Strategy 2024-2029 Fontys ICT: Get connected

A talent-oriented, research-oriented and agile Fontys. That's what Fontys wants to be in 2025. The 2021-2025 strategic plan focuses on those three goals under the heading Fontys for Society. Anyone comparing the Fontys strategic plan with Fontys ICT will see many similarities. Fontys ICT sees itself as a forerunner and challenger, and therefore does not always see the benefits of Fontys-wide cooperation. Are we at Fontys ICT indeed ahead in everything, or can we also learn from developments within Fontys? We look at this question using the three themes of Fontys for Society.

Talent-oriented

Fontys sees it as its social mission to develop the talent of students, employees and professionals from the region. This requires further development of the educational portfolio, which traditionally focuses on the full-time bachelor's programme. Fontys wants to focus more on the Ad, Master's and education for professionals. For Fontys ICT, 'talent-oriented' is in its DNA; with student-centred education and room for employees to shape their own jobs, Fontys ICT is ahead of the Fontys organisation. One development point is that Fontys ICT also still sees itself, often unconsciously, as a full-time bachelor's organisation. While we have three in-house programmes, the Ad, Bachelor and Master, in both full-time and part-time, and the professional doctorate will hopefully follow soon. There are many opportunities in a greater focus on and appreciation for the associate degree, the master's degree and part-time education in general. 

Fontys' strategic plan also sees improving accessibility to education as a development point for a talent-focused Fontys. Guidance and administration before and during studies are important. Fontys ICT is rightly proud of Student+. In the guidance and advice on study choices, the semester coach has a pivotal role, which is becoming increasingly important. Moreover, Fontys wants to strengthen hybrid learning environments. The aim is for every study programme to have a hybrid learning and research environment by 2025. For the full-time ICT bachelor and master, this is the case; for Ad students, Fontys ICT does not offer a hybrid learning environment. And part-time students do work in groups on practical assignments, but at the same time indicate that it is difficult to integrate their jobs into their studies.

Inquisitive

Besides being talent-oriented, Fontys strives to be an inquisitive institution. In the years up to 2025, Fontys aims to strengthen cross-institute multidisciplinary cooperation in research. From this ambition, the centres of expertise (CoE) and knowledge centres (KC) have been established. Fontys ICT is the leader of the Applied AI for Society knowledge centre. Moreover, the three lecturers have all also been appointed leading lecturers: Mark de Graaf of CoE Inclusive Society, Teade Punter of CoE HTSM and Gerard Schouten of KC Applied AI for Society. The interplay between the different levels, the CoE/CCs, the professorships and the research projects that are often intertwined with education, raises questions that are mainly organisational in nature. New roles arise: tasks and responsibilities are allocated differently. This puzzling and finding out together how research can best be organised will still be on the agenda at Fontys ICT in the coming years.

Agile

The third and final spearhead of Fontys for Society is agility. For an agile Fontys, the institutes will retain some of their autonomy, but within the frameworks set by the Executive Board. Moreover, Fontys wants to harmonise and improve its support processes. In order to maintain control over Fontys-wide programmes, the Portfolio Management Office (PMO) has been set up. Finally, Fontys encourages participation in changing coalitions and alliances, which arise at the request of the outside world. Fontys ICT is increasingly making its voice heard in Fontys-wide consultations. As a result, the frameworks largely fall in line with the status quo within Fontys ICT. Yet here and there it pinches. For example, Fontys ICT has built many support systems itself. The advantages of joining Fontys systems are not always (yet) experienced, nor by everyone.

Fontys ICT is launching its new strategic plan at a time when Fontys still has two years of 'Fontys for Society' ahead of it. So far, Fontys ICT ambitions are largely in line with Fontys for Society, and Fontys even seems to follow Fontys ICT on certain aspects, such as talent orientation. What the Fontys strategy from 2026 to 2031 will look like is still guesswork. The trend started seems to be that of more steering; last year three central frameworks were established, the talent-oriented design framework, the testing framework and the quality framework. It is therefore good that Fontys ICT has a seat at many tables, to participate in discussions and help determine Fontys-wide policy. As well as bringing, we can also get: a look behind the scenes at the other 23 Fontys institutes and services is interesting, just as we gain inspiration and knowledge from other (ICT) colleges and universities.

