UiB Staff Mobility Week 2023

SMW-23 had three thematic tracks:

• Career services for Early-Stage Researchers.

In academia, there are many more Ph.D. and postdoc positions than there are further career opportunities. UiB Ferd Career Centre for early-stage researchers opened about a year ago as the first career centre in Norway dedicated to researchers. UiB Ferd aims at supporting researchers in career development, for a career in academia or in other sectors. We offer different types of career events and courses, in addition to career guiding.
UiB Ferd, Career services for researchers; the why, how, and what! What does your university offer? We are looking forward to hearing more about it at SMW-23. 

• Towards a climate neutral university - working together with our students.

The university’s greatest contribution to the green transition is to develop knowledge that benefits society through education, research and innovation. But the green transition starts with us, and UiB believes it is of outmost importance to reduce our own climate footprint. How do we accomplish this, and how can we engage our employees and students to contribute?
At SMW-23 we will present some of our efforts and ideas, and we are looking forward to learning more about what you are doing.

• Universal design, inclusion, and services for students with special needs.

A university where everyone can participate and discrimination on the grounds of disability does not exist is the ideal, and what we are aiming at. For many years we have worked towards a learning environment designed according to the principles of universal design and with services for students with special needs. Now we have reinforced our efforts and started UiB Universal.
At SMW-23 we want to share with you our plans and experience from UiB Universal, and we hope to meet people within the same field of work and interest.

Partcipants: 

In 2023 we received more than 120 applications which became a total of 34 participants.
Included among the participants were two colleagues from Birzeit University in Palestine invited by SA.  

Number of participants in each group: Career: 11, Climate: 10 and Universal: 13.

Gender distribution: men made up approximately 20 % of all the participants.

Overview of countries (15) and number of participants (34):
2 Denmark, 1 France, 3 Greece, 3 Italy, 1 Latvia, 2 Lithuania, 2 Palestine, 4 Poland, 2 Romania, 2 Slovakia, 2 Spain, 1 Sweden, 2 Great Britain, 3 Czech Republic, 4 Germany

The groups also had participants from UiB in larger and smaller parts of the theme program.

New at SMW-23:

"Present-your-country-welcoming-meal" was a new item in the SMW-programme this year. All participants had been told to bring some samples of typical dishes from their own country (participants from the same country were encouraged to cooperate). The food was displayed on country stands, and we all went around and tasted, talked and got to know each other a little.

The following units were involved in SMW-23:

Division of Human Resources (HR)
Division of Research and Innovation (FIA)
Division of Student and Academic Affaires (SA)
Estate and Facilities Management Division (EiA)
International Centre (SA)
UiB Ferd Career Centre for Early-stage researchers (HR)
UiB Universal (SA)