From 8 to 11 September 2026, EUPeace was present at the 36th Annual Conference and Exhibition of the European Association for International Education (EAIE) in Glasgow, Scotland — one of the largest gatherings in international higher education, bringing together staff from institutions and alliances across Europe and beyond.
Represented by a communications and mobility team drawn from Justus Liebig University Giessen, Marburg University, and the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, EUPeace welcomed a steady stream of visitors to its stand. Among them were representatives of EUPeace’s Associated Partners as well as staff from other institutions interested in exploring closer cooperation in specific areas like immigration and inclusion or law and human rights — conversations that the team is now following up on.
Strengthening Ties Across the Alliance Community
Beyond the stand, this year’s EAIE also created valuable opportunities for in-depth exchanges with communications and project teams from across the European Universities Initiative. Rather than simply networking, EUPeace staff discussed concrete approaches to shared challenges, including the recognition of virtual mobility and micro-credentials, strategies for promoting alliance-wide educational offers to students, the development of shared digital campus platforms and course repositories, staff mobility formats, civic engagement and Living Labs, and practical questions around funding and the organisation of alliance participation at international fairs. These conversations provided useful ideas, contacts, and points of comparison that will inform future collaboration across the wider Alliance community.
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EUPeace on Stage
Alongside the stand, several EUPeace staff members contributed directly to the conference programme through panels, roundtables, and poster presentations.
Kemal Durić, Vice-Rector for International Relations at the University of Sarajevo, contributed twice to the programme. At the invitation of the European Commission, he spoke at a roundtable on cooperation with the Western Balkans, Moldova and Ukraine, alongside Daniela Pojar from the Technical University of Moldova and Filip Van Depoele, Head of the International Cooperation Unit at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture. Together with Jitka Králová, Head of the Mobility Office at Palacký University Olomouc, he also presented a poster on the development of an Adapted Physical Activity programme at the University of Sarajevo through Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility.
Johannes Weinreich, from Marburg University, joined a panel on embedding internationalisation among professional services staff, alongside Karen de Man from Erasmus University Rotterdam and Christina Bohle from Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, exploring how mobility and knowledge exchange can reach staff at all levels of an institution — not only those in explicitly international roles.
Also from Marburg University, Lisa Kattinger took part in a roundtable on intercultural preparation and debriefing for student mobility, together with Karen Wouters and Thibault Hoogstoel from Ghent University, using live simulations and role play to explore what makes mobility experiences genuinely transformative.
Klára Frausová, from the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, presented in an Ignite session “Get Inspired: From Borders to Bridges, Co-Creating Czech-German Staff Weeks,” sharing insights into a long-standing cross-border partnership between UWB and OTH Amberg-Weiden. Her presentation showed how joint International Staff Weeks across multiple campuses and countries have built a sustainable model of trust and shared expertise.