The youth and young adults who now have an age between 9 and 24 are called Generation Z. These are our current and future students. So it is interesting to know what is characteristic of this generation.  Studies show that the social identity of Gen Z 'ers is largely online; that they want to make the world that is naturally international, inclusive and diverse, better and more sustainable. And that the well-being of this generation is a concern.

Gen Z'ers easily ride on multiple digital highways at once. The Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences even suggests that this generation has the highest motor synchronisation in terms of hand, eye and ear coordination in human history. As a result, the thinking of these digital natives is not always comprehensible to others. Earlier generations often think from offline solutions. And then look at a smart online alternative. Generation Z skips a thinking step. Only when online really fails, other solutions come into the picture. Gen Z'ers mostly absorb information from the web and prefer videos to books. Distraction is an issue, though. It is difficult to focus on one task when there are so many triggers to distraction.  Data from the Statistic Brain Research Institute shows that Generation Z has an attention span of eight seconds, during which they determine whether content is engaging enough to pay attention to.

MTV calls this generation The Founders: the impatient founders of a new world. They want to change the world. Sustainability is a key word for this generation. If something is not good for the world, it quickly loses meaning. Diversity and inclusiveness is often not an issue for this generation. It is normal to have equal opportunities for everyone, regardless of background, gender, sexuality or ethnicity. They expect the same from organisations.  Young people spend a lot of time at home compared to previous generations. They meet up with friends less and their social life takes place largely online. Their online social identity is strong. Never before has the number of teenage pregnancies been so low and a young generation so well versed in the effects of drugs.

Through vlogs and social media, Gen Z'ers are connected to anyone anywhere in the world.  Place and time play no role on the web. Work can be done in Bali, the Netherlands or Australia, and whether it's at nine in the morning or three in the morning doesn't matter. Working with goals, finishing something by a certain deadline, therefore suits them better than working methodically. Hierarchy and authority don't mean much to Generation Z. On the web, everyone is equal.  Entrepreneurship attracts this new generation. A large proportion of high school students say they want to start their own business.  Although, according to a major study by MacKinsey, in which they surveyed 30,000 workers worldwide, Gen Z does not seem to be very different from other generations in terms of expectations and motivation for their work. Meaningful work and flexibility are at the top of their list. Boomers value these too, but after salary. Salary thus scores relatively lower among Gen Z as a reason for switching jobs or keeping a job.

In 2021, over 28,000 college and university students filled in an online questionnaire. What emerged? Half of the students surveyed (51 per cent) experience psychological complaints such as anxiety and gloom. Researcher Jolien Dopmeijer of the Trimbos Institute explains in an interview with the NRC that many students experience psychological complaints and performance pressure because they are overloaded. 'Students' week is completely full. With studying, lectures and then a side job to make ends meet. The cost of living is high. Besides, they want to use every moment of their free time. To develop themselves again. To see friends, do board work, play sports. There is no time to loaf around. Everything has to be useful,' Dopmeijer explains.

But just how much pressure is there? Or are we dealing with spoilt young people who cannot handle setbacks? Van der Velden, professor of Victims and Mental Health at Tilburg University, questions the Trimbos institute's research. There is much more attention to mental well-being these days than there was 30 years ago. That in itself is a good development, the stigma on mental complaints and disorders is reducing and that is nice for people who have it,' Van der Velden explains. But exactly for those reasons, some young people also know how to use such 'excuses' tactically. 'And there is nothing crazy about that,' Van der Velden argues.  If a student has had too much to drink and gone to bed too late, thus not finishing his paper on time, and knows that an excuse like 'being overworked' works well, the student will possibly use this to get a postponement, Van der Velden explains.

Broadly speaking, these articles show that Generation Z has unprecedented digital skills, thinks mainly in online solutions, has a rich online social life and is hot for a meaningful role in an international, diverse environment, with little hierarchy, lots of variety and a focus on well-being.  So good to take into account the unique characteristics of this generation.

