EUTOPIA Student Innovation Challenge 2025
From 17 to 21 November, 78 students from EUTOPIA and beyond gathered in Brussels for the VUB Innovation Challenge on the theme of “Challenges and innovations in multilingual societies".
Participants were put into small cross-institution and cross-disciplinary teams to work on a challenge of their choice and reflect on possible solutions.
Throughout the week, students benefitted from lectures and interactive sessions delivered by EUTOPIA academics members of the Connected Communities 'Multilingualism and Diversity' and 'Text and Discourse Analysis', who were able to provide insights into the opportunities that multilingualism affords but also the challenges it can pose.
On the last day, student teams presented their project through a 5-min pitch aimed at tackling the challenge they had chosen to work on. Topics ranged from multilingualism in healthcare or education to multilingual poetry and music.
Students highly enjoyed their time and found it very enriching:
Visiting the Autumn School in Brussels was a wonderful experience, it was so well organized, and it was an amazing opportunity to hear from speakers from across the world. I loved the group work with students from other universities and getting the chance to explore a new city. Thanks to EUTOPIA I now have lots of fresh perspectives to apply to my university work!
(Harriet Pickering, MA in Translation student)
It was an enriching week, full of people from all over the world. You can instantly gain different perspective from talking to people just like you. You will make new friendships and expand your knowledge through lectures, seminars and various open discussions. I highly recommend!
(Applied Linguistics student)