EXCLUSIV! Astăzi se decide viitorul Universitatii "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" din Iasi. In prim-plan va fi modalitatea de alegere a noului rector si raportul acestuia pentru anul 2018

Avand in vedere ca membrii Senatului Universitatii "Alexandru loan Cuza" din lasi sunt invitati in ziua de joi, 28 martie 2019, orele 12:00, in Sala Senatului, pentru a lua parte la sedinta ordinara, interesant este ca pe ordinea de zi va fi in prim-plan prezentarea raportului rectorului pentru anul 2018 dar mai ales modalitatea de alegere a acestuia pentru intervalul 2020-2024.

Pe de alta parte, iata de alte subiecte vor fi supuse discutiei.

1.  Aprobarea Raportului de activitate al Rectorului Universitafii ,,Alexandru loan Cuza" din lasi, pentru anul 2018.
2.  Aprobarea Metodologiei de organizare a referendumului la nivelul Universitatii ,,Alexandru loan Cuza" din laJi pentru alegerea modalitatii de desemnare a rectorului pentru mandatul 2020-2024.
3.  Stabilirea numarului birourilor seqiilor de votare si a locului desfasurarii referendumului pentru alegerea modalitatii de desemnare a rectorului pentru mandatul 2020-2024.
4.  Aprobarea componentei Biroului Electoral al UAIC responsabil cu organizarea si desfasurarea referendumului pentru alegerea modalitatii de desemnare a rectorului pentru mandatul 2020-2024.

5.Aprobarea lansarii spre dezbatere publica a Codului de Etica ?i Deontologie Profesionala precum si a articolelor din Proiectul Cartei Universitatii ,,Alexandru loan Cuza" din la?i, pentru care Ministerul Educatiei Nationale a formulat obieqii prin adresa nr. 3232/DGJ din 23.10.2018, precum ??i aprobarea procedurii pentru transmiterea de propuneri privind continutul acestora.

6.  Aprobarea rezultatelor concursului privind atribuirea sporului de performanta academica aferent anului 2019 pentru personalul didactic de la Facultatile de Biologie si Matematica.
7.  Aprobarea propunerii Facultatii de Chimie de acordare a titlului de Membru de Onoare al Senatului Universitatii ,,Alexandru loan Cuza" din laJi domnului dr. Nelu Grinberg, Boehringer lngelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Ridgefield, CT, USA.
8.  Aprobarea Raportului de activitate pentru anul 2018 si a Situatiilor financiare anuale 'incheiate la 31. 12. 2018 ale Fundatiei 11Alumni -Universitatea Alexandru loan Cuza" din lasi.
9.  Prezentarea Raportului Comisiei de Etica a Universitatii 11Alexandru loan Cuza" din laJi pentru anul 2018.
10.  Avizarea modificarii componentei Comisiei de Etica a Universitatii 11Alexandru loan Cuza" din lasi.
11.  Diverse.

Publicație: Bună Ziua Iași

EXCLUSIV! In Gradina Botanica din Iasi au demarat lucrarile la o constructie SPECTACULOASA! Iata cum va ARATA

O noua investitie spectaculoasa a demarat la Universitatea "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" - UAIC din Iasi! • Chiar in aceste zile au inceput lucrarile de realizare a unei constructii provizorii cu suprafata pe zeci de metri patrati, pentru desfasurarea de activitati specifice petrecerii timpului liber, chiar in Gradina Botanica "Anastasie Fatu" • În acest sens au fost efectuate demersuri începând cu anul 2016, pe perioada mandatului prof. univ. dr. Tudorel Toader (actualmente ministru al Justitiei), respectiv rectorul ales al Universitatii "Cuza" • Valoarea contractului este de 393.936 lei, în data de 21 martie 2019 fiind semnat ordinul de începere a lucrarilor

Investitie spectaculoasa demarata de Universitatea "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" (UAIC) din Iasi. Astfel, zilele acestea au inceput lucrarile de realizare a unei constructii provizorii cu suprafata pe zeci de metri patrati, pentru desfasurarea de activitati specifice petrecerii timpului liber, chiar in Gradina Botanica "Anastasie Fatu".

În acest sens au fost efectuate demersuri începând cu anul 2016, pe perioada mandatului prof. univ. dr. Tudorel Toader (actualmente ministru al Justitiei), respectiv rectorul ales al Universitatii "Cuza". Valoarea contractului este de 393.936 lei, în data de 21 martie 2019 fiind semnat ordinul de începere a lucrarilor. In anul 2016 a fost obtinut Certificatul de urbanism în scopul amplasarii constructiei provizorii. În anul 2017 a fost prelungita valabilitatea Certificatului de urbanism si s-a încheiat contractul pentru realizarea serviciilor de Proiectare si Asistenta Tehnica aferente investitiei "Gradina Botanica - constructie provizorie".

In 2018 s-a finalizat proiectarea, s-a obtinut autorizatia de constructie. S-a demarat procedura de achizitie servicii lucrari executie, fiind desemnat un câstigator, dupa ce la prima procedura nu s-a prezentat niciun ofertant.

"Pe amplasamentul Gradinii Botanice din Iasi se propune realizarea unei constructii provizorii cu suprafata de 85 mp, pentru desfasurarea de activitati specifice petrecerii timpului liber. Constructia provizorie va fi personalizata, executata pe structura usoara, demontabila, mobila, fara fundatie, urmând a fi montata pe amplasamentul stabilit punctual în cadrul Gradinii Botanice Iasi. Aceasta va fi amplasata pe strada Dumbrava Rosie, in apropierea intrarii principale in Gradina, din Copou. Licitatia pentru constructia acesteia este in derulare, avand doi ofertanti. Ca functional se propun: spatiu expunere suvenire, spatiu pentru cafenea/ ceainarie, grup sanitar si spatiu pentru depozitare marfa. Pentru a profita de potentialul ambiental ridicat al Gradinii Botanice Iasi, pe doua laturi a constructiei, se va amenaja o terasa cu o capacitate de aproximativ 20 locuri pe o suprafata de 56 mp", au transmis oficialii UAIC

Publicație :Bună Ziua Iași  

Editie interesanta in lumina reflectoarelor Studioului BZI LIVE cu profesorul iesean care formeaza cei mai buni studenti-matematicieni cu performante internationale

Joi, 28 martie 2019, ora 15.00 in lumina reflectoarelor Studioului BZI LIVE este programata o noua editie-dialog extrem de interesanta si de actualitate in zona academica. Invitat este lect.univ.dr.ing. Marcel Roman coordonatorul Departamentului de Matematica si Informatica de la Universitatea Tehnica „Gheorghe Asachi” din Iasi (TUIASI). Alaturi de acesta vor fi abordate teme si vor avea in prim plan: pregatirea studentilor pentru competitii nationale si internationale in zona stiintelor exacte, proiecte pe care le deruleaza, realitati din spatiul educational romanesc.

In alta ordine de idei, sase studenti au participat din partea Universitatii Tehnice la Concursul International de Matematica SEEMOUS 2019, derulat in Bulgaria. Studentii care au participat din partea Universitatii Tehnice s-au intors acasa cu medalii. Tinerii politehnisti ieseni au reusit sa obtina doua medalii de argint si patru de bronz. Toti provin de la Facultatea de Automatica si Calculatoare: Cristian Grecu si Vlad Corduneanu au luat medalia de argint, in timp ce bronzul a fost obtinut de Vlad Batalan, Iulian Rusu, Ioan Stanciu si Alexandru Berigoi. "Anul acesta, subiectele au avut un grad de dificultate foarte ridicat, mai ridicat decat la alte editii, dar este pentru prima data cand echipa Politehnicii ia medalii cu toti participantii. Este o generatie foarte buna si avem sperante foarte mari si pentru anul viitor, fiindca au dreptul sa mai participe si la editia urmatoare. Sunt rezultate imbucuratoare, se remarca un trend ascendent", a declarat lect. univ. dr. Marcel Roman, directorul Departamentului de Matematica si Informatica de la TUIASI.

