Session
✅ Included for all participants
Short-term student blended mobility, combining online collaboration with short physical stays, is reshaping internationalisation in higher education. But does it truly make mobility more inclusive or does it risk losing the depth of longer exchanges? This session will explore the resulting skills, value and impact for students, challenging assumptions and sharing new evidence to show how blended formats can strengthen, not replace, traditional mobility within a balanced, complementary ecosystem.
Mari Pohjola is a Lead Adviser and Team Leader at the Finnish National Agency for Education (EDUFI), where she leads the teams responsible for Erasmus+ Higher Education Mobility and the Team Finland Knowledge funding programme. She is responsible for the national implementation of both programmes and contributes to policy development in the field of higher education internationalisation. Mari chairs a national working group on Erasmus+ quality implementation and has been involved in several international initiatives on digitally enhanced mobility. She also led the work on a national study on the impact of short-term blended mobility in Finnish higher education.
Lorenzo Dello Iacovo is a Policy and Programme Officer at the Academic Cooperation Association (ACA), where he deals with digital education and HEI partnerships, including European universities alliances. As part of his work, he coordinates the New Mobility Formats thematic peer group and contributes to project-based research on blended and virtual mobility, examining the accessibility, educational value and impact of short-term mobility formats.
Before joining ACA, Lorenzo completed a Blue Book traineeship at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture, where he also worked on blended mobility and European cooperation in higher education. He previously worked for the UNITA – Universitas Montium alliance and held teaching and research roles at the University of Turin.
His background combines EU law and higher education policy. He is currently pursuing a doctoral degree with a research project on the legal framework governing European university alliances, including the possibility of a dedicated legal status.
