TLC (Esther van Schaik) took part in the 1st day of SURF Education Days 2021, which took place in Den Bosch on 9 and 10 November. The following questions were central to the day: “What do we want to retain from the past period of forced online education?” and “How can we maintain the urgency and power of innovation in the digital transition of education? In other words: what is a good balance between online and physical education and how can we make the right blend?

Of course, this requires further research and there is no single approach that works well in all situations. However, it is important to choose a bottom-up approach to blended learning (start small and let the lecturers take the initiative) with top-down support. It was also emphasised that “without clear guidance, digitisation will very quickly become part of the problem and can therefore increase the already existing workload and study stress”. In order to provide direction, a transition agenda has been drawn up by representatives of higher education under the leadership of Professor Derk Loorbach and Gijs Diercks of DRIFT (research institute Erasmus University Rotterdam). The transition agenda outlines a future vision for higher education and sets out the desired system changes.

Nynke Bos (lecturer Teaching, Learning & Technology Inholland) closed the plenary session of Day I of SURF Onderwijsdagen. She too spoke about the transition that the higher education sector is going through: “We are on two journeys: in the short term, it is important that we scale up blended learning, and we are also going through a shared transition that goes beyond the good intentions of instructors. Let’s focus on how technology can deepen the interactions on campus. All this precisely to make contact education of even greater value!”

In conclusion, the future of education is blended. However, give lecturers the space, ask students what ideas they have about (digital) teaching methods; and teach students how they can take control of their own learning.

For video reports see: Looking back at SURF Education Days 2021 | SURF.nl