Acesta a precizat ca selectia celor sase membri ai echipei de matematica s-a facut din peste o suta de studenti care s-au inscris initial la Centrul de Pregatire de Performanta in Matematica de la Politehnica ieseana. La centrul respectiv se pregatesc in permanenta studentii care reprezinta Universitatea la competitiile nationale si internationale, sub indrumarea profesorilor Ariadna Pletea, Marian Pantiruc, Radu Strugariu si Marcel Roman.

Toti cei care au intrebari pentru, lect. univ. dr. Marcel Roman, directorul Departamentului de Matematica si Informatica de la TUIASI,  le pot adresa la rubrica de comentarii sau in direct, pe Facebook

Publicație :Bună Ziua Iași

Festivalul National de Umor si Satira "Umor'n'Iasi", la Casa de Cultura a Studentilor Iasi

 Festivalul National de Umor si Satira "Umor'n'Iasi", aflat la cea de-a VI-a editie, a aparut în anul 2014 ca raspuns la initiativa Uniunii Europene (UE) de stimulare a participarii tinerilor la vot la Alegerile pentru Parlamentul European. De atunci, festivalul se tine anual în data de 1 aprilie.

De anul trecut s-a transformat în Festival National Concurs si se adreseaza tinerilor elevi si studenti, atât ca actori cât, si ca public. Anul acesta se va desfasura în perioada 1-7 aprilie si are ca tema "Participarea tinerilor la vot!" si in organizarea principala a Casei de Cultura a Studentilor (CCS) Iasi.

"Pe 1 aprilie se va desfasura spectacolul «Voteaza! Votul tau conteaza!», unde trei candidati, Rosu, Galben si Albastru, vor fi sprijiniti cu momente realizate de trei aliante de organizatii studentesti din Iasi. Subiectele momentelor pleaca de la valorile europene. La final, cei 500 de tineri spectatori vor primi buletine de vot si vor vota candidatul pe care îl sustin cu ajutorul a 20 de cabine si o urna de vot. Concursul se va desfasura în perioada 5 - 7 aprilie pe doua sectiuni, interpretare si creatie, si pe 11 categorii. Festivalul are un juriu de exceptie, iar în cadrul galei, când se vor acorda premii câstigatorilor, publicul va fi amuzat de invitatii speciali ai festivalului. Ca element de noutate, anul acesta festivalul umoristic a devenit unul national, bazat pe un regulament strict ce vizeaza mai multe activitati", arata Bogdan Crucianu, manager CCS Iasi.

Festivalul National de Satira si Umor "Umor'n'Iasi" este organizat de CCS Iasi în parteneriat cu Biblioteca Judeteana "Gheorghe Asachi", Casa de Cultura a Municipiului "Mihai Ursachi" si Ateneul National din Iasi.

Publicație :Bună Ziua Iași

37 de facultati isi prezinta oferta de studii, la Targul Universitatilor Iesene, in weekend, la Palas

Nu stii ce specializare sa alegi sau vrei sa afli totul despre admiterea la facultate? Te asteptam in week-end, la Targul Universitatilor Iesene, organizat in ansamblul Palas. Vino sa cunosti toate cele cinci universitati de stat din Iasi si sa faci primul pas in viitorul tau educational! Sambata si duminica, pe 30 si 31 martie 2019, in intervalul orar 10.00 – 18.00, la parterul Atriumului Palas Mall se va desfasura Targul Universitatilor Iesene. Evenimentul este o initiativa a companiei IULIUS, cu scopul de a crea o platforma de interactiune directa a liceenilor cu mediul academic iesean.

Tinerii interesati vor primi toate informatiile de care au nevoie pentru a-si face o imagine clara despre viitorul lor educational, de la reprezentantii institutiilor de invatamant superior si de la studenti. La eveniment vor participa Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza”, Universitatea Tehnica „Gheorghe Asachi”, Universitatea de Medicina si Farmacie „Grigore T. Popa”, Universitatea de Stiinte Agricole si Medicina Veterinara „Ion Ionescu de la Brad” si Universitatea Nationala de Arte „George Enescu” din Iasi. Participantii vor afla perioadele de inscriere si etapele de admitere ale celor 37 de facultati, pentru ce specializari pot opta in functie de domeniul lor de interes, cate locuri sunt disponibile, ce taxe de inscriere sunt percepute, care sunt perspectivele dupa finalizarea studiilor si multe altele.

In plus, licenii vor putea participa si la workshop-uri interactive, care ii vor ajuta in orientarea educationala si profesionala. Sambata, de la ora 11.00, in salile de conferinte Congress Hall, se vor desfasura intalniri de lucru pe teme precum „Ce te faci cand vei fi mare?”, „Cum imi aleg o facultate in Iasi?” si „Superputerile tinerilor in 2025”. Pe langa oferta educationala, targul reuneste peste 20 de asociatii studentesti, de la care tinerii pot afla despre viata de student si activitatile in care se pot implica. Totodata, vor fi prezente si companiile Delphi Technologies, Raiffeisen Bank si Adservio, de la care se pot informa cu privire la oportunitatile de cariera si nu numai. Targul Universitatilor Iesene face parte din programul „Iasi – orasul viitorului tau” al companiei IULIUS, care vizeaza cresterea atractivitatii Iasului la nivel regional si promovarea lui ca centru educational important si oras ce ofera multiple oportunitati.

Publicație :Bună Ziua Iași

200 de studenţi din ţară se strâng la UAIC să dezbată teme de antreprenoriat

 Peste 200 de studenţi de la diferite universităţi din ţară se întâlnesc la Iaşi pentru a fi alături de antreprenori şi profesori în cadrul celei de-a doua ediţii a Congresului Naţional al Studenţilor de la Ştiinţe Social-Umaniste care va avea loc în perioada 11-13 aprilie, organizat de Universitatea „Alexandru Ioan Cuza“ din Iaşi. 

„Din dorinţa de a readuce în actualitate tradiţia congreselor interuniversitare, prin acest eveniment se doreşte schimbul ideilor proprii ale studenţilor cu privire la teme şi probleme social-umane de interes actual, trăind o altfel de experienţă academică şi având oportunitatea de a se angaja în noi experienţe sociale, dar şi legând noi prietenii“, au precizat organizatorii.

În acea perioadă, participanţii vor putea lua parte la conferinţe, dezbateri, workshop-uri şi activităţi recreative, cazarea şi masa fiindu-le asigurate în mod gratuit de UAIC. Aceştia îşi vor putea îmbogăţi atât cunoştinţele academice, cât şi cele culturale. Pentru a putea participa la acest proiect, cei interesaţi trebuie să completeze formularul de înscriere disponibil pe pagina de Facebook Congresul Studenţilor de la Ştiinţe Social-Umaniste (https://tinyurl.com/CONGRESEDITIAII), până pe 8 aprilie 2019.

 Publicație :Ziarul de Iași

 În jur de 500 de tineri sunt înscriși la cele nouă cluburi de la Casa Studenţilor

 Câteva sute de tineri activează în acest moment în cadrul cluburilor de la Casa de Cultură a Studenţilor din Iaşi (CCS Iaşi) după o perioadă amplă de înscrieri.

