Editorial – 6.12.2024

The teacher’s retreat at BIO started as part of bioCEED and has now been continued organized by the department. This is an annual gathering highly desired by the educators at BIO and is crucial for maintaining and developing the strengths we’ve built in teaching. This week, we met at Scandic Flesland from Monday to Tuesday, with excellent participation and many key topics that sparked great enthusiasm!

One important topic was the transition from six study specializations in the master’s program for biology to a single study specialization in biology. With this change, we hope to offer more students the opportunity to pursue a master’s degree by providing them with more options, even if their first or second choice is not available. A key challenge will be ensuring clear communication about the various disciplines available and structuring the allocation of master’s projects and supervisors for students. We heard valuable experiences from Vilde Dimmen and Berit Oline Bilhovde from the Department of Earth Science, who made a similar change some time ago and whose insights will be helpful in our implementation.

We also want to improve the completion rate of master’s degrees. Ideas such as a welcome and information week, along with other onboarding initiatives, were discussed in groups. Many emphasized the importance of the sense of belonging, which is critical for study quality and student well-being. Other topics included recruitment as well as the potential for collaboration across courses, or even merging some courses, to create a more manageable workload for our teachers.

In the spirit of group work (a legacy from bioCEED), all ideas, inputs, and comments were written on post-it notes, collected, organized, and digitized. This provides an excellent foundation for implementing the great ideas that were brought forward. I mentioned this during the wrap-up on day one, and as I was speaking, a meeting invitation popped into my calendar for next week, focusing on summarizing and implementing actions—great initiative from the committee! Many thanks to the committee for all their planning and execution: Kristin, Beate, Christian, and Øyvind—well done!

Something many at BIO have missed is regular meeting points where we can gather to discuss academic topics, teaching, and other matters of interest. After a fall full of discussions and great input, I am now launching a plan for various gatherings on Thursdays from 12:15 to 1:00 PM. This time slot is free from teaching activities, so I hope it works for as many people as possible.

• The first Thursday of each month will feature “bioSEMINAR,” with two presentations by permanent scientific staff (Group A).
• The second and fourth Thursdays of each month will host “bioLUNCH” (bring your own lunch 😊), a more informal gathering with brief updates from leadership and two scientific presentations by PhD candidates, postdocs, or technicians (Groups B and C). The plan is to also have time for informal conversations and mingling over coffee.
• On the third Thursday of each month, we will hold “bioTEACH,” focusing on current topics related to teaching at BIO. Many of you probably remember the digital teacher meetings that started during the pandemic; we now aim to continue that format, but here on campus.

Once we see how this goes, we can discuss the format, frequency, and content for any necessary adjustments. Invitations will appear in your calendar in due course. I propose that we call all these activities, which are open to everyone, “bioTORSDAG”!

Congratulations to Tom Langbehn, one of this year’s recipients of the TMF Starting Grant! Tom receives this recognition during the Trond Mohn Foundation’s anniversary celebration in the University Aula today. Tom has succeeded in this prestigious competition with his project, “Systematically rethinking advection and cross-ecosystem subsidies,” which aims to better understand nutrient-rich areas in the ocean. Congratulations, Tom!!!

We have even more to celebrate at BIO today! Congratulations to the BIO Student Poster Symposium for receiving this year’s Uglepris! The award was presented by Pro-Rector for Education Pinar Heggernes at UiB’s Study Quality Seminar today. Many at BIO are involved in this fantastic event, and we want to congratulate EVERYONE who contributes or has contributed—course coordinators, instructors, students, teaching assistants, supervisors, technicians, and study administration (see the full bioPITCH team here: https://clichex.w.uib.no/team/).

Have a great weekend, everyone!
Ståle