Study Smart gets Dutch Education Premium
Maastricht University's (UM) interfaculty educational innovation project Study Smart is one of the three winners of the Dutch Education Premium 2025. This was announced on Tuesday during the Comenius festival in The Hague. Officially, the winning project is called “Study Smart: Students Learn to Study Smart”, and that flag covers it exactly. Study Smart offers an approach to a problem that more than three quarters of students struggle with: how do I learn effectively?
Recognition and appreciation
Project leader Anique de Bruin, professor of Self-regulation in Higher Education and also the new academic director of the Maastricht School of Health Professions Education (SHE) from 1 July 2025, is delighted with the award of the Education Premium. "This is a wonderful recognition for the tremendous team effort we have made in recent years. In doing so, we have shown how interfaculty cooperation with EDLAB as the hub can lead to educational innovation with global impact." EDLAB is the Maastricht University Centre for Teaching & Learning.
‘What makes Study Smart so special to me is that we have managed to put students' self-study strategies, an obvious blind spot, on the map over the past few years,’ says De Bruin. "Effective study is one of the most decisive factors determining student success in higher education. Our approach through Study Smart is proving to be implementable, scalable and, as our research shows, above all, successful."
Dutch Education Premium
During the Comenius festival in The Hague, the Dutch Education Premium will be awarded: the highest award in senior secondary vocational and higher education. The premium is awarded to education teams in appreciation of, and as an impulse for, educational innovation and improvement within secondary vocational education (MBO), higher vocational education (HBO) and higher education (WO). At the Comenius Festival, the educational teams hear whether they have come first, second or third. Linked to this is a premium of 1.2 million euros, 800 thousand euros and 500 thousand euros respectively. In addition, the teams receive an award from a representative of the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science (OCW).
(Video in Dutch)