Tinerii au avut posibilitatea să asiste la activităţile cluburilor, iar apoi să depună un formular de înscriere, fie la secretariatul instituţiei, fie online, pe site-ul www.ccsiasi.ro. Astfel, în acest moment activează un număr de 473 de persoane la aceste cluburi după încheierea perioadei de înscriere şi desfăşurarea primelor activităţi.

Casa de Cultură a Studenţilor a desfăşurat deja două sesiuni de recrutare de la începului anului universitar, tinerii având ocazia să aleagă activităţi precum arta, muzica, dansul sau literatura.

„Aşa cum bine știţi, cluburile Casei de Cultură a Studenţilor au desfăşurat etape de înscriere. În această perioadă, aceste cluburi au fost vizitate de către studenţi şi tineri, iar în acest moment sunt înscrişi 473 de membri activi la aceste cluburi. Aceste cluburi îşi desfăşoară activitate sub coordonarea colegilor mei din cadrul departamentului cultural artistic”, a declarat Bogdan Crucianu, directorul Casei de Cultură a Studenţilor.

Tinerii au avut posibilitatea să se înscrie la nouă cluburi care activează în acest moment în cadrul CCS Iaşi, acestea fiind „Fabrica de Voluntari”, Clubul de muzică „Richard Oschanitzky”, Ansamblul Folcloric „Doina Carpaţilor”, Clubul de dans „Elegance”, Trupa de dans „The Sky”, Teatrul Studenţesc XL, Clubul de Arte Vizuale „ConceptArt”, Clubul „Susţine Artiştii Ieşeni” şi Revista de Cultură „Junimea Studenţească”.

Publicație :Ziarul de Iași

University of East Anglia: 'Mental health improvements needed'

Students at a campus where four people died suddenly in less than a year have called on university bosses to lobby for better mental health services.

The University of East Anglia Students' Union (UEASU) has highlighted concerns about NHS services, course workloads and waiting times in a new manifesto.

Four students have died on the campus in Norwich since May.

Vice-chancellor Prof David Richardson said the university was focused on supporting staff and students.

The UEASU started drafting its first mental health manifesto the day after first-year student Theo Brennan Hulme was found dead in his room earlier this month.

Georgina Burchell, the student union's welfare, community and diversity officer, said: "The manifesto is really important and it pulls together a lot of things people are saying on social media.

"It makes something productive out of all the emotions people are feeling.

"It provides a clear outline to the university about how we think mental health should be managed."

The newly-released document, which said it represented students' voices, told how the union was "deeply concerned about the state of NHS provision in Norfolk" and the inadequate rating of the Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust (NSFT).

It called for university leaders to help shape NHS strategy for young people's mental health services, lobby for improvements and to set up regular meetings with the mental health trust and other educational institutions.

Fears were also voiced that students often had to wait weeks for initial help through the UEA's Student Support Services.

It also urged the university to ensure the number of assessments students were set was "mentally taxing... not mentally damaging".

• Call for help at uni after student deaths
• More students seek help for mental health
• People 'don't become adults until their 30s'

Prof Richardson said: "We have recognised the significant increase in demand in wellbeing and mental health services, what we can do, what we must do."

The university has already announced an extra £250,000 to pay for improved access to services and wellbeing staff and will spend £1.4m on mental health services from August - a 63% rise on this year's budget.

The NSFT declined to comment on concerns raised in the manifesto.

Publicație : BBC News

The THE-Microsoft survey on AI

What are university leaders and chief technology officers doing to meet future challenges?

The robots are coming. Future-gazers have been making that prediction at least since Alan Turing speculated in 1950 about the possibility of a machine that could fool an interlocutor into believing that they were talking to another person.

But the imminent arrival on our roads of self-driving cars (see the article “How do we decide what is right? The ethicist’s view”, below) has brought home to many people that the kinds of artificially intelligent machines long imagined by science fiction writers and visionary scientists are finally being realised.

But what does the AI revolution mean for universities? To find out, Times Higher Education has teamed up with Microsoft to conduct a major survey of more than 100 AI experts and university leaders.

The findings include:

• Only a minority of universities currently have an AI strategy, but most plan to develop one
• Universities find it difficult to recruit and retain staff able to teach and research in AI
• AI will increase employers’ demand for university graduates and will not lead to university closures
• AI will be able to assess students, provide feedback and generate and test scientific hypotheses at least as well as humans can
• But universities will not cut teaching, research or administration staff and may even recruit more.

Private corporations are in a desperate race to put affordable AI machines on the market, and politicians are doing all they can to facilitate that, anxious for the enormous tax revenue that national success in this area is expected to yield – not to mention the military superiority.

Last year, for instance, Darpa, the US government’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, pledged $2 billion to develop next-generation AI systems capable of “contextual reasoning”. China, the US’ great geopolitical rival, is also making huge investments , as is Europe. The UK is investing 
£1 billion (£300 million of it public money) in AI as part of its industrial strategy, which will include 1,000 new PhD places for those working on AI and related subjects. France and Germany are also investing in excess of £1 billion each.

And universities themselves are independently seizing the opportunities to get ahead; last year, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced a $1 billion commitment to establish a new college of computing, focusing on AI.

Yet there is widespread anxiety about the socio-economic consequences that this so-called fourth industrial revolution might have. The mushrooming volume of ink spilled in recent years on the topic is usually predicated on fears that many jobs – including some currently done by graduates – will be taken over by machines, potentially leading to mass unemployment. For instance, writing in the 2017 book Future Frontiers: Education for an AI world, Richard Watson, a futurist and visiting researcher at Imperial College London, questions the role of higher education in its current guise if “advanced machine learning and autonomous systems are capable of doing almost everything humans can do at a fraction of the cost”. He worries that universities are “teaching the next generation to become rapidly redundant in the face of accelerating technological change”.

Others argue that AI will create as many jobs for humans as it eliminates, but unease persists in those likely to be most affected by the changes. Of the 409 students who responded to a recent survey conducted by researchers at London’s Hult International Business School, only 31 per cent feel hopeful about the prospect of living and working with AI and automation, while 18 per cent feel mainly fear. Only 20 per cent feel confident and very prepared for what is to come.

“It was clear from the findings that universities need to do more to discuss this topic and also relieve [students’] feelings of uncertainty,” says Carina Paine Schofield, senior research fellow at Hult and co-author of the study. “[They] are the first generation for whom automation will definitely impact their working lives, yet their education system is only just beginning to wake up to the consequences of automation.”

It is with such warnings in mind that the THE-Microsoft survey was launched. What do those best positioned to give an informed view believe the consequences of the fourth industrial revolution will be for higher education – and how are universities readying themselves to respond to those changes? If AI significantly reduces the demand for human labour, will it also diminish the demand for a university education – or perhaps increase it, as desperate jobseekers bolster their CVs with ever more qualifications? And even if it does, will that translate into more jobs for academics – or will teaching and even research largely be taken over by intelligent machines, too?

The uncertainty surrounding the socio-economic effects of AI are reflected in the fact that just 31 per cent of the 111 respondents agree that national policymakers understand the social consequences that the AI technology they are funding and facilitating is likely to have over the next 10-15 years, compared with 52 per cent who disagree.

Yet, at the same time, respondents appear remarkably confident that universities and academics will remain relevant. Nearly all agree that AI will be a very big issue for higher education. And while only 41 per cent of the respondents – 80 per cent of whom are computer science academics – say that their institutions have specific AI strategies, most of those who don’t are acutely aware of the omission, and most of the university leaders among the respondents express an intention to develop strategies where they do not already have one.

