Coastal and island universities are embedded in places where land and sea meet, where different environments, economies, and communities come into contact. The territories around them face rising seas, shrinking populations, and fragile economies.

But these are specific places where new approaches to shared challenges can be developed and, from there, shared with the rest of Europe. EUNICoast’s partner universities sit within these territories. That positioning is both a responsibility and a resource.

That proximity has not always translated into partnership. Community engagement in higher education has long been treated as secondary: a public event, a report line, something done after the main work. The gap between what universities claim to be and what communities experience is structural, built into evaluation systems, funding cycles, and career incentives that reward research output over civic presence.

EUNICoast’s partner universities have adopted a joint position to address that gap. Community engagement is a core institutional mission: one that shapes how universities govern, research, and teach. The alliance’s Community Engagement Commission has published a policy and commitment statement that sets out what this means in practice.

The framework rests on three pillars: territorial anchoring, reciprocity, and transformation. Six guiding principles give these pillars institutional form: reciprocity between universities and communities, anchoring in each territory’s specific reality, epistemic pluralism, inclusion and equity in who participates, institutional autonomy coupled with accountability, and long-term relational commitment over short-cycle project logic. 

Eight operational commitments translate these principles into practice. Each partner institution is expected to develop an institutional community engagement plan, map and build sustained relationships with local stakeholders, integrate community-based learning into teaching programmes, train staff in participatory approaches, create shared platforms for ongoing dialogue with communities, document and evaluate partnership outcomes, allocate dedicated resources to engagement activities, and contribute to policy advocacy for structural change in how higher education systems recognise civic engagement.

The statement is binding across all partner universities, from the Baltic to the Caribbean. It is now being implemented across partner institutions and will shape the alliance’s work through 2027 and beyond.

EUNICoast, the European University of Islands, Ports and Coastal Territories, brings together thirteen universities committed to being genuinely useful to the communities around them. The full statement is available for download below.