Menno Fenger (49) has been a professor of Public Policy at the ESSB faculty since 2000. Following his studies in Nijmegen and his PhD in Twente, Menno has found his place within the faculty: “Being a professor is the best job there is. Being a professor at Erasmus University Rotterdam is even better. Rotterdam bursts with energy and ideas: here, I see the desire to tackle the most pressing issues of our time.”
Menno has been able to combine his role as a professor with his position as academic director of the ESSB Academy since 1 January, 2019. This way, he has been able to investigate the demand for post-graduate courses for professors at the ESSB Academy. This additional project allows Menno to develop what he has always seen as an opportunity.
Impact in Society
Menno: “For a while now, I have observed two developments that I think we at ESSB should do something with. First, there is only one growth market in higher education: post-graduate education. The student influx at universities is decreasing because the aging population in the Netherlands is increasing. Additionally, ‘lifelong learning’, continuing to develop yourself later in life, is increasingly important for professionals.” According to Menno, the time when you worked for the same company for 30 years has truly passed. “Even though I may not be a good example of this myself,” he says laughing. The second development that strikes him is that having an impact in society is becoming increasingly important for universities. According to Menno, the largest impact is not having your article read or your lecture listened to but that you teach people to do what you have described in your research. Menno says, “The university has an important task, to put recent knowledge into practice. That is what we are going to do with training and courses through the ESSB Academy.” The educational philosophy of the ESSB Academy focuses on the practical feasibility of knowledge. “We work according to the ‘bring your own case’ principle: participants come up with a concrete question of a concrete problem, and within the course and during the module, we work on a solution.”
Learning Environment
During the first year of the course, the reactions from the students were very positive. “Not only did they enjoy taking part in a course, but they clearly also saw the importance of it. It provides the necessary depth in the daily work.” The current students often work at large private and public institutions that see the importance of the continued development of employees. Menno sees this as a good thing, how universities play an essential role in this. “The labour market demands up-to-date knowledge. At the university, we are engaged in the most progressive work within various disciplines. Look at the development of the corona vaccine: universities play a crucial role in this. As far as I am concerned, the same goes for the lifelong learning of professionals in the workplace. The best learning environment for them is the university.”
50 Courses in 2025
The ESSB Academy has not only been enthusiastically received by students, but there has also been a lot of excitement for the initiative among scientific staff members. “After starting the Academy, about 30 colleagues contacted me. For a while, they had been walking around with an idea for a course without knowing where to start. I think that it’s great we can help them through the Academy. All the ideas are collected on a list. The goal is to offer 50 courses from the ESSB Academy in 2025,” says Menno. There is a large demand for some courses. Menno quotes his colleague Tineke Fokkema as an example: “Tineke is truly the expert when it comes to older migrants and the problems they encounter from a welfare standpoint. For years, she has been telling governments and civil society organisations what it takes to ensure that older migrants live well within society. Through her profession, Tineke has developed concrete ideas on how things can be improved. So if anyone in the Netherlands can give a course about this, Tineke would be the one. In the ESSB Academy, we have the knowledge and the people; and we know how to organise it. So, now we are going to talk to her about how we can make those two things come together.”
ESSB as a Marketplace for Ideas
Menno hopes that ESSB becomes a marketplace for ideas. “As a university, we have the task of bringing relevant knowledge and society together. That knowledge lies within our faculty, but also within the other faculties at Erasmus University and other universities, within the Netherlands and abroad. How nice it would be to organise events with a diverse group of speakers from all over the world! Rotterdam is characterised by the energy of social enterprises. I want to involve those people in the work we do at EUR. My goal is for a university to give knowledge back to society.”
- Professor