Higher education in the Netherlands is organised according to a binary system: the practice-oriented hbo is opposed to the science-oriented university. Such a system is found in only a few countries. With the advent of the professorships in 2001 and the extension of funding for hbo master's degrees in 2016, hbo is increasingly positioning itself as the 'equal but different' counterpart of universities. The recent pilot of the professional doctorate in hbo adds to this. Universities view the ambitions of universities of applied sciences partly with approval and partly with suspicion. The relationship between hbo and universities seems to be a love-hate relationship, they need each other and at the same time legitimise their own existence by opposing the other. The question of where this binary system is heading in the future is interesting for Fontys ICT's strategy.

It was a shocking graph that Joep Houterman, chairman of the Fontys University of Applied Sciences' Executive Board, showed at the opening of the 2023-2024 academic year: a comparison of government funding per student, between all education levels. This showed that, compared to secondary schools, mbo and universities, higher education comes off worst. Besides Houterman, Ron Bormans, chairman of the Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, was also present to explain the report 'Focus on Profession'. That report outlines the future of higher education. If current intake trends continue, we are heading for a situation in which higher education shrinks to the size of two multi-sector colleges and de facto two universities have to be added. Another development is that of universities' 'professional drift'. They are increasingly urged by society to take responsibility with regard to connecting with the professional field and society. Incidentally, it gives food for thought that universities are being called to account on questions that the universities of applied sciences would like to be called to account on, according to the Bormans Committee. What mechanisms are behind this? That is both a critical question towards society and a self-critical question towards the universities of applied sciences themselves.

With declining intake, lower funding and the turn of universities towards applied research and education, the future of higher education does not look bright. Yet the Bormans committee, like Houterman, sees many opportunities for the hbo, by emphasising precisely its unique strengths. The core quality of hbo is professional qualification. A dual role is seen for the associate degree, both in initial education and in lifelong development. Even more than now, the associate degree should have a strong civil effect and offer students the prospect of progressing to a bachelor's degree. The committee sees many opportunities for bachelor's programmes in dual education and lifelong development. Students should be offered tailor-made courses in which they receive proper guidance. The committee also advocates a larger and more diverse range of master's programmes in hbo.

A future hbo needs a strong research component. The design of this research component within Ad and Bachelor's and Master's programmes will have to be inspired by the needs of professional practice. In other words: the role of practice-based research is to provide students with knowledge, skills and behaviours that enable them to be research-oriented, flexible, adaptive and design-oriented, according to the Bormans Committee.

Whereas the Bormans committee researched the future of higher education for the VH, the Sterken committee did so for the UNL. The VH welcomed the Sterken report, saying that some 15 per cent of students in universities would actually do much better at a university of applied sciences. The VH takes this as encouragement to further develop practice-based research and higher education master's programmes. "Universities have reached out their hand," Houterman said. "Therefore, let us further develop and expand practice-based research. That is good for the development of education and also makes hbo more attractive for future master's students."

'Equal but different' then of course includes money flows equal to universities. In other words, it could well be that the hbo will receive substantially more money in the future, for research in particular. "And are you then well prepared for that?" asked Arian van Steenbruggen (Cvb Fontys University of Applied Sciences) and Johan Struik (board advisor Fontys University of Applied Sciences) to the XLT of Fontys ICT in September 2023.

This optimism was tempered a few months later by the election results. The Netherlands is likely to get a right-wing cabinet, with parties that do not favour the influx of international students. An analysis of election manifestos depicts another potential future scenario, namely one in which universities will still be allowed to admit international students on a limited basis, which will greatly reduce their intake. Currently, almost 80,000 of the 340,000 enrolled wo students are foreign. At an average growth rate of 12 per cent per year, which is a conservative estimate given previous years, this will rise to over 125,000 students by 2025. Unless the government sets a new course.

The universities are not waiting for the formation of the new cabinet, and are already coming up with their own guidelines for controlling the influx of international students and increasing Dutch language skills in February 2024. They are committed to reducing the intake of international students, reducing the proportion of English-language bachelor's programmes, more Dutch-language programmes and promoting Dutch language skills among lecturers and students.

The universities' outstretched hand to hbo would then have been somewhat premature. Fewer students means less income. When lecture halls are overcrowded, universities embrace the fan idea, but with lower enrolment, there is a risk that universities see hbo more as a competitor, who should not 'play university' with masters, PD and research.