Meanwhile, although only 43 per cent of respondents say that their institution has allocated internal budget for AI-related institutional projects, 78 per cent believe that their university has the right skills internally to work on such projects, and nearly three-quarters of the 15 university leaders and seven chief technology officers in the survey have drawn on internal faculty expertise in AI to plan their institutional futures.

Regarding that planning, the name of the game seems to be to prepare for ongoing expansion, rather than agonising over how to manage decline. Some 94 per cent of respondents – and all the university leaders – believe that AI will increase the demand from employers for university graduates, while only 2 per cent expect it to drop.

Accordingly, 86 per cent of respondents disagree – most of them strongly – with the suggestion that AI will lead to university closures, and 94 per cent disagree that it threatens their own universities’ futures. Contrariwise, 95 per cent see it as an opportunity.

That does not mean that work does not need to be done to realise that opportunity. Only 24 per cent of respondents agree that their university is optimally configured physically for the age of AI, compared with 35 per cent who disagree. And many see AI leading to a shake-up in the administrative roles that universities will need to cover; as well as IT, student services and admissions are expected to see the biggest changes.

Regarding student admissions, Alice Gast, president and vice-chancellor of Imperial College London, told THE’s Asia Universities Summit last year that universities will use AI to select the best candidates for degree courses, noting that Unilever is already using AI and social media to screen candidates for internships and graduate jobs.

Some respondents welcome the prospect of fewer administrators. Olena Kaikova, a senior researcher in computer science from the University of Jyväskylä in Finland, put it this way: “Who would want to do a boring routine job if it can be delegated to AI robots?”

Those whose mortgages depend on such jobs may beg to differ, of course. But perhaps they ought not to worry too much. More than half of THE’s respondents (56 per cent) – and just under half of university leaders (46 per cent) expect AI either to increase universities’ need for administrative staff or to have no effect on it over the next 10 to 15 years. Of those who expect it to lead to job cuts, the vast majority predict that those cuts will account for less than a quarter of current jobs.

For full survey results click here

One group of people whom universities are desperate to recruit is the computer science experts. One approach is to train them in-house. For instance, the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) has just set up a new Graduate School for AI, aimed at turning 60 students a year into what KAIST president Sung-Chul Shin calls “top-tier AI engineers”.

Shin’s ambition is to make the school one of the “top five AI schools in the world”, in terms of number of publications in the field, by 2025. It currently ranks 10th in the Computer Science Rankings run by Emery Berger, a computer science professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, but Shin expects that with the help of an allocated budget of 22 billion KRW (£15 million), on top of 23 billion KRW in external grants, the school will “break new ground”.

In realising this ambition, it will no doubt help that, according to Shin, KAIST’s current AI researchers are already “the cream of the crop”. But not every institution can say the same – and none can be overly confident of holding on to what they have, given the huge salaries on offer in the tech industry.

According to Karin Immergluck, executive director of Stanford University’s technology licensing office, losing existing staff to industry is “definitely becoming more of a problem in Silicon Valley – not just for Stanford but for the University of California, San Francisco and Berkeley as well”. But, regardless of their proximity to Silicon Valley, not one of THE’s respondents finds it easy to recruit and retain academic staff able to teach and research AI, and most find it “difficult” (48 per cent) or “very difficult” (41 per cent).

Frederik Heintz, a senior lecturer in computer science at Linköping University in Sweden, plumps for the latter option, explaining that “universities cannot compete in salary and other compensations with the private sector. Too much administrative overhead is another major issue.”

An Australian university leader, who asked not to be identified, agrees that “the uncertain, less-well-paid life of an academic” often compares poorly with a career in industry.

But Immergluck feels quite relaxed about the situation, depicting the migration of academics into industry as “just another form of tech transfer. The general public and industry are benefiting from the knowledge that a professor has gained over years of doing research at a university. Of course, no one likes losing their star faculty but it just is [a fact]. It’s a part of being in that kind of very interactive environment where universities and industry are collaborating very closely.”

Several respondents also highlight the fact that the brain drain has the virtue of facilitating academic collaboration with the tech world, which can be mutually beneficial. Moreover, the direction of travel is not all one way. According to Immergluck, US academics often return from a spell of “three or four years” in industry. And while they are away, “their previous university is the first one that they are going to think of when they want to form collaborations”.

Still, the pull of industry is such that although our respondents rank research as the area of university management and practice likely to be most affected by AI, they are less sure that the biggest AI research breakthroughs will occur in universities: 38 per cent believe that they will, but only 7 per cent strongly believe that, while 23 per cent disagree (the rest are unsure).

Jyväskylä’s Kaikova explains that, in her view, “universities do not have enough resources for the breakthroughs”. But it isn’t just financial resources that universities lack. Speaking at THE’s Research Excellence Summit: Asia-Pacific in Sydney earlier this year, Pascale Fung, professor of computer science and engineering at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, warned that one of the biggest challenges facing universities is access to the huge amounts of data needed to develop AI systems.

“Universities today cannot compete against the Googles of the world because they do not have that data. So we are actually facing the challenge of not having equal access to the raw material of our research,” she said.

The best way forward, she tells THE, would be for tech companies to share some of their data with universities in an “anonymised and randomised” way, so as to comply with data protection laws. Universities could also focus their efforts on “more specialised topics within the relevant research areas”. This would allow them to “maximise the impact of their research without being marginalised”, she explains – although it is “tricky to do and requires insight and vision”.

Many survey respondents suggest that the question of which sector will produce the biggest breakthroughs is not conducive to an either/or answer. “Fundamental research will still be done in universities, where constraints are more relaxed than in industry,” predicts Eduardo Alonso, a reader in computing at City, University of London. “On the other hand, natural competition will bring significant applied breakthroughs developed in companies,” he said.

Linköping’s Heintz agrees that universities will tend to focus on basic research, “which means that their breakthroughs will be significantly delayed compared to the applied research done by companies”. Hence, “the public perception will probably be that industry is doing most of the research, when, in fact, [it is] piggy-backing on what the universities have done for centuries”.

For Fung, it is “imperative” for universities to be more creative in their employment practices to allow their academics to hold part-time positions in industry. She says this is already happening in the US, but she fears that universities in other countries might struggle with public perceptions: “In Hong Kong, for example, our universities are publicly funded, so it is difficult to justify [giving someone] a full-time professor role while allowing that professor to also be part-time in industry. But these are the challenges we are facing, so some kind of innovative thinking needs to happen.”

Joint positions with industry could also allow universities to tap into tech firms’ enormous research budgets; 76 per cent of respondents believe that funding agencies are not currently investing enough in AI research. There is also widespread concern that not enough funding is going into researching the philosophical ethical aspects of AI (see box opposite). Asked whether they agree that AI researchers are sufficiently aware of the ethical implications of their work, only 36 per cent of our respondents agree, while 41 per cent disagree.

“There is a lot of work going on in AI by way of tech – boys’ toys and home robotics, creepy gadgets and so on – but what a lot of people are trying to look into is the ethical tone of it all,” says Sandra Leaton Gray, professor in education at UCL Institute of Education. “Unfortunately that’s a minority sport: it’s really difficult to do any humanities- and social sciences-based work on it because grants are not tailored towards it.”

