Universitatea „Cuza” și Universitatea de Arte vor sărbători împreună 160 de ani de la înființare
Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza” din Iași (UAIC) și Universitatea Națională de Arte „George Enescu” Iași (UNAGE) vor sărbători împreună, în perioada 26-31 octombrie 2020, aniversarea celor 160 de ani de la înființare. Cele două instituții vor organiza o ceremonie comună, dar și o serie de manifestări academice și culturale care să ilustreze importanța acestui moment festiv.
La 26 octombrie 1860 a fost înființată Universitatea din Iași, prima universitate modernă din România, în atmosfera de sărbătoare a Unirii Ţării Româneşti şi a Moldovei într-un singur stat. Astăzi, instituția poartă numele Domnitorului căruia i se datorează acest act fundamental de cultură românească: Alexandru Ioan Cuza.
De la înfiinţare şi până în prezent, structura Universităţii din Iaşi a fost într-o continuă schimbare, în armonie cu spiritul vremurilor prin care a trecut şi cu evoluţia societăţii şi culturii româneşti și europene. La început, Universitatea a cuprins doar trei facultăţi: Facultatea de Filosofie, Drept şi Teologie, urmând ca mai apoi să-şi diversifice profilul, să-şi mărească numărul de secţii, departamente, materii predate şi activităţi ştiinţifice. Astăzi, prima instituţie de învăţământ superior a României are 15 facultăţi şi un Institut de Cercetări Interdisciplinare.
La 1 octombrie 1860, Alexandru Ioan Cuza semna decretul de înfiinţare a primei şcoli de învăţământ superior din Ţările Române – Şcoala de Muzică şi Declamaţiune de la Iaşi. 26 de zile mai târziu, iau fiinţă Şcoala de Sculptură şi Pictură şi Muzeul Naţional de Pictură.
Din 1931, Academia de Muzică și Artă dramatică poartă numele marelui compozitor George Enescu. După mai multe transformări, în 1997, printr-o hotărâre a Guvernului României, primeşte titulatura de Universitatea de Arte „George Enescu”. În prezent, Universitatea Națională de Arte „George Enescu” se impune în trei domenii diferite ale artei – muzică, teatru și arte vizuale, contribuind la dezvoltarea culturii româneşti şi universale.
De-a lungul celor 160 de ani de existenţă, numeroasele generaţii de studenţi şi profesori au reuşit să impună UAIC și UNAGE ca instituţii de referinţă pentru întreaga societate românească. Mulţi dintre absolvenţii celor două universităţi s-au afirmat ca personalităţi de seamă: profesori şi cercetători în universităţi din întreaga lume, membri ai Academiei Române sau ai altor Academii din Europa, compozitori, pictori, scriitori, actori, diplomaţi, înalţi prelaţi etc.
Așadar, celebrarea celor 160 de ani de la înfiinţarea Universității „Alexandru Ioan Cuza” din Iași și a Universității Naționale de Arte „George Enescu” Iași, instituţii de învăţământ superior cu cea mai bogată tradiţie din România, constituie un prilej de a medita la rolul pe care l-au jucat ca formatoare de valori în viaţa societăţii româneşti, dar și un prilej de bucurie pentru continuitatea și recunoașterea dobândite de învățământul superior ieșean.
Publicație : Ziarul de Iași și Bună Ziua Iași
Proiect inovator al unei echipe de informaticieni ieşeni: operaţii cu ajutorul Inteligenţei Artificiale
Studenţii se vor familiariza, astfel, cu situaţia actuală din lume privind implementarea IA în medicină
Studenţii de la Universitatea de Medicină şi Farmacie (UMF) “Grigore T. Popa” vor putea participa, din toamnă, la cursuri de Inteligenţă Artificială (IA). Cursul este opţional, fiind primul proiect din România de IA în medicină implementat în cadrul universitar medical. Tematica propusă vizează, printre altele, introduceren IA, tehnici şi instrumente Machine-Learning pentru non-programatori cu aplicare în medicină, Data Sciencen medicină, dar şi impactul IA în diagnosticul, tratamentul şi prevenţia cancerului, IA în imagistica medicală sau robotică în medicină.
Studenţii se vor familiariza, astfel, cu situaţia actuală din lume privind implementarea IA în medicină (atât în mod general, cât şi particularizat pe domenii medicale) şi vor cunoaşte principiile care stau la baza algoritmilor de diagnostic, tratament şi prognostic care folosesc IA.
