What does academic freedom mean? And how do we give shape to it in Leiden? The Academic Freedom Core Team considered these questions and presented its final report on 17 June.

It’s Saturday and electric minibuses ride back and forth bringing prospective students to Leiden University’s various faculties. They want to see for themselves whether that interesting-looking programme will suit them.

From 22 January on, the video conferencing app Zoom will be available for students and teachers at Leiden University. The University is responding to calls by staff and students, and has now acquired the programme.

Eight scientists from Leiden University have been awarded a grant by the Dutch Research Council (NWO). With this Vidi funding, the researchers can set up an innovative line of research and further expand their own research group over the next five years.

Natalia Sobrino-Saeb has attended the Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony in Oslo. She was awarded this honour after winning the essay competition of the Nobel Ignitor Fellowship, a programme that seeks to inspire young changemakers around the world – for change can be made by all of us: “You never know…

Rich, white, urban: Western politicians often represent a small segment of the population. Political scientist Hélène Landemore advocates for a more inclusive democracy. She will deliver the Cleveringa Lecture on November 26.

At the conference of the Honours College Science & Society, students present TED Talks on a social issue of their interest. ‘It brings together everything they have learned in the past two and a half years.’

Alumni and researchers met at two well-attended alumni dinners in Yogyakarta and Jakarta. The alumni reminisced about their time in Leiden and got to see their lecturers once again.

The exhibition Leiden celebrates – 450 years of parades at Museum De Lakenhal shows how parades and society have changed through the centuries. Alumnus and historian Danielle van Goethem worked on the exhibition. She gives a preview.

There’s been a lot of commotion about the ‘Apartheid in Israel’ panel discussion being cancelled. The organisers, Students for Palestine, wanted to hold this at Leiden University’s Wijnhaven building in The Hague on 21 March. The Executive Board would only allow the event to go ahead if guarantees…

Leiden University is under fire: it is allegedly doing too little to tackle antisemitism. Rector Hester Bijl responds to this accusation and to a video from 2014 on social media in which extreme remarks are made. ‘We can be short about such comments: they are unacceptable. The university is and always…

Leiden University has recently received various petitions from students and staff concerning our ties with Israeli universities. We have also held extensive discussions with the University Council in response to questions raised on the subject. We think it important that our partners and research projects…

The demonstration at and occupation of our Wijnhaven building on 6 May had a deep impact on our community, including the Executive Board. The university is therefore holding two meetings to reflect on what happened and discuss how we can address this.

International alumnus Alejandro tells us in a flash about why it is so important to physically be in Leiden for your studies, about how important his Advanced Master was to his employers and how AI and tech affects his line of work.

The field of leadership suffers from ‘adjectivism’, says Professor Ben Kuipers. He immediately caveats this by saying that he too is going furnish the word leadership with an adjective: ‘Public’. But the goal here is to view leadership in a different light in his new role as Professor of Public Lead…

‘If you want to implement open science, you at least need someone at each faculty who can help researchers to solve practical problems.’ Dorien Huijser spent two years managing the transition to a new working method at the Institute of Psychology’s Brain and Development Research Center.

Towards the end of February, three Leiden University buildings will be assessed for their accessibility to people with a disability. The assessment will be carried out by Ongehinderd, a social enterprise committed to making the Netherlands more accessible. Its founder and director, Gerard de Nooij,…

Marlon Titre (1982) studied at Royal Conservatoire The Hague, did his PhD and studied at Leiden University, earned several other qualifications and is now, among others, Director of Filmhuis The Hague. Who is this multi-talent?

As an experiment, student Alicia Cai relied solely on AI tools such as ChatGPT and Claude for supervision while writing her thesis. What lessons were learned?

Fantastic plants, dizzying patterns and pulsating sounds: researchers from Leiden are going to study the effects of a simulated psychedelic trip on the mind and body at Lowlands Festival. Why might this be interesting for therapies?

Many traces of the city's slavery history can be found in Leiden but the public isn't always aware of them. The initiators of 'Mapping Slavery in Leiden' want to change this with guided tours and street markers. Representatives of the University and other Leiden institutions will be giving the first…

It often takes longer for women with heart problems to get the right diagnosis. In her Annie Romein-Verschoor Lecture, Professor Hester den Ruijter will talk about how hormones influence the heart and the importance of medical research that focuses specifically on women.

Volgende week lanceren we de nieuwe podcast Mind the Gap, een initiatief dat studenten begeleidt bij de overgang van afstuderen naar hun eerste baan. Hosts Laura van der Plas en Loes Velthuis vertellen in dit interview meer over de podcast, waarin ze praktische tips delen voor een realistische en zelfverzekerde…

'Working on your leadership starts tonight,' says lecturer Sandra Groeneveld at the introductory meeting of the Leiden Leadership Programme. The programme has been renewed this year, and students are ready to dive into it: 'I hope to get to know myself.'

