1. ET IN ACADEMIA EGO?
Flemish university colleges and
academic heritage
Interuniversity Platform for Academic Heritage:
Simon Leenknegt, Danny Segers, Isabel Rotthier,
Trudi Noordermeer, Frank Scheelings,
Geert Vanpaemel

2. Project on academic heritage in
Flanders
• Project ‘Balans en perspectief’ conducted in
2011-2012 / 2013-2014
• By Interuniversity Platform for Academic Heritage
• Funded by Flemish government
• Screening of universities and
• university colleges (‘hogescholen’)
• Collections described according to standards

3. Why Screen University Colleges?
• University colleges (‘hogescholen’) themselves
showed interest in participating
• Opportunity to find out more about lesser known
(educational?) collections
• These collections show resemblances with university
collections

5. Hogescholen (University Colleges)
• Offer professional Bachelor programmes
• Offer some academic Bachelor-Master programmes
(design sciences, industrial engineering, etc.)
• Last 15 years: growing demand for research
→ Process of ‘academisation’ and integration into
universities

6. Hogescholen (University Colleges)
• ≠ Hochschule (Germany); ≠ hogeschool
(Netherlands); ≠ university college (UK)
• 17 university colleges in Flanders
• All affiliated with one of 5 Flemish universities in a
university association

7. Screening of University Colleges
40 collections described, in 6 university colleges:
- Artesis Plantijn University College
- University College Ghent
- LUCA School of Arts
- Karel de Grote University College
- Antwerp Maritime Academy
- Erasmus University College

8. Which collections?

9. Academies of music and fine arts

10. Which functions?
Original function Current function
34 for educational
purposes
15 for educational
purposes
6 for exhibition 14 for exhibition
0 for research 1 for research
3 had different functions 18 (partly) inactive

11. 85 % originally educational function
→ University colleges and predecessors were mainly
educational insitutions

12. 1 collection for research
Possible explanation:
→ Most collections date back to 20th and 19th century
→ Research has become more important in 21st
century
→ e.g. academisation and integration into universities

13. 45 % now (partly) inactive
Possible explanation:
→ Vocational training needs up-to-date material
→ Care for old materials is not a task
→ Removals caused by institutional changes
→ E.g. merging of more than 200 institutions into 17

14. At times a complex institutional history, e.g.:
19th century: Ecole Professionelle de Brasserie de la Société des Brasseurs Belges
Institut Supérieur et Ecole Professionelle de Brasserie
Institut Supérieur des Fermentations de Gand
Hogeschool voor Gistingsbedrijven Rijkshoger Scheikundig Instituut
Hoger Rijksinstituut voor Chemie
en Voedingsindustrieën
Hoger Rijksinstituut
voor
Landbouwindustrieën
Hoger Rijksinstituut voor
Textiel en Kunststoffen
Industriële Hogeschool van
het Rijk
+
+ 12 other institutions
++
Industriële
Hogeschool van het
Gemeenschaps-
onderwijs = University College
Ghent (1995)
21st century:
Brewery studies
partly integrated
into Ghent
University