Cine vor fi lectorii cursului
Lectori asociaţi sunt conf.dr. Adrian Iftene, decanul Facultăţii de Informatică din cadrul Universităţii „Alexandru Ioan Cuza” din Iaşi, prof.dr. Marin Fotache, şeful Catedrei de Informatică Economică, Facultatea de Economie şi Administrarea Afacerilor (FEAA) din Iaşi, Eugen Buşoiu, fondatorul IAŞI AI, Florin Cardasim, fondatorul CodeCamp şi director regional Microsoft/software architect – România, la care se alătură dr. Radu Crisan Dabija, şef lucrări în cadrul UMF Iaşi, şi Iolanda Valentina Popa, informatician, medic specialist, doctorand UMF Iaşi.
Iniţiatorul proiectului, Alexandru Burlacu, medic primar cardiolog în cadrul Institutului de Boli Cardiovasculare Iaşi şi şef lucrări la UMF Iaşi, arată că prin intermediul cursului se vor prezenta soluţii de IA în diversele patologii medicale şi se va facilita utilizarea conceptelor pentru viitoarele proiecte de cercetare ale studenţilor/viitorilor medici. Obiectivul cursului nu este doar unul ştiinţific şi academic, spune medicul, ci şi de formare „de oameni plini de compasiune şi comunicare profundă”. „Dezvoltarea şi implementarea în cadrul UMF Iaşi a cursului de IA reprezintă o dorinţă mai veche de-a mea, care porneşte de la un exemplu dat de Eric Jeffrey Topol, cardiolog, om de ştiinţă şi autor american. Profesorul spune că cea mai mare oportunitate oferită de IA nu este reducerea erorilor, a volumului de muncă sau chiar vindecarea cancerului, ci este oportunitatea de a restabili conexiunea şi încrederea între pacienţi şi medici. Nu numai că am avea mai mult timp să ne reunim, permiţând o comunicare şi o compasiune mult mai profunde, spune Topol, dar am fi capabili să reînnoim modul în care selectăm şi instruim medicii, iar eu îi împărtăşesc viziunea. (...) De asemenea, am realizat că foarte mulţi tineri îşi doresc să înveţe mai multe despre domeniul acesta, iar prin intermediul cursului studenţii de la UMF Iaşi vor avea ocazia să se familiarizeze cu situaţia din lume privind implementarea IA în medicină, care pe viitor va schimba paradigma actuală. Am constatat că în România există un zid între sectorul medical şi sectorul IT, nu se comunică suficient. Deşi interesul este mare, în rândul tuturor, totuşi ţara noastră a rămas în urmă la acest capitol. Ne propunem să reducem decalajul”, a declarat pentru „Ziarul de Iaşi” medicul Alexandru Burlacu.
Suport pentru medici
Conf.dr. Adrian Iftene, decanul Facultăţii de Informatică din cadrul Universităţii „Alexandru Ioan Cuza” din Iaşi, a menţionat că omenirea se îndreaptă într-o direcţie în care tehnicile IA vor fi din ce în ce mai folosite în medicină, accentuând ideea că nu se doreşte înlocuirea medicilor, ci oferirea unui suport care să îi ajute în lucrul cu astfel de aplicaţii. „Pentru asta, este nevoie ca medicii să înţeleagă cum funcţionează algoritmii de IA, ca să poată să îi folosească cât mai eficient, pe de o parte, şi ca să ceară sfaturi informaticienilor, pe de altă parte”, a spus jurnaliştilor „Ziarului de Iaşi” Adrian Iftene.
La rândul său, Eugen Buşoiu, fondatorul comunităţii de IA din Iaşi, consideră că proiectul nou-implementat în cadrul UMF Iaşi este binevenit. Subliniază că este prima iniţiativă de acest gen din România, în care specialişti din tehnologie se unesc pentru a ţine un curs de IA în domeniul medicinei. „Faptul că din toamnă studenţii de la UMF Iaşi vor putea participa la un curs introductiv de IA este un prim-pas în a avea o mai bună înţelegere asupra acestei tehnologii şi asupra beneficiilor care pot rezulta în urma îmbinării tehnologiei cu alte domenii non-tehnice”, a precizat Eugen Buşoiu, fondatorul IAŞI AI.
Publicație : Ziarul de Iași
Britain's universities are on the verge of unravelling
The fiendish complexity of organising teaching and timetables in the context of coronavirus will push the sector to the brink
Imagine a cross between a jigsaw and a chessboard, and now imagine playing games on it in 11 dimensions – including time. As universities limber up for probably their most difficult challenge since the second world war, that’s what higher education management feels like right now.
Universities are experiencing countervailing pressures. The first emanates from students and parents, and especially from the regulator, the Office for Students: get as many students back into interactive teaching as quickly as possible.