From research on stellar winds to sign language: an impressive seven researchers from Leiden University will receive a prestigious Vici grant from the Dutch Research Council (NWO).

How can the Netherlands help secure a peaceful future for Israel and Palestine? At a recent meeting at the university, two remarkable speakers shared their perspectives: Somaya Bashir, a Palestinian woman living in Israel, and Palestinian journalist, Houssam Khadra, who fled Gaza over a decade ago.

Nearly a year since the abrupt switchover to mostly online learning, the Digital Education seminar gave teaching staff the opportunity to review their experiences. What can stay in 2021 and what must go? Frequently voiced opinions: yes please to digital tools that make lectures more interactive; yes…

On the university’s birthday, professors teach a class of 10 and 11-year-olds during Meet the Professor. The professors were bombarded with questions.

What is the Leiden Leadership Programme? And why is it a worthwhile addition to your master’s? Alumnus Ruilin Ma gained more confidence in his capabilities through the LLP – but there were things he valued even more: ‘Proud to be part of such a warm community.’

Western civil servants openly struggle with their government’s policies on the war in Gaza. During a meeting at Campus The Hague, three former civil servants told their stories.

One day you feel inspired by a field trip, the next you are a speaker at TEDxLeidenUniversity. It happened to International Relations student Alexia. How did she end up on stage – and why did she want to? Alexia shares her story with us. ‘I was given hope, and I wanted to share it with others.’

With its FestivOWL theme, Orientation Week Leiden (OWL) promises to be one big festival for new international students in Leiden.

This week, around 1,200 brand new students from 68 different countries are getting to know each other and their new student city. Orientation Week Leiden (OWL) got off to a good start on sunny Lammermarkt, which was packed with enthusiastic internationals.

Author and political scientist Mounir Samuel has spent recent years delving into the many ways that language can exclude people and bring them together.

Video conferencing from your sitting room and algorithms on social media that know your interests: new technology is an increasingly integral part of our lives. At the same time there is a growing call to protect our privacy, and this is causing friction, at the University too. In part because of the…

The organ in the Academy Building is 25 years old. University organist Jan Verschuren and tuner Bert Crama talk about the long history of university organs, improvising with short cortèges and their love for this organ.

From scanners in lecture halls to systems for working from home: the discussion about new technology is being held on various fronts. That is why the University wants to make more use of its in-house experts. At the Technology and Trust symposium at Leiden University on 2 February, researchers from…

The members of the Duivelsei student association are games mad, be it computer or board games. Game of the Goose and Ludo have fallen out of favour. The students prefer more-challenging board games or online gaming instead. ‘You can be yourself here.’

Light, open and green: a description that fits the new, renovated location of the Faculty of Humanities. The official opening of the Herta Mohr Building took place on 8 October, and it has many remarkable features: for example, recycled ‘mushroom columns’, a pedestrian bridge to the University Library…

Jeroen van Gessel’s lecturers didn’t always have time for extensive feedback on his written assignments. So, together with tech-savvy friend Menno Hahury, he founded Eduface, a startup to develop an AI teaching assistant. ‘The first users now work three times faster.'

What is the right master’s if I want to work in a particular profession? Can I come and have a look at your company or do an internship there? As a student, you are sure to have questions about the job market and professional practice. You can use the Mentor Network to look specifically for an alumnus…

The new Humanities Hub in the Huizinga Building was officially opened on Tuesday 3 December. In the different labs, researchers presented the options for using digital technologies in humanities research.

The students from the Leiden University Green Office have big ambitions and have outlined their recommendations in a new Green Paper. Like being the most sustainable university in the world by 2030. Students Janey Franssen and Job Kemperman are two of the paper’s authors. How do they want to achieve…

The clever young people at the National ThinkTank who tackle an urgent societal problem each year include two Leiden alumni this autumn: Jiao Harmsen and Jort van Dalen. They will spend at least four months getting to grips with the topic of ‘education’.

On Tuesday 10 January, the Meijers Lecture was held followed by the New Year’s reception in the restaurant of the Kamerlingh Onnes Gebouw. Dean Joanne van der Leun opened the reception with a New Year’s speech. The following is a short overview of the event.

What should our education and research look like in 2027? How can we make the university more sustainable and achieve greater impact? The new Strategic Plan will set the direction for the coming years, and the Executive Board wants students and staff to provide as much input as possible. Would you like…

Leiden University was present for the second time at the second Leiden Pride on Saturday.

Facility, Organisation

Are you the first in your family to go to university? Or is the Dutch education system unfamiliar because you (or your parents) didn’t grow up in the Netherlands? Going to Leiden University is a great achievement, but it might feel overwhelming too. These tips will help you settle into student life.

Researchers from the LUMC and the Universities of Granada and Almería have found a gut bacterium that is associated with stronger muscles in people and mice. Their findings, published in the journal Gut, hint at the potential for new probiotics to support muscle strength and healthy ageing.