026 term of office, although we believe that in order to steer the future course properly, we need to look far enough ahead. We also believe that a certain degree of strategic stability will be essential if certain projects are to be completed. The plan is broken down into strategic objectives according to the University's traditional division - research and innovation, teaching and training, community services, cooperation and internationalisation - and is linked to the vision and values put forward in the electoral programme on which the Rectoral team was elected.

The strategic objectives are illustrated by a list of actions that will help to achieve them. This list is intended to evolve over time and is therefore not exhaustive.

Analysis

ULiège has a long tradition of scientific research rooted in the transitions in society, from the industrial revolution to contemporary social and environmental issues. Active in all areas of science and technology, the humanities and the life sciences, the institution allocates almost half of its budget to research activities. It is precisely the diversity and quality of the research that sets ULiège apart. The construction and transmission of knowledge are intimately associated with research and help to nourish its teaching, its exchanges with the city and the region, its cooperative ventures and its influence in the world.       
Some of these strengths can also lead to areas of weakness. The diversity of themes and the multiplicity of campuses can lead to the compartmentalisation of teams and disciplines, to a multiplication of structures, to a scattering of resources, to a lack of institutional visibility and to competition rather than cooperation and transdisciplinarity in diversity, even though these are essential to understanding and responding to the complex challenges posed by issues of transition.

Strategic Objectives

ULiège wants to respond to these challenges by pursuing three strategic objectives for 2026:

• Support cross-disciplinary research and disruptive innovation in a spirit of respect for the diversity of our research, in order to encourage creativity and the emergence of new knowledge. In particular, this means encouraging the formation of multidisciplinary research groups and dynamics around major contemporary scientific issues, while also strengthening interactions with other university and non-university research players to benefit from the enrichment generated by the cross-fertilisation of expertise.  Non-incremental research and innovation will also be encouraged by supporting bold scientific approaches and risk-taking to promote innovation.
• Improve and develop the efficiency of our research structures in order to improve the quality of support services for researchers and secure the resources that directly contribute to their scientific ambitions and the quality of their research. This ambition must be based on an evaluation of structures and processes. The aim is also to initiate a process of reflection to determine the institutional scientific platforms with a view to consolidating resources. This dynamic will be based on a reform of research evaluation that will incorporate more qualitative criteria, while respecting the diversity of our research.
• Increase the influence and impact of our research to share our scientific advances and enhance their value and visibility in the scientific community and in society. This approach will also enable us to assert our scientific identity, based on our vision and values, and make it more visible.

Strategic Objectives and Key Actions

Analysis

As a public institution, ULiège's mission is to provide a university education open to as many people as possible, with a view to social progress and emancipation. It offers a full range of courses, including 39 bachelor's degrees, 194 master's degrees, 62 specialised master's degrees and 184 certificate programmes, on which almost 28,000 students are enrolled. The democratisation of, and wider access to, higher education has led to an increase of more than 63% in the number of university students over the last 15 years, which has had an impact on the need for specific support and on the student-teacher ratio in the closed-envelope funding system within the Wallonia-Brussels Federation. This structural change is taking place in a changing legislative context (Paysage decrees, initial teacher training, Support for Success, etc.) that is complex to put into practice.

At the same time, the emergence of new societal realities, such as the digital revolution and its new tools including artificial intelligence, the environmental and social transition, the speed at which knowledge is evolving, the crisis of democracy, anti-science rhetoric and the heterogeneity of life trajectories, are generating new expectations of the university. This means that ULiège has a responsibility to rethink its study programmes, teaching approaches, academic rhythms and assessment methods in order to best fulfil its role as an educator in tune with the dynamics of its time, with the aim of emancipating its students. ULiège can already count on the digital strategic plan that has been drawn up for teaching. The process of change must be carried out without losing the specific nature and essence of university education, i.e., the close link between teaching and research, scientific rigour and the development of a critical mind based on knowledge, while at the same time strengthening our attractiveness to future national and international students.