The return of students to universities is especially important for the financially weaker higher education institutions, because they desperately need the cash from first year undergraduates who can be encouraged on to campus, rather than defer their entry for a year or two.
But pulling in the opposite direction there are fears about safety. Although one must take the science and sociology around a disease as new as Covid-19 with something of a pinch of salt, there are enough studies around to cause deep concern about the spread of the disease once teaching resumes in the autumn.
The questions are manifold, and universities face more dilemmas than anyone can really list. Should older staff be kept away from campus? What pre-existing conditions should exclude staff from the classroom? How many vulnerable family members should be included in lecturers’ risk assessments?
Then there’s the timetable. Imagine a “normal” undergraduate class. Perhaps there’s a lecture and then a couple of classes: 40 students divided into two seminar groups of 20 over three contact hours. But with social distancing that could become four classes of 10, plus the lecture.
In recent years, an emergent and exploited precariat of associate lecturers (often PhD students or post-doctoral researchers) has emerged to fill the gaps. Given the financial crunch that’s now hitting, that option is mostly closed off. Shrinking numbers of permanent faculty must front the shop alone.
But if we return to our imaginary “normal” module, that could involve a single five-hour stint that will not only break the lecturer, but could bust the timetable if it runs across into other slots. Fine: you can put two of those classes together online and rotate groups of students through face-to-face and web-based learning. But that only takes an hour off: back to a four-hour block, with three hours of in-person teaching. That’s still a budget-busting pressure on time and square footage universities don’t have.
Then assume that some students don’t want to come on to campus at all. Perhaps they’re shielding, or their relatives are. Maybe there’s five or six of them, so we’re back to a four- or five-hour block within an online-only session at another time during the week. Maybe that doesn’t sound too bad, but now do all that three times for each lecturer – and multiply that challenge by 15 to 40 across a department.
The timetabling office might well not know which students should go where. The module leader could know – though many students only intermittently check the legacy format of official email – but has no way of seeing the whole timetable. Confusion will abound.
Now imagine the room survey that runs alongside those changes. Most universities own or lease all sorts of accommodation. They have to look at every single room not just for size but ventilation and entrances and exits, too. Narrow corridors, sealed windows and tiny cubby holes abound. Lecturers could end up running across and between campuses, on to buses full of students, driving around cities with their colleagues. How do you assess the safety elements involved?
Someone has to do all the timetabling, room assessments, class rosters, new reading lists and tech upgrades. It is involved, time-consuming, multi-dimensional work that cannot be rushed.
OK, you may be tempted to break out one of the smallest violins in the world. Of course, hundreds of thousands of people are about to lose their jobs (some university staff will too). No one in higher education minds a bit of hard work – as they have shown, year in, year out, driving one of the British economy’s biggest-earning success stories.
It’s not the effort that’s the point. It’s the potential for these complex plans not to fit one with the other, a situation exacerbated by the fact that universities have been thinly stretched, like the NHS, for far too many years.
Acknowledging the burden of complexity is actually a frank acceptance of where we’ve got to. Just as students of governance far too often forget the human factor, the unseen intellectual, physical and even spiritual energy required to run things is going to exact a high price on staff.
The worst-of-both-worlds Balkanisation of British higher education – especially in England – is the real culprit here. Neither fully marketised nor fully planned, universities will be hit by the rising demands of students and parents who are both modern consumers looking for value for money and traditional strivers who rightly want to attend, want to learn, want to experience a “real” education.
Their £9,000-plus tuition fees will be going into timetabling, hasty room realignment, meticulous module redesign, scanning and ebooks, software purchases, huge explosions in contact hours per member of staff. The students will rightly say: Why all the fuss? I can’t see what I’m getting.
Britain’s universities increasingly look like the late Soviet economy, running down their social capital behind a glitzy screen of Potemkin imagery and glasnost-era statistics. Bits of it are locking up, alternately insulted and goaded by the gap between central government diktat and the reality on the ground. The result will be the same: a very long slide into mediocrity and mendacity.
Publicație : The Guardian
It's not banter, it's racism: UK students accuse universities of brushing complaints aside
Statements supporting Black Lives Matter are meaningless without action over racist incidents, students say
As one of six black medical students in a cohort of 150 at Aberdeen University, Jessica Eze, a Londoner, says it is hard to speak out about prejudice because your voice feels “too tiny”. So when a white patient in the hospital in which she was training publicly congratulated her on being able to speak English, she couldn’t tell her tutors how demoralised she felt.