Leaton Gray is part of a new specialist interest group set up within the British Educational Research Association to redress the dearth of AI research in the discipline. “Amazing projects have not been funded because they are difficult to review,” she says. “How do you go about reviewing a proposal for something that nobody really understands yet? So many of the AI and education funding proposals are arbitrarily rejected by confused reviewers with little expertise in what is quite a new field. It is imperative that we get this right, first by more enlightened grants for social science-related AI research, not just more money for the tech promising to bring in more money.” What about AI’s impact on the way research is conducted? To what extent could AI actually take over the research process itself? Could there ever be an AI version of Alan Turing (who was recently voted the “greatest person of the 20th century” by BBC viewers, largely for his groundbreaking use of a proto-computer to break Nazi codes during the Second World War)?

Almost all respondents expect AI to have a significant or very significant effect on the way that research is conducted. Indeed, this is already happening to some extent. For instance, Lee Cronin, Regius chair of chemistry at the University of Glasgow, has been using AI bots since 2010, most recently to mix chemicals methodically and at random in the hope of discovering beneficial new reactions.

Respondents are confident that this is just the beginning. Most agree that AI will have the cognitive capacity to participate in scientific advancement, at least to some extent. Exactly half believe that AI will be able to direct the testing of scientific hypotheses at least as well as humans can, and 52 per cent think machines will be able to generate new scientific hypotheses as well as humans can. Respondents are less sure of whether AI will be able to generate new theories, concepts or insights in non-scientific disciplines, but 26 per cent believe that they will be able to.

Cronin himself, though, is more sceptical, remarking that his bots “have discovered nothing on their own, since they all have a human overlord”. For this reason, he strongly disputes the suggestion that the involvement of silicon brains will reduce the need for carbon-based researchers. “My robots are going to make boring stuff obsolete so we can focus on being creative,” he says.

And whatever their views on the potential of AI, most of our survey respondents agree that it will only complement rather than replace human scientific input; as Heintz puts it: “Humans and AI [working] together is…much more powerful than either one or the other.” The vast majority disagree with the suggestion that AI developments over the next 20 years will result in decreasing demand for humans in the lab. That view holds even for research assistants, who typically carry out the more routine tasks: just 20 per cent of respondents expect demand for them to drop, compared with 72 per cent who do not. Of the latter, 46 per cent strongly disagree with the suggestion.

Teaching staff also have little to fear from AI, our respondents predict. Nearly half (45 per cent) believe that AI will not result in any teaching staff being made redundant over the next 10 to 15 years. Meanwhile, 25 per cent expect their institutions to take on more teaching staff, with many predicting that the rise of AI will increase the demand for education from humans seeking to remain employable. Only 7 per cent of respondents think that AI will lead to more than a quarter of teaching jobs being lost, and just 1 per cent expect more than half to go.

Asked how great the impact of AI will be on curricula and pedagogy, most respondents say that it will be “significant” (56 per cent) or “very significant” (33 per cent). Respondents are reasonably confident that AI will be able to provide student feedback at least as well as humans can, with student assessment another area where AI could play a big role. But they are less confident that an AI teaching assistant could run a tutorial or, especially, give a lecture: just 15 per cent of respondents believe AI could rival a human at that task, compared with 64 per cent who disagree.

The key reason cited is that learning is stimulated by a human presence. According to Heintz, “all aspects of teaching and learning can be improved by AI-technology, but learning to a large degree is a social process, where doing it together with other people is important”. A computer scientist from the Republic of Ireland agrees: “A human knows what it’s like for a human to learn, and this will be hard to replicate for AI. Some students will always benefit from a human ‘overseer’ providing motivations/deadlines, and some will feel that they need human contact.”

But what students study may well change. As one of the students who participated in the Hult survey put it, “Students across the world will have to face the possibility that perhaps what they are dedicating their lives to studying right now…may soon become redundant.”

Unsurprisingly, computer science is the discipline whose graduates are most frequently predicted to see growing employer demand, followed by engineering, medicine and business. But making such predictions is a very imprecise art, as underlined by the fact that business is also among the disciplines forecast to be most likely to see a decline in demand for its graduates, behind languages but ahead of law.

Meanwhile, respondents are keen on the idea that not only science students but also humanities and social science students will need to be taught specific technical skills to help them programme and interact with artificial intelligence productively: 41 per cent of respondents believe that more than threequarters of the latter will need such training. But what is interesting in the Hult survey responses is the active desire among students for more courses in subjects like ethics and philosophy. There was also a sense that universities should focus on skills and subject areas where AI is less likely to have an advantage: those that require aptitudes such as complex decision making, critical thinking, gut instinct, entrepreneurship and emotional intelligence. For this reason, many observers predict that liberal arts degrees will be as much in demand as computer science courses.

In terms of teaching staff’s specific duties, Leif Azzorpardi, Strathclyde chancellor’s fellow in computer and information sciences at the University of Strathclyde, says his institution will potentially take on more people “to deliver better services” to students in collaboration with AI. “Teaching staff’s duties will certainly change from mundane tasks such as marking to engaging more with students to create unique learning experiences,” he says. However, “of course, institutes that do not embrace AI will not be as competitive, and will have to make redundancies”.

It is, of course, important to remember that university teaching and learning is not just about preparing people for the jobs market. In a separate chapter of the Future Frontiers book, Toby Walsh, Scientia professor of artificial intelligence at UNSW Sydney, stresses that “with society under a period of significant change, we will also need an informed population to navigate this future, and to demand appropriate checks and safeguards. A citizenship educated in ethics, society and civics is therefore essential.”

And most observers agree that the frequency with which people access higher education will increase: “Just as the [first] industrial revolution made it essential that universal education was provided to the young, the AI revolution will make it essential that education is provided to people at every age of their lives,” Walsh tells THE , allowing people to keep their skills up to date.

But he denies that this amounts to a call for wholesale change. “AI won’t change the ultimate mission of universities – educating people to the frontiers of our knowledge and undertaking research to expand that frontier – but it will change how that mission is delivered,” he says. “AI can help flip the classroom, personalise education and tackle the increasingly and distressingly prohibitive cost of delivering that education. Some of the skills that universities help people learn will change. But the skills that will be most in demand will tend to be old-fashioned ones, that universities used to deliver, such as analytical and creative thinking.”

This may be particularly true in the West, he predicts, where universities may see their niche in terms of “soft skills and higher ethical standards” – while the likes of South Korea and China, with their bigger research budgets, plough a more purely technological furrow.

Glasgow’s Cronin also cautions university leaders against getting carried away by what he sees as the largely unjustified hype surrounding AI. “The key problem, as ever, is that a small pool of academics have managed to push politicians to think that investing in AI research is going to change the world. I don’t think that is right,” he says.

Universities remain “the cradle of innovation and invention”, he says. “AI machine learning can never replace that until you make a totally new, self-replicating machine or life form with artificial consciousness…And that will remain firmly in the realm of science fiction for many hundreds of years.”

Help with distribution of this survey was provided by the Confederation of Laboratories for Artificial Intelligence Research in Europe.

For all the intellectual achievements of the past century, many concede that there has been little progress in solving philosophical problems.

There is no broad agreement, for example, about whether free will exists, whether the mind is more than the sum of its parts, or even whether a runaway tram should be diverted from hitting five people at the price of hitting one: the famous “trolley problem” first posed by Oxford philosopher Philippa Foot in the 1960s.

Perhaps that explains why only two or three philosophy papers are among the 30 citations in a recent Nature article, “The Moral Machine experiment”, on the actions that self-driving cars should take in the event of a dilemma resembling the trolley problem.