Strategic Objectives

ULiège intends to respond to these challenges by pursuing three strategic objectives:

• Rethink and develop our teaching and training programmes to enable our students to grasp the challenges of transitions, to grasp the complexity of contemporary dynamics and to make the link with their future jobs. We believe it is necessary to identify the existing training courses, their content and their cycles according to the fields of study, and to specifically develop interdisciplinary teaching, which is essential for grasping the challenges of transitions, in a way that complements existing specialised courses. At the same time, we need to monitor the implementation of the Digital Strategy for Education in order to integrate this dimension as effectively as possible.
• Support students and their supervisors at every stage of their studies. This support is part of an ongoing approach to teaching quality. The aim is to evaluate student support systems with a view to developing them and improving their visibility and accessibility. This approach should also enable teachers to receive training so that they can develop the content of their courses, develop innovative forms of teaching and introduce greater permeability into disciplinary systems. Enhance the value of teaching activities so that teachers can devote the necessary time to them without penalising their career progression.
• Respond to the needs of a wide range of people and enhance opportunities for lifelong learning, in particular by making the most of personal and professional experience and training. 

Strategic Objectives and Key Actions

Analysis

As part of its third mission, the university is committed not only to raising public awareness of the issues facing society, but also to informing and training citizens, managers and professionals in all sectors in the scientific knowledge and systems approach that are essential to understanding and responding to the highly complex issues of transition, and to making the right choices and finding the right solutions.

To achieve this objective, ULiège can obviously count on the expertise and the individual and collective commitment of its members, as well as on the many structures in the ULiège ecosystem at the interface between research, teaching and civil society - veritable transmission pathways between the University and the community.

The ULiège Museum and Cultural Centre, which already brings together 30 players from museum spaces, scientific collections and knowledge mediation structures, must fully play its role as a facilitator and platform for sharing between stakeholders.

The aim is to bring together all the willing players to enable them to structure and coordinate the various approaches, to bring needs to the fore and to encourage the emergence of participatory science projects and an active community.  

Strategic Objectives

In order to strengthen its contribution to the community, ULiège intends to:

• Better define the third mission by drawing up a framework for evaluating services to the community in order to give it greater recognition; create forums for sharing knowledge and experience, which could be organised around citizen science and arts and science projects. The various initiatives generated by the multiplicity of players need to be coordinated and integrated into a common strategy that can be better supported by the institutions, including ULiège.
• Renew and strengthen the University's links with the City to create a more concerted and favourable framework for communicating the community's needs to the University and integrating its strategic projects, such as the Einstein Telescope, the possible relocation of two faculties to the city centre, the centre of expertise for top-level sportsmen and women, the renovation of Colonster Castle, and the development of the campuses into the City's and the Region's strategy.
• Strengthen the mechanisms for conserving and promoting scientific, cultural and artistic heritage as part of an approach based on responsibility, sharing and enhancement. This strengthening should also enable us to meet our legal obligations in terms of heritage conservation.

Strategic Objectives and Key Actions

Analysis

ULiège is firmly integrated into a network of international partners and has long experience of cooperation between partners in the North and South. It is positioned at the heart of a network of Belgian universities, a network of European UNIC universities, and is involved in cross-border partnerships and numerous cooperative ventures, including those developed historically with French-speaking countries. ULiège benefits from a number of institutional framework agreements that facilitate the sending and hosting of researchers and students from all over the world.

This model of intensive mobility needs to evolve to take account of environmental concerns and the teaching resources offered by digital technology, while at the same time pursuing the European objective of internationalising student education (which is to offer at least 50% of students a stay abroad or some aspect of international and multicultural exposure during their course).  We also need to do a better job of promoting our cooperation and internationalisation activities, which have a major impact on our institutional reputation, both for students, researchers, companies and major organisations.

Strategic Objectives

To meet these challenges, ULiège wishes to pursue three strategic objectives:

• Structure our institutional internationalisation strategy so that we can promote it more effectively both internally and externally. We believe it is necessary to draw up an inventory of existing cooperative ventures, identify solid key partnerships and encourage the co-creation of ambitious teaching and research programmes, while ensuring reciprocity in cooperation with southern countries as part of an approach based on global citizenship and solidarity.
• Increase in & out mobility of students to reach the best European standards, taking into account our objectives to reduce the environmental impact of such mobility. This will involve adjusting the resources available to enable mobility, as well as identifying any obstacles and remedying them in consultation with representatives of the faculties and the student community.
• Encourage greater internationalisation of research and management staff in order to increase their expertise by promoting the acquisition of scientific expertise, multicultural exchanges and diversity, and thus the internalisation of ULiège. This ambition will be achieved by changing the methods of mobility and promoting them (shorter, hybrid stays), and by strengthening the organisational, administrative and financial functions of the host organisation in order to encourage the desire for in & out mobility.