But as the Black Lives Matter movement gathered force around the world, Eze and her classmate Iona Robertson last month broke their silence with an open letter to the university, detailing eight incidents in which medical students had encountered racism and calling for change, including training for staff and students on combating racial abuse.
The letter has received nearly 500 signatures from doctors, alumni and students and the university has been quick to act. Now Eze is working with the dean of the medical school on a plan for addressing the issues it raises.
One student says in the letter that a patient referred to them as “monkey”, and “instead of saying anything staff just laughed”. Another says that when she asked a tutor how to deal with racist comments from patients on a GP placement he told her it was just part of the job and he faced similar discrimination about his “Scottish beard”.
“Universities can’t control how racist our society is, but they need to acknowledge it,” Eze says. “They need to put something in place to help us cope with witnessing this sort of racism and experiencing it.”
She says her own experience was “very demotivating”. “This is my second degree and being congratulated for speaking English just felt too much.”
Prof Siladitya Bhattacharya, head of Aberdeen’s school of medicine, says: “I am shocked and saddened by the accounts detailed in the open letter, and I am actively taking steps to address the underlying issues these highlight.”
He says the university has already talked to health partners about issues raised in the letter, and will be launching a review of the school’s curriculum to make it more inclusive, as well as working with students to make it easier to report racial abuse or prejudice.
“There is much to do to tackle structural racism in education and research; we will do whatever is necessary to root it, and stamp it, out.”
Eze says the university “is clearly listening” and she is hopeful things could change. “The UK is majority white, medical schools are majority white, our patients are majority white. I’m glad so many people [who signed the letter] felt we are part of this country and have a right to be heard.”
Universities have generally been quick to put out statements reinforcing their commitment to diversity and racial equality, though some have stopped short of endorsing the Black Lives Matter movement. But like Eze, many students want the recent protests to be a catalyst for action.
Osaro Otobo, a recent president of Hull University students’ union, tweeted: “Universities have been rightly called out this week for their hypocrisy of releasing supportive statements for Black Lives Matter, when many have done little to support us before now.”
Otobo says as president she felt “powerless” to stop racist incidents. In a Twitter thread she describes being grabbed by a male student who called her a “black bitch” at a ball. She says she was “advised by a senior staff member who tried to help that there was not much they could do” and that CCTV footage of her shouting at the student would be bad for her image as president.
Prof Susan Lea, vice-chancellor of Hull, says: “We are deeply saddened by any one of our students having experienced racism on campus. Discrimination, in any form and on any basis, has no place here at the University of Hull.” She says Hull will be reviewing how it can improve inclusivity on campus. “We may uncover some uncomfortable truths. However, only with awareness and understanding can we move forward to make real, meaningful change,” she says.
Otobo is now campaigning for a legal requirement forcing universities to have a discrimination policy with clear processes for reporting abuse and for how the institution will respond.
Meanwhile, at the University of the Arts in London, more than 10,000 people have signed a student petition calling on the university to address racism. And there have been more than 80 submissions to a Twitter and Instagram account asking UAL students and staff to tell their stories of racial discrimination anonymously. The university says it is reviewing the submissions.
Anita Waithira Israel, the outgoing education officer at the UAL students’ union, says: “The pattern of racism has simply become normalised and often students and staff are too traumatised or afraid to raise concerns. I’ve had to single-handedly represent each and every black student at UAL. The onus is on black student union officers to work on race-related issues.”
Israel says pursuing this agenda has been an “isolating” experience. “UAL likes to perform its diversity agenda, but black students and staff are really struggling.”
A year ago she wrote a report detailing issues of racism at UAL and the university agreed to enact some of its recommendations. In November the board agreed an enhanced equality and diversity strategy but, Israel says, “since then I feel like nothing has happened”.
A UAL spokesperson says the university acknowledges that “change has been too slow”, and is now working “urgently and intensively” to tackle race issues, with a major anti-racism initiative planned for the new academic year.
The spokesperson says: “We take all reports of racist behaviour very seriously. We ask anyone with complaints or new information about racism at UAL to talk to us directly and in confidence, so we can investigate thoroughly.”
Prof David Richardson, vice-chancellor of the University of East Anglia, who is chairing a Universities UK group producing new guidance for institutions on tackling racial harassment, agrees that better “report and support” systems are key. But he warns that one result will probably be the statistics on harassment going up. “That doesn’t mean incidents are going up, it means we are understanding what is actually happening.”
Richardson says UEA has already experienced the fallout of this type of action after making it easier for students to report sexual harassment – and then hitting the headlines for having higher numbers of incidents than its competitors.
Nonetheless, he is prepared for this to happen with racial abuse. “You have to acknowledge there is a problem in order to address it,” he says.
