Uppsala University receives continued government mandate for short courses for professionals
From 2026, the national initiative for short courses for professionals will become permanent and will be expanded to include nuclear engineering. Uppsala University will retain its mandate to coordinate the initiative, which has an annual budget of SEK 60 million.
Cecilia Johansson.
Under the mandate, Uppsala University is tasked with coordinating the efforts of higher education institutions to develop a broad and well-coordinated educational offering for professionals within the priority areas of green transition, batteries and technology, as well as nuclear engineering.
“Making the initiative permanent demonstrates that short courses have become an established tool for the continuing professional development of working professionals,” says Cecilia Johansson, coordinator of the initiative.
“The expanded initiative brings new opportunities, but a key challenge going forward will be increasing the visibility of the courses and identifying suitable formats for a shared platform,” she adds.
In addition to coordination, Uppsala University will also develop its own short courses for professionals. For this purpose, the University has been allocated just over SEK 7.6 million, which may be used for courses focusing on the green transition, batteries and technology. Of this amount, SEK 4.5 million is earmarked for the development of courses in nuclear engineering.
According to the government’s appropriation directions, Lund University is responsible for coordinating short courses focused on artificial intelligence (AI).
Facts
During 2024 and 2025, Cecilia Johansson led the coordination efforts at both local and national levels. Going forward, the short-course initiative will strengthen and deepen collaboration with the Faculty’s lifelong learning initiative. In the longer term, a proposal will be developed for a permanent organisational structure for education for professionals.