Fontys ICT's future touches on the dynamics within higher education outlined here. With TU Eindhoven and Tilburg University as neighbours, it is good to keep an eye on developments in order to anticipate them with education and research. As long as ICT is a deficit sector, it is likely that the inflow of international students will remain permissible.

​With one foot in the Brainport region and the other in Midpoint Brabant, Fontys ICT stands in two innovative Brabant growth regions. In both regions you can see the ambition to forge more and stronger public-private partnerships. Public-private alliances are the future. Add to this the fact that Fontys wants to be 'for society', and you can see that strengthening regional cooperation is more important than ever. So it is interesting and valuable to zoom in on our regions.

Brainport Eindhoven, with 21 municipalities and over 800,000 inhabitants, is small in size but big in impact. The world's most complex and advanced machines, products and innovations are conceived and made in Brainport. There is no place in the world where as many patents are applied for as in the Brainport region. Key technologies are being developed. From artificial intelligence to additive manufacturing and from photonics and systems engineering to micro- and nanoelectronics.

According to Paul van Nunen, director of Brainport Development, Brainport's strength lies in the clustering of the public and private sectors. Thinking together in terms of possibilities. Jeroen Driessen, CEO of Driessen Group, predicts that this public-private cooperation and the formation of alliances with each other will become increasingly important in the future. Innovative systems thinking has made the Brainport industry great, says Van Nunen. By bringing this systems thinking to the public sector, solutions to bottlenecks are being sought. In the region, the public and private sectors have strategic dependencies. For instance, an attractive residential and living environment is important for businesses. Housing, traffic and public transport seem to have reached a ceiling in the Southeast Brabant region. That is why we are looking at developing a second location in the Turnhout region in Belgium. That region offers space and good infrastructure.

Network congestion is a growing problem in the Brainport region. The Dutch power grid is under pressure, especially in Brainport Eindhoven. In this innovative high-tech region, companies are not only growing fast, they are also taking big steps towards sustainability. More and more companies are electrifying their production processes, generating their own renewable energy and switching to clean modes of transport. The electricity grid, originally designed for another era, is struggling to meet the increasing demand due to the region's growth and the importance of sustainability.

Brainport has always deliberately kept focus, staying close to technology. The region essentially revolves around machines. Although the term high-tech may give the impression that the Brainport region mainly employs highly educated people, this is not the case. Van Nunen points out that 50-55% of jobs are at MBO level. There is a high demand for technical and ict-educated talent, including many mbo graduates. Interesting here is the group of 4,9000 people, including young people, who, according to UWV data, could and would like to work but do not yet have access to the labour market. Brainport is looking at whether and how they can address this group. Brainport Eindhoven has developed into an international society. In 2022, Southeast Brabant had 71,918 people with a foreign nationality. This represents an increase of 6.9% compared to 2021. Internationalisation is not only due to an increase in the number of internationals in the region, but also because companies are working more and more internationally. English is widely spoken in this international environment.

Education plays an important role in preparing students for an international world. The 'Vision Internationalisation Education for All in Brainport Eindhoven' translates the cooperation with multi-helix partners into programme activities up to and including 2025. The focus here is on childcare, primary education, secondary education and senior secondary vocational education. An important part of the programme of activities is investing in teachers' international skills. They play a key role in shaping internationally oriented education.

Our other region is called Midpoint Brabant. This area around Tilburg in central Brabant seems to stand in the shadow of the Brainport region. Midpoint Brabant may be smaller, but a 2023 study by Rabo Research shows that Midpoint Brabant is also a growth region. Whereas Brainport is characterised by engineering and mechanical engineering, Midpoint Brabant profiles itself as an education region and booster of the new economy, broad prosperity and sustainability. When working on the economy, Midpoint Brabant aims to increase the broad prosperity of Midden-Brabant. Activities aim to promote prosperity and well-being of inhabitants in the region.

AI and digitalisation are seen as accelerators of these desired developments. Together with the Municipality of Tilburg and partners, Midpoint Brabant is working to develop Tilburg's Spoorzone into a Digital Innovation District where knowledge institutions, companies, startups and governments are working towards a future-proof economy and society. In other words, working together to find solutions to social issues based on research and applications of technology and AI, as well as embedding these in society. MindLabs plays a pivotal role in this.