Richardson’s group will publish its guidance in the autumn. He says he understands students’ impatience for action: “I agree with students who say not enough has been done. I think they have been highlighting this particular issue for a long time.”
Warwick University Students’ Union has been collecting evidence of discrimination from black students since the BLM protests. Tiana Holgate, the union’s welfare officer, says: “Black students have told us they don’t feel like they belong. Racism is passed off as ‘banter’, and students say their concerns aren’t taken seriously. It’s very common for black students to avoid certain spaces and events because they don’t feel welcome.”
Chloe Batten, the union’s education officer, says: “In my first year I definitely remember feeling I hadn’t ever encountered as much racism as I was experiencing at university. That was so disappointing. I thought people at university would be more educated or socially aware and it would be different.”
She says the BLM protests felt like a call to action on campus, but “the momentum fizzled out pretty quickly”. “It felt like the university defaulted to just reiterating what it’s already been doing to address race equality, without talking about any new actions going forward.”
A spokesperson says: “The University of Warwick absolutely condemns racism and fully supports the Black Lives Matter movement. And we want to provide reassurance that our words are backed by action.”
He says this includes a commitment to closing the black attainment gap across the institution by 2025, compulsory workshops on race and equality for senior management, and a race equality taskforce. From July, staff will start new “non-bystander” workshops, which will explore what stops people from confronting and challenging racism in others and themselves.
Publicație : The Guardian
Loi de programmation pluriannuelle de la recherche : « Il faut ouvrir le système français de recherche et d’innovation à la société »
Avant que la loi de programmation pluriannuelle de la recherche (LPPR) soit présentée en conseil des ministres, un collectif d’universitaires, de chercheurs ou de membres d’association, demande dans une tribune au « Monde » à ce qu’y soient introduits la reconnaissance et le soutien des recherches citoyennes et participatives.
Tribune. La loi de programmation pluriannuelle de la recherche (LPPR) devait être présentée en conseil des ministres. Certaines de ses dispositions vont appeler des arbitrages et donner lieu à des débats publics et au Parlement. Toutefois, il manque un pan essentiel dans le texte actuel : la reconnaissance et un soutien clair au développement des recherches citoyennes et participatives.
Leur importance est avérée dans les sciences du climat, en sciences de l’environnement et de la biodiversité, dans la lutte contre la pauvreté et les inégalités, la mathématique distribuée, la recherche en éducation, l’intelligence artificielle et dans le domaine de la santé.
Elle est attestée par l’action de milliers d’associations, de coopératives, de TPE et PME au sein du tiers-secteur de la recherche, tels ATD Quart-monde, Résolis, Tetris, So Science, Téla Botanica, Jogl, la Fabrique des territoires innovants, B & L Evolution, Inversons la classe, l’Hôtel Pasteur, Eqosphere, des centaines d’associations de patients, l’Assemblée virtuelle et bien d’autres. Mais la plupart du temps, ces collaborations avec nos établissements publics et universitaires s’effectuent sans aucun appui.
Ces orientations font consensus et ne coûtent presque rien. Tout le monde en convient. Rien ne s’oppose donc à enrichir le texte, avant son passage en conseil des ministres, d’un chapitre concis d’« ouverture du système français de recherche et d’innovation à la société ». Il pourrait promouvoir les recherches ouvertes, participatives, interventionnelles, citoyennes dans lesquelles une part de plus en plus grande de nos chercheurs trouve un souffle nouveau dans leur carrière.
Milliers d’emplois
Il élargirait les perspectives de milliers d’emplois scientifiques dans le pays. Il valoriserait une vision enrichie de l’innovation qui connaît depuis une dizaine d’années un élargissement dans ses processus (innovation distribuée, ascendante, interactive…) et dans ses objectifs (innovation sociale, durable, responsable, frugale…). Il réconcilierait pertinence et excellence de la recherche, comme l’a prouvé le dossier d’octobre 2018 de la revue scientifique de référence Nature.
Il serait dommageable d’oublier cet enjeu car il est aussi d’ordre démocratique : dans une démocratie active et équilibrée, il importe que les citoyens soient associés au développement de la recherche ; il ne suffit pas de les informer de façon descendante. Le contexte hexagonal est favorable : contrairement aux idées reçues, depuis cinquante ans, la recherche bénéficie d’un taux de confiance inégalé en France, oscillant autour de 80 %. Cette confiance doit inspirer le texte. Or, il réduit la société soit aux entreprises marchandes (qui auraient le monopole de la création de richesses et de valeurs) soit aux tenants des penchants irrationnels et aux « fake news ».
Publicație : Le Monde
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