On April 3rd-4th Dr. Dr. Roland Zarzycki, Vice-Rector for Academic Affairs at Collegium Civitas participated in a study visit at the University of Utrecht. The University of Utrecht is a public higher education institution and one of the oldest universities in the Netherlands. It conducts interdisciplinary research in four major areas: life sciences, pathways to sustainability, dynamics of youth, and institutions for open societies. The University of Utrecht is also one of the leaders of the global Open Science movement. Already in 2017, the institution began implementing a wide-ranging transition plan towards more open science and education.

 During his visit, Dr. Dr. Zarzycki took an active part in discussions organized by the International Association of Universities (IAU), which Collegium Civitas is a member of. The meetings were devoted to the Open Science movement, the essence of which is encouraging collaborative and public research in which findings are made available to everyone at the earliest stage possible. Researchers from the University of Utrecht shared their experiences and good practices in this area. The overarching goal of the meeting was to broaden global understanding among academics from around the world to ‘foster more transparent, collaborative, and inclusive scientific practices to make new knowledge more accessible and verifiable, to ensure more equitable access to science and knowledge, and to enhance international research collaboration’, as stated by the IAU.

 In reference to the meeting Dr. Dr. Zarzycki notes “In the face of rapidly deepening processes of commodification of science and education, the Open Science idea and movement seem to be one of the last chances for the global scientific community to regain control over the means of production and distribution of knowledge, cognition, and science. This initiative, which some people perceive only in terms of saving money on open access publishing, is in fact a fundamentally important battle for freedom of thought.”