Strategic Objectives and Key Actions

For us, levers are the means by which we can implement our strategic objectives. They are the way in which we make our vision and values concrete and effective and respond to the new expectations of the University community.

We intend to place ethics at the heart of our institutional policies in order to guarantee respect for the physical and moral integrity of the human and non-human subjects involved in our research, while encouraging reflexivity and a sense of responsibility that should lead to the consideration of the social, moral, economic and even political implications of our work and activities within ULiège.

Our ambition is to actively support this approach by developing institutional guidelines and guaranteeing greater transparency in the management of ethics-related issues, and more broadly in all issues handled at the University. This approach, initiated by the work of the ethics committees and the appointment of an ethics officer, must be pursued so that it is embraced by all members of the university community. To this end, training in ethics and scientific integrity should be stepped up, and reflection on these issues should be encouraged at all stages of training and professional careers, and more broadly in all institutional decision-making processes. 

Key Actions

The University's governance is both centralised and decentralised. This type of architecture is well suited to the university world, as it makes it possible to combine the need for an integrated vision and strategic management at university level with the need for management adapted to the specific characteristics of our faculties and units. In this context, ULiège intends to promote and implement participative governance and explicit decision-making processes, which are essential to understanding strategic choices and adherence to institutional policies. This approach should result in better coordination of the University's entities and more effective exercise of the autonomy of university bodies. This strengthened governance must also extend to collaboration around our campuses with our local partners to ensure their harmonious development.  
This dynamic must be based on a process of continuous improvement to guide our strategic choices and pursue our missions efficiently. This quality approach must integrate all levels of our Institution, mobilise and involve all of the University's stakeholders and take into account all of our missions. At the institutional level, this approach should help to clarify our operations, simplify and modernise our procedures, bring greater consistency to our regulations and allocate our resources more optimally in line with our strategic objectives.  This means continuously evaluating our internal processes and proposing and implementing corrective action where necessary.

Key Actions

ULiège is already strongly committed to equality and well-being policies. Measures to combat all forms of discrimination and violence, including those related to gender, must be continued and strengthened. At the same time, our objective of promoting equality requires us to raise awareness and train the University community about biases linked to personal characteristics in order to improve inclusiveness and put in place robust systems for preventing and supporting people who are victims of violence. These equality and anti-discrimination policies contribute directly to the quality of life of the members of the university community.   

They must complement actions to promote the well-being of staff and students, for whom ULiège is not just a place of work or training, but also a place for building positive social links, developing skills, investing their time and energy, living and seeking personal fulfilment. In this context, the initiatives that have been taken to improve the feeling of well-being at work must be continued and strengthened, in particular to counter the negative effects of the increasing workload and changes in working patterns.

Key Actions

The evolution of digital technology and its uses cuts across all our university missions. Faced with this profound transformation in the way we operate, which is fuelling both hopes and fears, the challenge is to ensure that technology is implemented efficiently and appropriately over the long term, in a way that is both sober and inclusive, so that it is compatible with our ambition for sustainability. The Digital Strategy for Education sets out a way forward.  We need to broaden our thinking to cover all institutional processes in order to promote effective and responsible use of digital technology, both internally and externally. Ultimately, the targeted development and implementation of digital tools will have to bring proven, human added value to our University's various areas of activity.

In practice, beyond the coordination of existing policies, we will need to extend our thinking to all our activities, including the teaching of digital expertise. The consolidation of strategies, aimed at optimising digital coherence and IT robustness, must be based on cross-functional, coherent, integrated and strengthened institutional digital governance, as well as on sustainable support tools. In particular, it will be necessary to ensure that the resources allocated to digital technology are in line with institutional objectives, that the tools offered are accessible and user-friendly for all, that the existing tools and processes in all our areas of activity are continuously improved and, of course, that our IT systems are robust and resilient, requiring a high level of security to be maintained.

