Home About us Organisation Annual report

Annual report

The year 2023 was a time of development and brand renewal at HAMK.

Introduction

In August, we launched the new the Bettermakers brand, which was developed together with students, staff and stakeholders. The feedback was very positive!

We want to build our activities forward in human-sized steps so that each of us can contribute to the goals and results through our own actions. We were pleased to give all our& staff a small performance bonus at the end of the year for a job well done.

We are part of the RUN European University. The first three years of RUN came to a successful conclusion. We had a joint General Assembly with our RUN partners in November 2023 in Portugal.

In many respects, the RUN partnership achieved the objectives set for the work. In particular, the short programmes for students (SAPs), staff and student mobility and the Research Hubs made positive progress.

We were able to conclude that our European University will continue and develop in the coming years. The new funding period 2024-2028 will require even closer cooperation to achieve a competitive European University with common permanent structures.

Key figures

24 000 applicats

84% employment of graduates

10 000 students

1227 degrees

1300 international students

429 teachers qualifications

762 staff

400 publications

Finland’s 8th largest university of applied sciences in terms of student numbers

Research volume 15 M€

More than half of studies include the promotion of sustainable development

Yksi henkilö seisoo ja muut istuvat kuuntelemassa

About the expertise

In developing the education, we set out to build on the Design-Based Education (DBE) pedagogy. At the same time, we prepared the teaching staff for the introduction of the new pedagogical thinking. The first pilots started in 2024, with coaching, sparring and support.

Our students continued to graduate well. However, we identified a clear need for more guidance and measures to improve student well-being.

In 2023, we piloted a learning experience indicator. This will be a research-based survey that measures student experiences of studying and learning, learning environments, general work-life skills development and student well-being.

The questionnaire can be used to identify students who are at risk to have challenges in their well-being and studies. It also provides information on how to develop pedagogical and guidance solutions to support deep and reflective learning, planned learning and student well-being.

The questionnaire also guides students to take responsibility for their own learning and for developing their learning skills. The indicator is used at RUN Europe University as part of SAP implementations.

In spring 2023, 435 staff members participated in the self-assessment of staff competences. According to the results, our staff has developed a lot, especially in the areas of leadership, pre-employment, digital pedagogical and systems skills.

On internationalism

We continued to develop our recruitment and services for international tuition-fee students. We focused specific efforts on housing for international students, mentoring services, language cafés and friendship programme, support for student employment and the introduction of the Goin Connect tool.

The tool helps students to get to know each other and exchange information about studying, living, arriving in the country and other practical arrangements before they arrive in Finland. Based on feedback, the tool serves international students well.

The number of international students with tuition fees continued to develop well, reaching over 600 at the end of 2023. During 2023, we also built four new foreign language programmes (Nursing, Professional Horticulture, Sustainable Urban Design and Information and Communication Technology, Robotics).

We are part of the RUN Europe University. The first three years of RUN came to a successful conclusion. In many respects, the RUN partnership achieved the objectives set for the work. In particular, the short programmes for students, the SAPs, staff and student mobility and the Research Hubs made positive progress.

We decided that our European University will continue and develop in the years to come. The new funding period 2024-2028 will require even closer cooperation to achieve a competitive European University with common permanent structures.

Knowledge export will increase, especially in tuition fee-based degree programmes.

On research

HAMK’s research activities developed strongly in 2023, with a particular focus on the development of three new multidisciplinary research ecosystems, business cooperation and international funding. In 2023, our research activities amounted to around EUR 15 million.

External RDI project funding accounted for around 75% of all our RDI funding. Our strategic goal is to double this funding by 2030. To achieve this, we want to work increasingly closely with our business partners on RDI.

The key ecosystems we will continue to develop are Smart Solutions in Biotechnology (SmartBio), Smart and Sustainable Built Environment (SmartBuilt) and Smart Future Education and Competences (SmartEdu). These developments build on the “Parhauden strategia” strengthen multidisciplinary research collaboration, including the involvement of teachers, students and alumni in our RDI activities.

A major event for us was the start of construction of a new smart biotechnology research and laboratory environment, Smart & Bio, at the Hämeenlinna University Centre. The new facilities will become operational during 2024.

In 2023, we achieved excellent results at home and internationally. Our five academy-funded projects, two of which secured follow-on funding, delivered high quality results. With Business Finland’s infrastructure funding, we strengthened our equipment for the biogas sector and built a laboratory for modern biotechnology. The expansion of our Africa project funding and significant regional and national RDI funding are further evidence of our increased financial expertise. We strengthened our capacity to coordinate Horizon funding by hiring our first Grant Writer and mobilising researchers, including with our RUN-EU research partners.

Our publishing activities are an important part of HAMK’s visibility and the sharing of research results. We published about 70 peer-reviewed publications, and produced more than 400 publications in total. We will continue to develop our publications, for example by renewing HAMK’s own publication channel. The results and activities also received positive comments from external stakeholders. For example, the smart sleeve we developed was noticed by several media.