This is hugely important because we are rapidly entering an era in which artificial intelligence algorithms will determine who lives and who dies, not only in car accidents but also in healthcare and drone warfare. We urgently need a manual of machine ethics – but no one is quite sure how to devise one, or who should be involved.

The Nature paper assumes – drawing on an interview with former US president Barack Obama – that consensus is a critical criterion for determining a “correct” set of ethical principles for self-driving cars. But what the paper reveals is that “we” seem to agree on little other than sparing people over animals, more over fewer people and the young over the old. Drawing on survey results from 2.3 million people, it shows that there are significant differences between the intuitions of different geographical groups: “Western” people have a preference for sparing the fittest; “Eastern” people prefer to spare the law-abiding (bad news for jaywalkers); while “Southern” people (Latin Americans, among others) are inclined to spare women and those of higher status.

This shows how difficult the task of programming ethical rules into machines will be. But, to a philosopher, there is nothing revelatory about the idea that people from different cultures have different views about what is right or fair. The interesting (and, not surprisingly, unanswered) question is whether ethical preferences come from objective principles or from culture – or, rather, the extent to which culture determines individuals’ perception of moral principles. Yet while these questions are critical to the authors’ claims, they are barely discussed in the paper.

This points to the increasing disconnect between the cultures of philosophy and technology – particularly among those involved in designing machine-learning algorithms. Few people in industry care what philosophers have to say. We can talk about what truth is or is not, and political disinformation will continue. We can talk endlessly about what makes human intelligence unique, and the media will continue to claim that programmers have finally developed a machine able to think in a way that actually resembles human intelligence. And we can say over and over again that there isn’t really a good answer to the trolley problem, but self-driving cars will appear on the roads regardless.

Industry no doubt sees enormous surveys probing moral consensus, such as the one in the Nature paper, as the key to programming driverless cars. But what if consensus isn’t the right way to go at all? What if machinery should be programmed to strictly adhere to, say, utilitarian principles?

It may be that a good start to a solution lies in education. A slightly less recent Nature viewpoint suggests that the “philosophy” part of the doctorate of philosophy should be beefed up. The article was written by the director of the promising R3 initiative at Johns Hopkins University, which aims to promote “rigour, responsibility and reproducibility” in scientific practice. Interdisciplinary understanding, with a particular focus on philosophy, may help to improve these three Rs in so far as if researchers are trained to question the foundations of the scientific method, their scientific reasoning is likely to be more robust.

Moreover, their sensitivity to the pressing ethical questions that emerging technologies pose will be much more acute – even if the answers remain difficult to determine.

Publicație : The Times

Inhuman resources: arrival of the avatars

How will the rise of artificial intelligence affect universities’ carbon-based employees? John Gilbey runs the algorithm

“So that is why”, I concluded, to the apparently unimpressed and definitely somnolent audience in front of me, “I believe we need to ensure that fully autonomous artificial intelligence systems are only introduced after obtaining the truly informed consent of society at large. Thank you.”

I glanced up at the clock on the wall of the lecture theatre. Seven minutes to 10. Spot on: just time for questions. But first…Turning to the screen, I addressed the studiedly androgynous avatar standing patiently on its right-hand side. “So, John B, did I miss anything this time?”

It had only been a couple of semesters, but I’d been surprised how quickly I had got used to working with an ASI – an Academic Support Interface. I’d certainly never have believed I’d give it a name based on a rubbish Beach Boys joke (I consider myself “John A”, of course).

The University of Rural England was an early adopter, and, to start with, ASI was really just a development of lecture capture systems. I’d been deeply sceptical about those as well, but ASI turned out to be really useful in making sure all my notes, slides, video and audio from the lecture ended up in the right part of the virtual learning environment. But the upgrades arrived thick and fast.

Simultaneous signing of the lecture was the first big improvement: the sign language users on my course really liked it. For this to work, you needed an avatar – which you could set to be a photo-realistic HD version of yourself if you liked. I stuck with the default, figuring that one edition of me was quite enough for the world to have to cope with.

Gradually, the scope extended to ensuring that I gave the right lecture and flagging any content I missed. Rather than allowing John B to butt in whenever I messed up, I gave it a feedback slot at the end – which was generally a fairly neutral statement that, yes, I’d used all the slides and videos earmarked for the lecture. Until now, that is.

I’d turned back to the console and was already scrolling through my messages in a dismissive sort of way when John B started to speak. “Sadly, John, your lecture this morning does not reach the required standard. Would you like me to expand on this statement?”

John B didn’t sound sad – but was certainly going to by the time I’d finished with it. My lecture may not have been perfect, but I was pretty sure that it was no worse than usual – unlike John B’s attitude. Making a mental note to find which server-rack it resided on and give it a damn good kicking, I managed to splutter “Yes, I bloody would!”

In retrospect, this was probably a mistake. John B listed a catalogue of failings – in beautifully modulated tones that somehow made it worse.

“Overall, your lecture only delivered 73 per cent of the required content. The Standardized Coherence Score was just 3.2, with 18 vague or ambiguous statements. A total of six references were cited that are not present in the currently accepted corpus for the subject, and should be discounted by the audience as unconfirmed sources. This suggests a level of personal bias. In addition...”

“That’s enough!” I yelled, above the amused chuckling and chatter of the class. “End of lecture. Next class is – some time…Heck, I don’t know…Obviously...”

And I stormed out.

My first destination was the coffee machine. My second was the director of teaching. I knocked on her door without breaking step. “Sod off!” Jenny said, before looking up from her screens. “Oh, it’s you – I thought you’d turn up. Is that coffee for me? No? Bastard!”

I offered to share it, but she declined. If anything, I’d say that Jenny was having a worse morning than me. “It’s bloody uproar,” she muttered, waving at her desktop computer while the constant ping of incoming messages rendered an oddly comic counterpoint. “They upgraded the software over the weekend and it has turned on all sorts of features that were buried deep in the AI – until now. Their Big Data portal is now hoovering up a lot more stuff than we thought, apparently – but I guess you found that out...”

The solution seemed obvious. “Why don’t you just reverse the updates and roll back to Friday’s dataset? You wouldn’t lose much.” Jenny slapped her palms flat on the desk. “You thought of that all by yourself, genius? The software team tell me it would take 10 minutes – but they’d need Senate approval...”

“Senate? But you’re the director of teaching – it says so on the door!”

“True – for now, at least. It seems that Senate had a presentation from the AI software supplier last week. They did a hard sell on how this new version would solve all the Senate’s financial problems, plus make them taller and better looking – stuff like that… And don’t bother asking Susan about it because she wasn’t invited. She’s just resigned, by the way, so if you fancy being information services director, now is the time. There isn’t much of a queue...”

The email was waiting for me when I got back to my office clutching a second mug of coffee. I was required to attend a meeting with a representative of human resources at the worryingly precise time of 16.05 that afternoon in Meeting Room CS.01.42. Somehow, I didn’t expect it to be good news – and for the first time in a while, I was right about something.

It was a video meeting, of course. HR learned long ago that bad news is better delivered remotely. The policy has cost them a few screens, but probably saved some broken noses. I vaguely knew Trevor, the character on the other end – I’d been on a couple of selection panels with him – but he didn’t offer me any informality on that account.

“We are here to discuss your academic performance,” he began, before reiterating John B’s comments and adding more extra detail than I care to relate. “Clearly, this is outside the performance parameters defined in your current contract – as amended in March 2019. Your contract will not be renewed at the end of the semester and you will be removed from teaching and administrative duties immediately.”

I was stunned. I had no idea what the contract said, but I was damn sure I had a right of appeal, at least.

