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University as a source of change in the quality of human life – internal and external perspective
The word universitas could be defined both as ‘unity’ and ‘plurality’. One of the biggest strengths of a university is its diversity, which includes all kinds of abilities, for instance neurodiversity and many others that may require all kinds of support but at the same time contribute to university’s life, bringing in new values, experiences and traditions to help the institution itself become a more integrated and stronger community. Over the past twenty years we have witnessed how the academic community has opened up to more diversity, including people with various disabilities. Different communities, including the academic community, have been overcoming stereotypes and opening up to new ideas, often thanks to the experiences that could be observed in other countries all over the world. Frontier universities often cooperate with other cultures and are active participants of the area of transcultural experience and that is why they stay open to inclusion, sharing ideas, innovative organizational solutions and concepts. The boundaries that, as an ambiguous construct in the entire psycho-socio-geopolitical complexity of the human world, the university in the frontier respects and overcomes, which is a complex metaphor of adaptability and emancipation – so essential in the life of every human being. This metaphor provides not only theoretical but also practical messages to take the role of the university as a leader of social changes in large and small communities, creating conditions for improving the quality of life and achieving a better tomorrow for all members of these communities, especially those more easily subject to the processes of social exclusion. Considering the above, we would like to initiate a discussion about the role of the university in the frontier – both geopolitical and psycho-social borderline of human fate:
- developing university’s diversity, especially in terms of opening to disability and neurodiversity, creating knowledge and actual transformation towards universal accessibility;
- in creating education for all and contemporary disability studies;
- in identifying the factors of exclusion, multiple exclusion and kyriarchy-like complications of the present day;
- in using the experience of multi- and transculturalism in building a culture of inclusion;
- in the emancipatory role of higher education, its potential for transgression and levelling out differences between people;
- in increasing the quality of human life from an internal and external perspective;
- in building a civil society and creating small and large social policies – also in the field of education – taking into account building a better future for everyone.