(This content has been translated automatically.)

Dear students,

During the autumn months, our university introduces itself to new prospective students in various Czech and Slovak cities. These days, a team of student ambassadors travelled 300 km eastwards to Košice and Prešov. Interest is at an all-time high, just as it was at the Gaudeamus fair in Bratislava (in Czech). We will be going to the Brno fair in early November and then we will head to other parts of Slovakia.

For those of you who are already part of Palacký University, and therefore also recipients of our newsletter, we have prepared a lot: we will invite you to lectures and courses, ask for your opinions in surveys and we will not miss the competition.

Over 600 000 meals are cooked and served in the UP canteens in an average year. Whether you visit the canteen regularly or only occasionally, you have stopped going to the canteen or you have never eaten there, we would like to know your opinion on various areas related to canteen meals. Therefore, the University management and the Administration of the Halls of Residence and Canteens have prepared a comprehensive questionnaire (in Czech). In this article (in Czech), you will find details and answers to several frequently asked questions that have long been raised about the canteens. Your answers are, of course, completely anonymous, and you can fill them in (in Czech) until 5 November.

After the start of the winter semester, the UP dormitories have traditionally vacated several places for additional student accommodation. These days, the available beds are available in varying numbers in different dormitory buildings. The possibility of additional long-term accommodation is currently available to male and female students of all years. If you are interested, please contact Alena Halabicová, the dormitory clerk, as soon as possible, tel: 585 638 026 or 606 398 176.

This year we will meet for the 28th time to commemorate Prof. J. L. Fischer (in Czech), the first rector of the University of Olomouc after its restoration in 1946. This time, Dana Drábová, Czech nuclear engineer and chairwoman of the State Office for Nuclear Safety, has accepted our invitation to give a lecture on Nuclear Energy in the Service of Man (in Czech). The most obvious and most debated use of nuclear energy is the possibility to extract the enormous energy hidden in the nucleus of the atom. Less talked about, however, are the even greater benefits that have come from the use of radiation and nuclear technology in medicine, industry, agriculture and other fields. How mankind has managed to use nuclear energy in just one century and what it offers us today, we will hear on Thursday, 3 November at 5 pm in the auditorium of the Faculty of Education.

Are you the first in your family to go to college? Who or what helps you most to navigate your studies? In order to direct your efforts in the right and meaningful direction, the university needs just a few minutes of your time and the answers (in Czech) to a few questions. We'd love your help to find out how it really is – an anonymous questionnaire (in Czech) is waiting for your answers until the end of October.

Is climate change responsible for the fire in NP Bohemian Switzerland? Why are coral reefs dying? – It is easy to read many half-truths, myths and emotionally tinged information about climate and climate change. In order to have a factual, sophisticated and generally meaningful debate, it is a good idea to base it on scientific knowledge and verified data. That is why the Facts about Climate (in Czech) portal was created, and its founder and director Ondráš Přibyla will present 10 of the most important insights into the topic of climate change through data and data visualisations on 26 October in the seminar Climate Change and Ways to Address It (in Czech). The seminar is part of the Lifelong Learning courses at UP and is co-organized by the Sustainable University. More on the website (in Czech) and Facebook (in Czech).

News of record inflation is pouring in from everywhere – what to make of this information? How to handle money today, where to invest it? And how to deal with housing, does it make sense to save for it? On Wednesday, 26 October, the topic will be How to handle money in times of crisis and a week later How not to be "homeless" after the height, always from 5 pm in the premises of the centre (in Czech) at Křížkovského 8. Follow the centre's events on its Facebook page.

What's new at the university in terms of planning, strategy, external relations or benchmarking? If you open the October newsletter of the Strategy and Quality Office of UP, you will find that fundraising and the related coordination of the UP Endowment Fund have been newly transferred to this area. The theme of the issue is the third role of UP and strategic goals, the concept of de minimis and its functioning is also explained. Read the whole newsletter on the web (in Czech).

Publishing results is also an integral part of scientific work – but some of them are difficult to access. One solution is called open access – open, permanent, instant, free online access to the full text of published scientific results (usually articles) without restrictions for anyone. On the occasion of the International Open Access Week, the UP Library has prepared a series of seminars on open science and open access during the week of 24 October. For beginners there is a seminar on the principles and possibilities of publishing in Open Access mode and handling open data. Furthermore, you can learn about the current development of Open Science at Palacký University or about Open Science practices in research projects from Horizon Europe or OP JAK. Programme and registration on the Open Science (in Czech) website.

Lectures, informal meetings, acquiring necessary contacts, discussions and competition, all this is offered by this year's UP Business Camp (in Czech) programme. It is organised by the UP Science and Technology Park and will take place on 5 November at the Palacký University Fortress of Knowledge. The tenth edition of the event will be marked by the theme "Turbulent times – opportunity or risk?", and the competition "Clash of Startups" is an integral part of the programme. The programme and tickets for the UP Business Camp can be found here (in Czech), and the registration for the Startup Challenge can be filled out here (in Czech).

Since contests are a popular part of our newsletters, we have two of them today. You can win a voucher for an hour of individual coaching at the UP Career Centre or a voucher for a performance from the repertoire of Divadlo na cucky, our long-term partner. Just let us know in which year the first lecture in honour of J. L. Fischer took place at UP. We're waiting for your answers at soutez@upol.cz by October 25, and let us know which voucher you're competing for. 

Three minutes can determine the success of a thesis. Approximately that is the length of the animated videos from the series "UP Library Advises", prepared by the Department of Communication together with the University Library. The five educational films focus on the issues of citation, finding information sources, plagiarism and predatory journals. They also inform about the possibility of using the library's services and tools, which are available to UP students and employees free of charge. The videos can be viewed on the university's YouTube or UPstream platform, where you can also find the first series of animated videos that focus on safety in cyberspace.