“You can, of course, appeal this decision. However, I would warn you that, in such a case, some additional material would become part of your academic record.”

“Such as?”, I muttered, with as much calm as I could muster.

Trevor referred to a paper in front of him. “At 09.00 this morning, the sensors in the console microphone of Lecture Theatre CS.02.01 registered a finding equivalent to a blood alcohol level of 20mg/100ml – which is above the university’s new action level. At the same time, a CBOH value of 7.2 was recorded, which I understand is a record. I’m sure you would not want this more widely known...”

CBOH was “combined body odour and halitosis”. I thought dark thoughts for a moment or two.

“But what about my students? We are only halfway through the course!”

The ghost of a smile crossed Trevor’s face. “The university is currently reviewing all aspects of its teaching policy, with a view to substantially improving provision and reducing costs. The avatar you refer to as ‘John B’ will present the rest of the course – having observed your ‘style’ over the last year. We are confident that the student body will approve. Now, do you accept these findings?”

Left with no obvious option, I nodded – then was asked to vocalise my agreement, for the record. As I did so, the printer in the corner of the room spooled up and began printing a document. My “notice of suspension”. HR, with their love of arcane ritual, insisted on physical media for all really bad news. But, apparently you don’t even get an envelope these days.

I went to the pub. There seemed little else to do. It was crowded for that time of the afternoon, and most of the customers were sullenly reading uniformly printed paperwork. Jenny was already at a table in the far corner. I’d never seen her drink before, yet she had a large whisky in front of her.

“You too…?” I asked.

She nodded and waved her own notice.

“What did they get you on?”

She shook her head glumly. “Poor communication, if you can believe that. This month I apparently responded to 22 per cent of email outside the target time. It looks like they counted stuff arriving at the weekend. Oh – and I apparently told a colleague to sod off, and called him a bastard...”

“It must all be a mistake,” I said, trying desperately to be positive. “A university can’t operate with just a massive AI doing the teaching, reviewing the subject matter and assigning the marks. You can’t just have an HR department running everything!”

A grunt from behind me made me turn around. Trevor, dishevelled and clearly drunk, was leaning unsteadily against the wall, a crumpled document in one fist.

“What makes you think”, he asked in haggard tones, “that HR don’t use avatars?”

Publicație : The Times

Japanese universities ‘improving on internationalisation’

THE rankings data show institutions are progressing on all areas of their global outlook, but experts say there is still more work to be done

National initiatives to boost the global outlook of Japanese universities are finally starting to pay dividends, according to data from Times Higher Education’s latest ranking.

Data from the 2019 THE Japan University Rankings, published on 27 March, show that large numbers of institutions have improved their performance in key areas such as their share of international students, international staff, exchange programmes and courses in a foreign language.

Internationalisation is often cited as one of the main weaknesses of Japan’s higher education system, and improving in this area has become an urgent priority because of the country’s declining youth population and its large debt.

The Japanese government has implemented several projects aimed at stimulating internationalisation in higher education since the early 2000s. These include the £52 million Top Global University project, which launched in 2014 and provides additional funding for the hiring of foreign and expatriate academics, the recruitment of international students and the creation of English-medium degree programmes at 37 institutions.

Comparing figures for the 216 universities that submitted data to both the 2018 and 2019 editions of THE’s Japan rankings, half reported an increase in the proportion of international learners in their student body, while only 42 said that the percentage had decreased.

One hundred and two providers reported a rise in the percentage of foreign staff at the institution, while there was a dip at 62; and 99 campuses reported an increase in the proportion of courses that were taught in a foreign language, compared with 49 that reported a decrease.

Although more evenly balanced, progress on the proportion of students taking part in international exchanges was also evident, with 92 providers reporting an increase and 78 reporting a decrease.

There is little correlation between universities’ overall rank and their internationalisation improvement. But, in general, national universities receive higher environment scores than private or municipal public institutions, while universities founded before the Second World War are generally stronger in this area than their younger counterparts.

Annette Bradford, associate professor in the School of Business Administration at Meiji University and an expert on international higher education, said that the ranking findings were “a very welcome development” that might, in some cases, reflect the “large-scale government funding schemes for internationalisation”.

“Many universities have been working hard towards internationalising their campuses, curriculum and student body,” she said.

Futao Huang, professor at the Research Institute for Higher Education at Hiroshima University, said the results suggested that “efforts made by the government, individual universities and colleges, and industry, as well as private foundations, in this regard for the past decades have come to be effective”.

However, he continued, Japanese universities must introduce “more flexible teaching and learning systems” to make it easier for students to find jobs abroad, and institutions must adopt a “more flexible policy of hiring international academics, in terms of job contracts, tenure, salaries and pension systems”.

“Individual universities [must] provide more supportive policies…for international academics, especially [those] coming from Western countries who cannot speak Japanese,” he said.

Akiyoshi Yonezawa, director of the Office of Institutional Research at Tohoku University, said that unlike many other nations, Japan did not have a market-driven or commercial approach to internationalisation, and its universities were implementing initiatives aimed at increasing their global outlook as a result of pressure from the government, university rankings or domestic students demanding international experiences.

While this has its advantages, Japan will need to “enter such a market-based competition” in order to recruit global talent for research and teaching and to continue to improve on internationalisation, he said.

But James McCrostie, associate professor in the department of business management at Daito Bunka University, said that it was “definitely too soon to celebrate”, claiming that “much of the government push to internationalisation seems related to the 2020 Olympics”.

“Only time will tell if the bureaucrats’ attention span lasts beyond next summer,” he said.

He added that the Japanese government has cut the scholarship money available to foreign students, meaning that there is now funding available for just one in 315 students, compared with one in 14 students in 2011.

“The nationalists decided not to spend Japanese taxpayer money on foreigners and to spend that money on scholarships to send Japanese abroad instead. But most of the increase in Japanese going abroad has been in short-term, one-month [trips] abroad during spring and summer vacations,” he said.

“The only way real progress will continue is if universities and the government work together. That means ensuring that Japanese students are able to survive in an English academic environment and that solid Japanese as a second-language programmes are put in place.”

Japanese universities ‘fail to take on student feedback’

Japanese students generally feel challenged by their university and believe that they are able to apply their learning to the real world, but they think that institutions are poor at taking on board their feedback.

These are the main findings from Times Higher Education’s first Japan Student Survey, which asked students to rate elements of their learning experience at their university on a scale of zero to 10, where zero represented no support and 10 represented being fully supported.

Respondents gave the highest average score, 6.9, when asked whether their institution supports them to apply their learning to the real world. They also rated their institutions highly on the extent to which they feel challenged by their classes (6.83).

When it came to their ability to make suggestions or to provide feedback on a course or on management, students awarded an average score of 6.61, but this fell to 4.79 when they were asked to what extent their suggestions have been acted on.

Universities’ support of critical thinking skills (5.88) and in helping students reflect on, or make connections among, things learned (5.82) were also rated relatively poorly by students.

The survey ran from August to November 2018 and received almost 37,000 responses from more than 400 Japanese universities. It included 11 questions on elements of learning engagement at universities, seven of which are used as metrics in the engagement pillar of the THE Japan University Rankings 2019.

Futao Huang, professor at the Research Institute for Higher Education at Hiroshima University, said that Japanese academics tended to spend more time on research than on teaching and that the vast majority delivered lectures instead of using “other more diverse instructional methods”.

“New ideas such as learning outcomes, active learning and student-centred activities…have been introduced in Japanese universities only in recent years but have not been widely accepted,” he said.

