Visit from Umeå University
Frankie Ekerholm from Umeå University visited CIP from 3-11 April 2025 to gain inspiration for a new four-year project at Umeå University, where she is heading a team tasked with developing new Swedish and English courses for staff across the university.
During her visit, Frankie observed several of CIP's teaching activities aimed at staff and participated in the 'Danish learners’ lunch club’ at Søndre Campus'. She also talked with CIP staff and conducted interviews with department and section heads across UCPH to draw on their experience and knowledge as input for implementing the new project in Umeå.
We began our project in Umeå with a preliminary study in 2023. When I searched the websites of Swedish universities to get an idea of how they worked with language skills development, I didn't find much that we weren't already doing ourselves. Until I looked across the Øresund strait and found CIP. We therefore arranged a short visit over two rainy days in November 2023, and it was truly inspiring. Now that we have really started working on our own project, it was natural to have a new and longer visit to gain even more inspiration.
During her stay, Frankie soon realized that, both in Umeå and at UCPH, it is important to offer qualified support to managers who want to help their staff with a long-term and sustainable plan for their language skills development, whether the language skills are to be used for teaching, supervision, active participation in meetings, or something entirely different.
Frankie herself says that the visit to CIP has given her new ideas, energy, inspiration, and knowledge - and we can only say "It was our pleasure!"
