Last Wednesday, the 9th of November 2016, we celebrated a new and innovative conference at the University of Deusto: the 7th University Conference on Innovation and Quality: “Good Academic and Management Practices for the Learning Innovation Process in the European Higher Education Area (EHEA)”. It was a good moment for the university community to show its innovation capacity and the entrepreneurs that conform the Institution. Today I want to highlight mainly the work, effort, enthusiasm and illusion that two people of the team of the Educational Innovation Unit of the University of Deusto have put on the process of the same, a process that started more than 8 months ago and for which they have had to work really hard. The point is that the entrepreneurs (intrapreneurs) also exist at the University of Deusto.
Do you want to know them a bit?
Their names are common, Eva and Marta, but their quality as professionals is what makes them different. Marta Roldán and Eva Hernández have shown us, especially these last months, that being part of the Educational Innovation Unit is more than developing a workplace. The two of them have put on this process of creation and innovation probably more than what they could have imagined. What it’s true is that since the first moment we started designing the project guided by Almudena Eizaguirre and Elena Quevedo, and supported by the Vice-Rector of Academic Order, Educational Innovation and Quality Elena Auzmendi, both Eva and Marta showed the essential attitude required a few months ago, when a nice dream starting taking form. Today we admit that the dream became a reality that a lot of people were able to share. It was possible because as Elena Quevedo states: “the things that are done with passion, enjoyment, hours, affection and creativity can’t go wrong”.
The truth is that I’ve been talking about entrepreneurial initiatives and P.E. for more than a year. I have also been supporting the idea that says that the “entrepreneur gene” doesn’t belong only to the person who creates a business or starts a project of self-employment; so, well, here you have another example of that.
Eva and Marta are two of the women who form the team of the Educational Innovation Unit, which I’m proud to be a part of, for being a woman, for keep creating “something” so important in our Institution as the Educational Innovation, for being able to work with professional women of the standing of those I’m surrounded by and for doing the things we do, which is not little.
Both Marta and Eva have shown us that they’re two responsible, working, creative, proactive, persistent women who bet for innovation, take risks, jump into the swimming pool -deep end- (sometimes even in the proper sense; they know what I’m talking about) and besides, they do all of that with a smile on their faces. Because even if the project itself required it like that, it could have been different. But they did it, and we managed to create not just a new Conference but an innovative one.
On Wednesday the 9th of November the University of Deusto’s gates were opened to show the whole education community that also the professionals of the university, teaching and non-teaching staff, start new projects each day and that we are not stuck on the past. Because to move on we have to bet for new actions, methodologies, innovation on projects and products… and the only way to achieve all of this is with people who are prepared for that; people who believe, create and innovate; people that when they have permission they are able to do things like the ones that were made on November 9th; people who know that they have to take steps to open new ways that make us different; people who, let me saying like this, HAVE a different mission, we are committed to (helping) people, their training and the good work that distinguish as from other professionals, people committed to the mission of the University of Deusto, people like Marta and Eva, among others.
By the way, I invite you to take a look at the good practices First part and Second part that, after a selection process, were presented during the Conference. If you like what you’re reading, do not hesitate and subscribe to our blog, Aprender para Enseñar (“Learn to Teach”), so you will have access to more initiatives that promote innovation at the university level.
I don’t have anything more to do but to dedicate this post to Eva and Marta. Thanks for your attitude and your creative and innovative capacity. As you know, Somos Innovación, Berrikuntza gara (“We are Innovation”).
Keep believing, creating and innovating.
Happy week.
Translated by María Ubierna Quintanilla and supervised by Arantza Arruti.