Arnim Heinemann

President

University of Bayreuth (Germany)

Dr Arnim Heinemann is a senior executive and academic leader with extensive expertise in international education, currently being President of the SGroup – Universities in Europe. In this role, he contributes to advancing the group's mission of fostering inter-university cooperation across Europe and beyond. His work underscores his commitment to leveraging education as a transformative force on a global scale.

Additionally, he is a prominent figure in international education networks, often speaking and representing his work at major events like the European Association for International Education (EAIE), the Association of International Education Administrators (AIEA), and NAFSA, among others.
In addition, he currently serves as the Senior Executive Director for Global Engagement at the University of Bayreuth, Germany. In this role, he oversees a global network of university offices across Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe, emphasizing the institution’s commitment to international collaboration and academic exchange.

Cecilia Christersson

Vice-President

Cecilia Christersson, is the former provost and the vice rector for Global Engagement and Challenge Based Learning at Malmö University. She has led many strategic developments throughout the institution and specifically the one of Challenge Based Learning as an innovative transformative educational concept across faculties. She is also dedicated in building international CBL networks and partnerships together with a variety of local and global societal partners. 

Maria Del Mar Fernandez

Secretary of the Executive Committee

University of Valladolid (Spain)

Mar Fernández has been the Director of the International Relations Services of the Uva for over 25 years and the Director of International Relations Area from 2006-2019. She has worked on the design of the strategic plans for the Internationalization of the Uva and she has implemented many of them. She has led a large number of ERASMUS+Projects, co-ordinates Mobility in the framework of ERASMUS+, bilateral agreements and other national and International programmes and she actively participates in the International frameworks in which the UVa is involved. Her role at the SGroup is to design, promote and implement internal projects within the SGroup with active participation of university members and associates. As Secretary of the SGroup she deals with all the procedures with the Spanish Ministry of Interior.

Rūta Jankauskienė

Kaunas University of Technology (Lithuania)

Rūta Jankauskienė is an international relations officer with over 27 years of work experience in the higher education sector. Her expertise covers the implementation of the Erasmus+ mobility projects, international collaboration, activities with international academic networks, coordination of international events as well as leadership for managing delegated end-to-end creation of different project deliverables.
Her professional competencies were developed through a number of trainings in the area of internationalization of higher education in Lithuania and abroad.
Rūta holds a Master's degree (diploma with honors) in Marketing management.

Frederik De Decker

Ghent University (Belgium)

Frederik is currently the Head of the International Relations Office at his alma mater Ghent University (Belgium). He also started his professional career in internationalisation there, 30 years ago, triggered by his own study abroad experiences in The Netherlands and Poland. Previously he had different responsibilities related to internationalisation and educational policy in various Belgian higher education institutions, including head of the Office for educational development and internationalisation at Artevelde UAS (2000-2006) and senior advisor educational policy at the umbrella organisation Ghent University Association (2006-2014).

He participates regularly as an expert in international projects, mainly dealing with innovation in internationalisation, educational development, qualifications frameworks and quality assurance. Topics he frequently addresses as an (invited) speaker at conferences and publishes regularly about. He also chairs and participates in various advisory boards re. these themes at the Flemish level, e.g. the Working Groups on internationalisation of the Flemish Education Council (Council for Higher Education) and the Flemish Interuniversity Council. Frederik is a member of the Board of directors of ENLIGHT European University and member of the Executive Committee of the SGroup of European universities. His special interests are the concept of (international/intercultural) learning outcomes/competences; micro-credentials; inclusive mobility and responsible internationalisation.

Kathleen O'Connor

University of Lille (France)

Dr. Kathleen O’Connor coordinates university participation in international networks on behalf of the president of the University of Lille.

Dr. O’Connor served as Vice-President for International Relations at the University of Lille 3 – Human and Social Sciences from June 2016 until the merger of the three public universities of Lille in January 2018. From 2018 to 2021, she was Deputy Vice-President and then Vice-President for International Relations at the University of Lille. From January 2022 to September 2023, she held the position of Vice-President for International Networks at the same university. She exchanged this vice-presidency for a more constrained mission when she was elected Director of the language center in 2023.

From 2017 to 2022, Dr. O’Connor coordinated the international strategy of the University of Lille’s excellence initiative. The university received a definitive excellence university label in February 2022. She continues as a member of the coordination team for the initiative.

For her current mission, Dr. O’Connor oversees the University of Lille’s participation in the European University Alliance NeurotechEU, for which she is the Vice-Chair of the Board of Governors. She will take over as Chair in 2025. In addition, among other activities, she coordinates participation in SGroup activities and in the 3i Network, a cross-border research network of four universities.

Dr. O’Connor holds a doctorate in English linguistics from the University of Lille. She is a member of the CNRS research laboratory Savoirs, Textes, Langage, where she focuses on language teaching and learning, in particular the role of autonomy in language learning. She is an Associate Professor of English linguistics at the Faculty of Languages, Cultures and Societies. Furthermore, she is Director of the Centre de Langues de l’Université de Lille, which coordinates the teaching of 22 foreign languages for students at the university as well as for interested members of the public.

Joanna Misiukajtis

University of Szczecin (Poland)