The 2023-2027 action programme consists of ten tasks for the future. Midpoint Brabant provides services to organisations to help them with, for instance, sustainability and digitalisation. For instance, for SMEs in Central Brabant, there is the Smart SME programme, with guidance from a digital coach, an ICT company and/or student. To keep healthcare in the region accessible, good and affordable, Tilburg University, ETZ (Elisabeth-TweeSteden Ziekenhuis), the municipality of Tilburg and various other organisations work together on prevention, integrated health care, informal care and digital care.

​​The ICT field is developing at lightning speed, and the developments themselves affect the field. Thus, the snake bites its own tail again. For a long time, Artificial Intelligence was an abstract concept for many people. With the advent of ChatGPT, everyone is getting a taste of the impressive possibilities of AI. It also presents education with new challenges, because how do you still know if students have programmed something themselves? And is that question actually still relevant? A broad social debate is also flaring up, about the risks of AI. Moreover, AI is by no means green; it consumes a lot of energy and water.

The name generative AI (GAI) refers to AI systems that can create content automatically, at the request of a user. Since the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022, millions of users worldwide have been experimenting with this technology. The technology is already having an impact on society, and expectations of what it will bring to society are high. Building on their AI knowledge and products, since 2018, several technology giants have developed large language models, including OpenAI, Google, Meta, Microsoft in America and Baidu in China. They have created models not only focused on language, but also for other modalities, such as CodeX (OpenAI), protein structures (such as Deepmind's AlphaFold) and robotics (such as Google's PaLM-E). Because training those models requires a lot of computing power, hardware and data, large tech companies in particular have so far been able to train a language model. For instance, keeping ChatGPT on air costs an estimated US$700,000 per day. This kind of computing power also requires a lot of energy and water consumption.

The scientific literature lists dozens of tasks that GAI can perform in education, both for pupils and students, and for teachers. Examples include making summaries, writing study materials and timetabling. Furthermore, the systems can help with assessment. A chatbot can provide support to students as a real-time questioner, study buddy or source of ideas and suggestions. The performance of generative AI systems is such that they can pass various school subjects or university courses. ChatGPT, for instance, passed a law exam and a medicine exam. In summary, commonly mentioned opportunities for using generative AI in education are time-saving and efficient, higher quality of teaching material, better learning yield and promoting student motivation.

In research, GAI can help students and researchers with literature searches. Several scientific journals have already published articles in which ChatGPT has been co-authored. It is expected that GAI applications can lead to substantial increases in productivity and efficiency. Partners from our regions are more likely to turn to Fontys ICT for this.

The Rathenau Institute concluded in December 2023, based on a scan, that generative AI reinforces risks in the digital world, and creates new risks. A few examples: how will we soon be able to distinguish reality from AI-generated content? Also copyright, the question of whether all content may be made available to GAI's language models comes into play. Are texts allowed to be used or are they legally protected? Who oversees the use of generative AI and are new laws needed?

Sogeti's Johan Flikweert's lecture lists Gartner's Top Strategic Technology Trends in Software Engineering. They distinguish three fields: Developer Enablement, AI-augmented Software Engineering and Scaling Software Development. In doing so, Flikweert himself from Sogeti said he expected AI to play a bigger role in software engineering, and off-shoring to move more towards near-shoring, especially Portugal and Spain.

That ICT is developing rapidly, the flight of generative AI shows that well. Now AI is popular, but this will be another innovation in the future. Time for research and a good connection between that research and education are therefore important prerequisites to keep education current. When an innovation becomes more widely known, social concerns around safety, surveillance and ethics also increase. Do we adequately address society's criticisms or concerns? And are we making our students sufficiently aware of the sustainability aspects of ICT innovations? It may well be that students from Generation Z in particular find it interesting and meaningful to engage in debate with each other about, for example, the sustainability of ICT solutions.