Key Actions

The solidity of our finances determines the implementation of our institutional policies and the pursuit of our missions. However, they are under pressure from the closed-envelope system of public funding for universities and the continuous increase in the student population over the last 15 years in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation, which has led to a reduction in resources per student (-24.3%). This model must be reformed to ensure sustainable funding for our missions, and future negotiations must be anticipated by including key variables in our simulations, such as weighting coefficients, fixed and variable portions, earmarked funding and the number of non-resident students. The overall strategic reflection on the management of our financial resources should also focus on the implementation of the principle of subsidiarity at the most appropriate level and on the ethical and sustainable management of our finances.

At the same time, we need to diversify our sources of funding to improve our resilience in the current climate of uncertainty.  We need to make greater use of various channels, such as the Alumni network, companies and the ULiège Foundation.    

Key Actions

Our campuses embody our local roots and the diversity of our missions. They are places for research, teaching and community life, and they also reflect the image and appeal of our University. The convergence of these characteristics invites us to accelerate the transformation of our campuses into transition laboratories by promoting the well-being of our community members, reducing our environmental footprint and experimenting with new ways of travelling, eating, consuming, working and studying that are more in tune with contemporary issues.

This approach must be differentiated according to the specific characteristics of each campus, while at the same time emphasising their openness to local and regional players. The transformation of our campuses in response to these new realities will have to be carried out by caring for and developing our built and non-built heritage, which is an integral part of the institutional strategic plans for infrastructure, mobility and energy. These plans will have to be updated to take account of ULiège's new challenges, priorities and budgetary constraints.

Key Actions

Our community is made up of several tens of thousands of people, students, scientists, academics and members of the administrative and technical staff who are currently at ULiège or have spent part of their lives here to study or work. It is a force for change that permeates the whole of society and the economic environment. We believe it is essential to develop a sense of belonging to ULiège in order to mobilise internal and external players around the University's projects. This need is all the greater given the remoteness of our campuses and the natural preference for a faculty identity over an institutional identity. It must also be built with our partners, including the CHU of Liège and the Alumni network, to which we must pay particular attention, as they are ambassadors for consolidating our identity and raising the profile of ULiège.

The human resources policy also plays a role in the attractiveness of ULiège. Our ambition is to consolidate a modern and benevolent approach to the management of our staff, respectful of individuals and talents, which takes care to offer stimulating career paths for each member of staff at every stage of their career, in particular by encouraging internal mobility and strengthening the training on offer. 

Key Actions

The objectives of ULiège's institutional communication are to highlight scientific research and teaching projects, to promote training and teaching and to develop a coherent and unifying image that reflects the richness and diversity of the Institution. We believe it is essential to organise communication to facilitate the work of the teams and to offer ULiège a strong and coherent image. With this in mind, a structured communication plan must be drawn up to propose a set of coordinated actions, explicitly identifying priorities and clearly defining messages, target audiences and desired results. This communication plan should be communicated internally to all stakeholders. It will also be necessary to produce a dashboard to ensure effective communication management and an annual review to assess the relevance of the actions taken.

Key Actions

Measures for implementing and monitoring the Institutional Strategic Plan  

The Institutional Strategic Plan belongs to the University community, so transparency in its implementation is a priority. Several tools have been put in place to ensure that ULiège's strategy is effectively monitored and implemented. 

• A participatory process to make the plan operational. The actions in the strategic plan will be implemented by involving all stakeholders.
• A dynamic dashboard for monitoring the plan. The objectives and actions of the strategic plan will be regularly monitored on the basis of achievement and results-based indicators.
• An annual report to monitor actions and objectives. The progress of the strategic plan will be the subject of an institutional report presented to the Board of Directors and circulated to members of the University community.
• Redirecting institutional resources. The strategic plan will be implemented by redirecting human, real estate and financial resources towards its priorities.
• Support for project management. The players involved in implementing the actions in the strategic plan will be supported in a project management approach using specific tools.
• An assessment of the consistency of future actions with the objectives of the plan. Future actions implemented by ULiège will be evaluated to check their consistency with the values, vision and objectives set out in the strategic plan.

Introduction

Some of the objectives of the ULiège Strategic Plan require the implementation of specific operational programmes. These are developed in action plans and roadmaps that complete and focus the Institutional Strategic Plan. These institutional documents have been drawn up and adopted separately, but are perfectly aligned with the values and objectives of the Institutional Strategic Plan. The number and scope of the plans are likely to evolve as the Institutional Strategic Plan becomes operational.

List of documents referenced in the ULiège Strategic Plan: