AAU Learning Day 2025: Education is the most important investment for society and for the individual

By Marianne Fuglsang Welling Farsinsen, AAU Communication and Public Affairs

Voxpop by Sofie Astrup, AAU Communication and Public Affairs
Photo: Anders Fast Nielsen, AAU Communication and Public Affairs

True to tradition, education and problem-based learning (PBL) defined the annual theme day where teachers and other AAU staff gathered for inspiring presentations, workshops and a celebration of the teaching at AAU. This year, Learning Day was held on 9 May in Aalborg at AAU SUND, while almost 40 staff members gathered around the same theme in Copenhagen. Esbjerg held Learning Day on 2 May where 25 AAU staff and students participated in the programme.

In Aalborg, Jeppe Emmersen, Vice Dean for Education at the Faculty of Medicine, hosted the day and began with a thank you to everyone present for investing time in one of Aalborg University's most fundamental purposes: education.

Well-being as a foundation for learning

The stage was set for today's keynote that this year focused on what characterizes our current and future students, and how we can best accommodate them and ensure well-being at the university and in our teaching.

Bella Marckmann of the Danish Evaluation Institute (EVA) deals with analysis and assessment of the quality of higher education in Denmark where high dropout rates and student well-being have received increased attention. 

While many elements influence these outcomes, one thing is clear – study environments and high-quality teaching are fundamental to students' day-to-day experiences. Academic engagement and social cohesion are essential for reducing dropout rates and improving student well-being. 

In her presentation, Bella Marckmann discussed how the university can tackle these challenges and which factors play the most crucial role in students’ academic success.

"Good teaching is teaching that focuses on the student understanding – what we call "learning for understanding". This occurs when teaching incorporates the following three principles: that students interact with the teaching material, that students collaborate in processes where they learn together – both principles that AAU as a PBL university is probably already good at – and finally, that learning takes place in a diverse study environment in terms of age, gender, ethnicity, social background, academic competences, etc.". This was just one of several points from Bella Marckmann.

In Copenhagen, EVA also gave the day's keynote similar to Aalborg, and here it was supplemented by a workshop facilitated by EVA’s Bjarke Tarpgaard Hartkopf and Erika Skov.

Tribute to AAU's talented teachers

After the keynote, there was an opportunity to network over a cup of coffee before the participants divided themselves into the morning's various workshops where they could try their hand at microcredentials or get acquainted with AAU's AI Lab developed for students and staff. In the afternoon, it was also possible to spread out on several different workshop and panel topics, including "Students' perspectives on generative AI at AAU" and "The engaging lecture - didactic and pedagogical approaches".

A fixed item in the annual program on Learning Day: celebrating some of AAU's talented teachers. Professor Sune Qvotrup Jensen, Department of Sociology and Social Work, is Teacher of the Year at AAU in 2025. He gave an inspiring presentation to his colleagues on what he emphasizes when teaching and supervising his own students. 

Sune Qvotrup Jensen talked about how he is always aware of encouraging students to ask questions. He believes that they learn more from interaction than just listening to him talk. "Just because I say it doesn't mean they understand it!" He reassured his colleagues that this does not mean that as a teacher you have to be able to answer everything on the spot. You can rest easy in having a strategy for it; for example, say to the student who asks: "I haven't prepared that, but stop by my office later and we can talk about it." It’s about creating a safe learning situation where all questions are allowed.

For the fourth year in a row, the AAU Pedagogy Prize was also awarded on Learning Day. The award went to Martin B. Østergaard of the Department of Chemistry and Bioscience, who in connection with his pedagogy produced a highly acclaimed work that addresses the interesting dilemma of PBL promoting a collective, group-oriented approach to teaching and learning. However, when students reach the last semesters of their programme, they often write their thesis individually. The report shows the potential of supervisor seminars as part of a learning community to complement the traditional supervision of individual students and small groups.

Learning Day in Aalborg ended with the opportunity for networking, experience exchange, and, not least, dialogue about the day's many inspiring points.

Why are you participating in Learning Day?

Henrik: I consider teaching to be one of the cornerstones of being employed at a university, and I think it's great to be able to learn new things that I hope I can use in my own teaching and supervising.

Anne: I think it's important to always develop as a teacher, and every time I attend Learning Day I get inspiration for new things or confirmation of some of the things I already do. I also think it’s important to stay up to date, especially because the young people who start now have different expectations than young people had ten or fifteen years ago – not just generationally, but because our entire society is different. So I think that they have different expectations of the teaching compared to what there was before.

Morten: Learning Day is part of the university pedagogy programme that I’m taking, but of course I also want to improve as a teacher and learn new things.

What’s your takeaway from today?

Henrik: So far, I’ve taken part in a hands-on workshop, so I can use it in developing my teaching and get ideas that break with tradition. Like new elements for Moodle with more student involvement and activation, because this likely also gives students a better outcome than when they listen to us talking.

Anne: That the things that are happening go cross all faculties, so we can also use our colleagues at other faculties for both confirmation and feedback: confirmation of what we’re doing and feedback on what we can do better.

Morten: I can use some of the main points from the presentation from earlier today about making all the students feel included doing class. 

What’s most interesting to you? 

Henrik: So far, I’ve only heard the presentation and participated in my first workshop, so I think it’s difficult to say, because the two things have been quite different. Of course, I can take something from the presentation about students with potential challenges in participating in the teaching, but it wasn’t as concrete as what I experienced in the workshop, so I think both have been good

Anne: I participated in a workshop on how to get the students to think that the lectures and the "regular teaching" are good, so that they don’t only come to exercises and project work. We had some good talks about why this happens, and how we make it clear that lectures are also important for the students.

Morten: I’m participating primarily to get new inputs, so I thought it was really interesting to hear about microcredentials in my latest workshop which is one of the methods and technologies we have available as teachers.

What might you use the new inspiration for in your teaching?

Henrik: I could use some of what we talked about in the workshop on microcredentials where we heard about different elements that can help make new plans for structuring the teaching – some seemed rather grand, but I would like to use this on a slightly smaller level.

Anne: After Learning Day, I always do a little fine-tuning of the modules and the teaching I’m responsible for. Like adjustments in the way I interact with the students, a different way of making my slides or a different way of making the introduction when I start a lecture. So I'm going to do that after today.

Morten: I'm excited about the next workshop I'm going to, "The Engaging Lecture", because it's something I’m focusing on in the university pedagogy programme, so I might get some good tips there.