No unknown phenomenon after the corona period: the note on the door of a restaurant that is unfortunately closed due to a lack of staff. The tightness in the labour market will not disappear in the future, but actually increase. Government and employers are looking for creative solutions. What can AI do? What ICT knowledge and skills will be in demand in the future? And what does the future of work mean for the way we develop ICT education?

Demographic trends such as ageing and de-greening, which refers to a decline in young people due to a lower birth rate, show that in 26 years' time, more people will retire than enter the labour market. The potential labour force will be only 60 per cent of the total population by 2050. Another trend is that although more and more Dutch people have started working, part-time work is relatively common. And we are not just talking about working parents or carers; the upcoming young generation Z consciously chooses to work part-time. Work is just one part of their lives. Earning enough is a prerequisite and not an end in itself. The number of young people working between 28 and 35 hours a week has doubled since 2003 and that line continues to rise.

Ton Wilthagen, labour market professor and Tilburg city professor, does not expect the demand for work to decrease. The Dutch economy is doing well. Moreover, there are many social tasks in society for which we need people, such as energy transition and ageing. To meet the demand in the care sector, 1 in 4 people would soon have to work in care. Furthermore, we aim to produce more locally and depend less on foreign countries. Wilthagen outlines a future perspective in which choices will have to be made. We do not know a command economy in the Netherlands, but it may become a realistic option with these trends.

Employers are looking for creative solutions to fill their vacancies. One example is that Enexis is recruiting bakers because their fine motor skills can be used for electrical work. Retraining is provided by Enexis itself. Attracting international talent is another tried and tested method to fill the shortages in the Brainport region, for instance. Another opportunity is the more than 1.2 million people who represent unprecedented talent and would like and could work, but are (still) not in the picture. The director of Brainport told the XLT that they are looking at reaching out to people from this group and giving them access to the labour market.

Besides training and recruiting new employees and digitising work to need fewer staff, there is a growing focus on keeping existing employees vital and happy. Jeroen Driessen, CEO of Driessen Group, sums up job happiness with the three p's, pleasure, purpose and people. In other words, doing cool things together that matter. "And work-happy employees make for happy customers," says Driessen.

ICT is a shortage sector with a tight labour market. Demand for ICT workers is expected to continue to grow. According to UWV (2023), employers are mainly looking for highly skilled ICT workers who want to work full-time. Those candidates are hard to find. Lifelong development (LLO) is becoming more important. More than 60% of employed ICT workers are expected to need additional education or training before 2027 to keep up with rapid technological developments. This mainly concerns improving analytical skills and being able to deal with AI. This means that employers must continue to invest in training and developing their staff.

What is also interesting is how developments in ICT, such as generative AI, will affect the future of work. In a December 2023 report by the Rathenau Institute, researchers raise the important questions of to what extent AI systems will take over jobs, to what extent people will interact with the systems, and to what extent technology will enable new jobs. Jobs consist of bundles of tasks, and technology often takes over only part of the job set. Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania and OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, calculated that in 80% of jobs, at least 10% of tasks could be automated with generative AI. Working people will thus have time to do other things, and in turn learn new skills. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) expects, partly for this reason, that GAI systems will mainly support human work.

Research confirms the statement that with our ICT training we are preparing students for jobs that do not yet exist. Jobs that did not exist 10 years ago, such as cloudless computing specialist and drone operator, demonstrate the importance of teaching skills that can be applied in the jobs of the future. The Future of Jobs survey by the World Economics forum identifies the most essential skills of the future every five years. The top 15 most desired skills for 2025, set in 2020, has a top three with at one: analytical thinking and innovation, at two: active learning and learning strategies and at three: complex problem solving. Jeroen Driessen also foresees that diplomas will say less than skills & competences in the future.

In summary, the future of work touches ICT education and research in several facets. ICT research can help solve labour market bottlenecks. For instance, what can AI do in this regard? And to accelerate digital transformation, ICT education could be more strongly integrated into all education and training. Further training and upskilling of workers is growing in importance, possibly blurring the line between school and work; employers are also investing in their own training, for instance. For graduates, the employers of the future may be less interested in the title of the education than in their acquired knowledge and skills. And for future employers, job happiness, with flexible, meaningful work that you do together, is important. Not only to retain employees, but also because work-happy teachers, support and staff together make for 'study-happy' students.