Joke Fleer appointed as new Dean of the University of Groningen Honours College

At the start of this academic year Professor Joke Fleer succeeded former dean Elmer Sterken as the new dean of the University of Groningen Honours College. Joke Fleer is a professor in health psychology at the UMCG and head of SCOPE, the UMCG center of expertise for personal- and professional development. She is also the dean of the University College Groningen. This background makes Fleer ideally suited to lead the Honours College into the future.

Joke Fleer is very enthusiastic about what the Honours College has to offer to UG students who seek an extra challenge, as it gives them the opportunity to broaden their perspectives inside and outside their faculty and engage with students from other disciplines, nationalities and cultures, as well as with dedicated teachers across the university. “This experience broadens students’ perspectives immensely”, says Fleer, “building their interdisciplinary expertise on scientific and societal challenges, but also learning a lot about themselves while working intensively with students from other faculties”. According to Fleer, this interdisciplinary setting can be formative as well; stimulating students to engage with others and being better able to put themselves in the position of others, “a quality that is very much needed in these polarizing times”.

For teachers, Joke Fleer says, the Honours College can even more strongly serve as a hub for educational innovation, where new ideas and innovative teaching methods can be tested outside the regular curriculum. In her new role, Fleer would like to strengthen this role of the Honours College in educational innovation, by creating more space for teachers to learn from each other. This in turn, will benefit their home faculties and the wider university. Having a place “where you, as a teacher, can experiment and practice things, is immensely valuable”, says Fleer.