Amsterdam, Netherlands - SEO Economisch Onderzoek

Aim and scope of this studyEXECUTIVE SUMMARYThis report forms the contribution of the Amsterdam region to the OECD reviews of highereducation in regional and city development. In the period 2008-2010 the OECD is executing asecond round of reviews of 15 regions world wide. The aim of these reviews is to study thecontribution of higher education and research to regional and city development. The backgroundof this question is that in order to be competitive in the globalizing knowledge economy, theOECD countries need to invest in their innovation systems at the national and regional levels.Traditionally, the emphasis in innovation and educational policy has been on national goals or onthe pursuit of knowledge with little regard for the surrounding environment. This is nowchanging. There is a growing awareness that higher education institutions must do more thansimply educate and research. The impact they are making in the world starts at their doorstep andconcerns their own city or region. To be able to play their regional role the higher educationinstitutions must engage with others in their regions, provide opportunities for life long learning,collaborate with the business community to boost innovation and contribute to the developmentof knowledge-intensive jobs with added value to the community at large. This has implicationsfor all aspects of these institutions’ activities – teaching, research and service to the communityand for the policy and regulatory framework in which they operate.How can higher education institutions live up to this challenge? The OECD reviews aim toexplore policy measures and institutional reforms that can help them do so. The report on the firstround of reviews in 2005-2007 provided many suggestions for improvement (see OECD, 2007b).The second round of reviews deepens the analysis by including city development as a moreexplicit theme and offers a new set of regions world wide the opportunity to undergo the processof self-reflection and peer review aimed at improving the contribution of higher education toregional and city development.For each region, the review is made up of three steps. The starting point for the review is a selfevaluationreport drawn up by the region. For this report the OECD has provided a set ofguidelines indicating which questions should be answered and how the answers should beformulated (in terms of style and contents). The second step consists of a visit of a peer reviewteam which interviews the main regional stakeholders and conducts research on the basis of theself-evaluation report. Thirdly, the findings of the peer review committee are communicated tothe region in an advisory report. Finally, the general lessons of all reviews are brought together ina separate OECD study.This document forms the self-evaluation report of the review partners in the Amsterdam region.The partners taking part in this review are the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the University ofAmsterdam, the Hogeschool van Amsterdam, Hogeschool INHolland, the City community ofAmsterdam, the Chamber of Commerce and ING-Bank. SEO Economisch Onderzoek was askedto write the self-evaluation report on behalf of these partners. For practical purposes, a soundingboard was formed with representatives from all participating organizations. This project team waschaired by the regional coordinator for Amsterdam, prof. dr. P. Nijkamp from the VrijeUniversiteit. Mr. M. Draisma of the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam acted as liaison officer andcontact person for the region.ConclusionsA main purpose of this report is fact finding. It reports many details concerning the interactionbetween the higher education sector in the Amsterdam metropolitan area and other stakeholders5