The Act on the Educational Environment of Pupils and Students

According to the Act on the Educational Environment of Pupils and Students, all students on Danish universities are entitled to a good educational environment in a way where the education takes place in a safe and sound way. The educational environment at schools and educational institutions (educational establishments) shall improve the participants’ possibilities of development and education and shall thus include the psychological and aesthetic environment of the educational establishments.

How do we work with study and educational environment at the IT University?

At the IT University, we work seriously and focused on mapping problems in the educational environment.
Since autumn 2011 we have worked to establish a suitable study environment organization, and we currently have an ad hoc working group (The UMV Group) with representatives from the students (according to educational law called education representatives) and our study programme management.
In spring 2012 we will conduct an evaluation of the study environment – an educational environment evaluation n (UMV). The evaluation is carried out in week 5 and 6, and handled by an external supplier.
The supplier will prepare a report and a draft action plan and submit these to the UMV group. The UMV group then has the responsibility to follow up on the results and implement changes. The group will regularly inform students about results and actions. A meeting about the results of the evaluation will be set up in early May.

What is an educational environment evaluation (UMV)?

It is a legal requirement for all educational institutions to perform an evaluation of the educational environment at least every third year. This means completing a written evaluation of the physical, psychological and aesthetic educational environment.

The evaluation must as a minimum contain four elements:

• Charting of the physical, psychological and aesthetic educational environment
• A description and evaluation of possible problems
• Creating plans of action
• Guidelines for how to follow up on the plans of action

It is a requirement that the students are involved in all four stages of the work. This requirement also means that the students share the responsibility of providing and sustaining a good educational environment.
You can read more about evaluations of educational environments on the Danish Centre for Educational Environment’s website: www.dcum.dk

The purpose of the Evaluation

The purpose of the evaluation is to make visible where the educational environment can be improved.
At the IT-University the Study Administration coordinates the evaluation - studadm@itu.dk 
The students are represented in the process by two educational environment representatives who are appointed by the political student organization StupIT.