Leiden University College hosts first Live Webinar
Over the past few weeks the world has experienced unprecedented disruption, disorder and over all change. Leiden University was no exception. Not only did all in-person teaching get cancelled and substituted by online classes, the cancellation of open days, information sessions, experience evenings and events also took place across the university.
The unforeseen cancellation of the Liberal Arts & Sciences experience day scheduled to take place on March 28th was taken in stride at Leiden University’s honours college: LUC The Hague. Never wasting a crisis or an opportunity to show the world why it is critical now - more than ever to study Global Challenges, LUC put innovation to the test in order to connect with prospective students and transform its experience day into a virtual experience.
Home Offices and Living Spaces
The experience day was replaced by an information session that took the form of a live webinar facilitated via platform ZOOM and moderated by Senior Recruitment Officer Elizabeth Zeller. Over eighty prospective studens across the world followed the live webinar to hear LUC staff speak from the confines of their home offices and living spaces. It saw a presentation given by the Dean of LUC, Prof. dr. Judi Messman, followed by further explanation from Dr. Thijs Bosker and LUC Study Advisor Carolien Gutteling-Sieverink. Before closing the information session with a Q&A session held by Admission Officer Liping Oerlemans and the entire recruitment team, candidates listened to current students Anouk and Theo and LUC Alumnu Anne, reflect on their LUC experience thus far.
Global Challenge: COVID-19
Dr. Thijs Bosker (Earth, Energy & Sustainability) gave those who attended the webinar a challenging introduction to what it means to be a student at LUC. Before divulging more information on the majors offered at LUC, he reflected on the situation that had led to the webinar, namely that of the Corona Virus. From an interdisciplinary standpoint Bosker challenged those who attended to consider how we could rank the Corona Virus in comparison with other challenges we currently face including,
"7.6 billion people on the planet, and we are all connected as we can see right now with a disease that starts in China, moves all over the world, is infecting people all over the world at the moment and that is an example of a current issue,but there are many other issues that are global in nature - and also the scale of the issue is important"
"To give you a couple of number to put things a little bit in perspective, this year to date there have been 75,000 mothers that died during child birth, there have been 400,000 people who died from HIV/Aids, there have been 240,000 people who died from malaria, there have been 1.2 million people that died from smoking and 600,000 people that have died from alcohol abuse"
"Corona definitely is a major issue, but how should we rank this? How do we look at this issue when it is compared to some of the other issues that we are facing at the moment"
LUC Webinar Promo
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Prior to attending students were required to sign up via online registration and were invited prepare questions in anticipation of the presentation to be given. The online format of the webinar led to high demand for places and facilitated the attendance of prospective students globally. In this poignant moment in time as the world is turned on its head, the answer to ‘Why study Global Challenges’ struck a chord with all who attended.
Leiden University College The Hague (LUC) is the international Honours College of Leiden University, offering an innovative and cutting edge Liberal Arts & Sciences programme that focuses on today's Global Challenges: Peace and Justice, Sustainability, Prosperity, and Diversity.