The Community for Learning & Innovation (CLI) gives lecturers from Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR) the opportunity to apply for a fellowship. With this fellowship, they research educational innovation, or carry out an educational project. On this page, you can read more about the CLI Fellowship of Renée Scheepers (ESHPM), which focuses on how project-based learning can contribute to students' societal engagement.
Project-based learning bridges the gap between disciplinary and scientific knowledge and the professional project skills that students need in their (future) work to solve societal problems. This gap is reduced by engaging students in small-scale learning around complex, realistic societal issues, embedded in team-based projects. Project-based education is part of an innovative educational programme within the new bachelor curriculum of the medical degree (ErasmusArts 2030) at Erasmus MC.
The current project has mapped how students experience project-based education, and how study-related stressors and resources within project-based education support students’ motivation. These insights were gathered using both qualitative (focus groups) and quantitative (questionnaires) methods in the 2024/2025 academic year.
The qualitative methods consisted of three focus groups, which showed that students found project-based education motivating due to study resources such as clear information, autonomy in the learning process, support from fellow students, and support from teachers during project-based education. On the other hand, they also experienced study stressors due to conflicting expectations about course objectives, the emotional demands of group work, the cognitive load caused by limited substantive guidance, and a low workload.
In addition, the quantitative methods, in which 150 students completed the questionnaires, showed that students found opportunities for growth motivating during project-based education. The questionnaires were also administered in the 2025/2026 academic year, and those results will be incorporated into this project description at a later stage.
For more detail, read the article “Buiten de muren van de spreekkamer” (only available in Dutch), where Renée Scheepers describes how students within Erasmusarts 2030 learn to address complex societal healthcare challenges.
- Researcher
- Related links
- More CLI Fellowship projects