He added that while student feedback has been implemented in many universities, there is little evidence to show that the responses have been used to improve instruction.

Private universities, which account for more than 70 per cent of Japan’s higher education institutions, “place more emphasis on their institutional mission, academic beliefs, importance of disciplines and rigid sequence of curriculum rather than diversifying needs of students,” he said.

However, Annette Bradford, associate professor in the School of Business Administration at Meiji University, said that she was not surprised by students’ low scores in this area “given that changes may not be made until after they have graduated from a course or institution”.

Note: The analysis was based on all universities that submitted valid data. However, the THE Japan University Rankings include only institutions that are in the top 150 overall and/or in the top 150 in any pillar, which amounts to 213 institutions in the 2019 edition.

Publicație : The Times

Good luck with it’: damning verdict on UK’s ERC alternative plan

Post-Brexit UK grants scheme would find it ‘almost impossible’ to match European Research Council’s international competition and quality, former European Commission research head warns

The UK will find it “almost impossible” to match the European Research Council’s quality if it creates its own rival programme after Brexit, and would deal an “enormous blow” to science in the UK and on the Continent if it leaves, senior European research figures have told Times Higher Education.

As the Brexit crisis enters its most pressing phase yet, the British government has started work to consider whether it can create an alternative UK grants scheme, also open to international researchers, if the nation does not reach an association agreement to join the European Union’s next seven-year framework programme for research, Horizon Europe.

The highly prestigious ERC, part of the framework programmes, provides grants to outstanding individual researchers and has been likened to European football’s elite Champions League. Without an association agreement, ERC grantees will no longer be able to work full-time in the UK, leading to fears that existing grant-holders will leave and the ability of British universities to attract world-leading scientists will be diminished.

Robert-Jan Smits, who was instrumental to the ERC’s development in his former role as European Commission director general of research and innovation, said that the UK was “one of the strongest science systems in the world, completely interlinked with the European science system”.

“I could not imagine a Horizon Europe without the UK. We need each other,” he added.

Switzerland created a domestic-based grants scheme after a referendum backing immigration restrictions led to a huge diplomatic row with the EU and the nation’s exclusion from the framework programme in 2014.

Asked about the potential for a UK-based ERC alternative, Mr Smits replied: “Talk to the Swiss because the Swiss tried to do that…Of course it was not a success at all.”

The ERC took “years to establish” and “the credibility is the international competition”, he said. “Good luck with it,” he added, in reference to any UK attempt to create an ERC alternative.

Mr Smits said that leaving the ERC “would be an enormous blow” for the UK science system because it has become “the gold standard…It would be almost impossible to compensate for that.” But it would also be a blow “for Europe as a whole” in science, he continued.

Chris Skidmore, the UK’s science minister, told the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee earlier this month that while the UK wanted to associate “we have to look responsibly at what we do about the ERC and other grants that may not be available should we not associate to Horizon Europe”, which is scheduled to begin in January 2021.

European elections and the choice of a new commission will delay the start of UK-EU negotiations on association until late 2019 or early 2020 – creating a “tight but possible” timescale, Mr Skidmore has previously told THE. UK concerns about any shift in Horizon Europe away from excellence towards capacity-building in eastern Europe are another potential stumbling block to an association deal – which would cost the UK between €1 billion (£858 million) and €2 billion a year.

Mr Skidmore told peers that he had asked Sir Adrian Smith, the former University of London vice-chancellor, to “lead a major piece of work, a project with the academic community, to look at whether we can establish a new international research fund…open not just to UK researchers but to international researchers”.

Sir Adrian is expected to present this interim findings this summer, Mr Skidmore said in a statement on 26 March.

Helga Nowotny, a former ERC president, said that this idea provoked a sense of “déja vu” in light of the Swiss experience.

“Experience shows that it is not only difficult but practically impossible to create a ‘substitute’ for the ERC,” said the emeritus professor of social studies of science at ETH Zurich.

“Neither can the same high level of competition be created, nor will the amount of funding be available, nor the resulting prestige.”

Professor Nowotny called Brexit “a tragedy for science in the UK and everywhere else in Europe”.

Dame Athene Donald, professor of experimental physics at the University of Cambridge and a former member of the ERC’s governing scientific council, said that the ERC’s prestige “rests on many factors including the fact the competition is open across Europe, the grants are large and for five years, and its peer review system is extremely rigorous, using referees from around the world”.

“I sincerely hope that the UK will continue to be able to access ERC funds and all the benefits they bring to science, rather than the UK attempting to provide what may turn into a pale imitation parallel scheme,” she added.

On the potential for a UK association agreement, Mr Smits said he negotiated agreements with Switzerland and Israel while at the European Commission “and if you really want [a deal], you can go for it quite quickly”.

He described himself as “an optimist”, but added that “it’s getting extremely close” on timing. “The clock is ticking.”

Publicație : The Times

English regulator ‘will be proactive to stop university closures’

But Nicola Dandridge says that ‘to pile limited public resource into failing institution’ would be mistake

It is “profoundly misleading” to suggest that England’s regulator will “sit back and wait for providers to fail”, but “to pile limited public resource into a failing institution is palpably not a good way forward”, according to its chief executive.

Nicola Dandridge spoke to Times Higher Education as the Office for Students marks a year since beginning full operations in April 2018 – in which some vice-chancellors have portrayed the regulator as too interventionist on many issues and reliant on “threats”, but also too accepting of the possibility of institutional failure.

The OfS was set up by the government to accompany the transition to a fees-based funding system and to regulate in “the student interest”, with an entirely different relationship with the sector from that of its predecessor organisation, the Higher Education Funding Council for England. In switching from the post of Universities UK chief executive, Ms Dandridge went from representing universities to regulating them.

In its first year, the OfS brought in staff from both Hefce and the Office for Fair Access and set about developing its strategy and implementing the new regulatory framework, she said.

And the OfS has also created the register of providers on which institutions must be included if they wish to access public student loans. This has been “an absolutely huge undertaking”, said Ms Dandridge. For the first time ever, there has been a “review of every university and provider that wants to access public funding”, she added.

During this process, “the question of financial sustainability has emerged, unsurprisingly”, Ms Dandridge said. “Not in the sense that we are worried about widespread financial collapse; because we’re not. But there are issues we will be watching closely to ensure institutions don’t get into trouble.”

Sir Michael Barber, the OfS chair, attracted criticism from some when he said that the regulator “will not bail out universities or other course providers in financial difficulty”.

But the OfS has the powers and the oversight of performance data that will enable it to be “proactive in preventing” collapses, Ms Dandridge said.

“It’s profoundly misleading to imply we’re just going to sit back and wait for providers to fail,” she said in response to critics. “That is a priority for us – to do what we can to stop that from happening,” she added.

But “having said that…to pile limited public resource into a failing institution is palpably not a good way forward”, Ms Dandridge said. That would mean “teaching grant…would be taken away from other providers to fund a failing institution for no good purpose”, she explained.

Ms Dandridge has previously said that it would not be the OfS’ job to “seek the sector’s friendship”.

When the OfS published a data analysis on the rise of unconditional offers in January – saying that it would empower students to challenge “pressure selling” – “there was some pushback from the sector on that”, said Ms Dandridge. “Some people really didn’t like our position on it, felt it undermined their own position and policy on admissions and all the rest of it.”

But the feedback from the sector in general, students and parents was “overwhelmingly positive”, showing “real concern” particularly on conditional unconditional offers, she said.

The OfS will “work constructively and respectfully with what is a fantastically world-leading, high-quality sector”, Ms Dandridge continued. She added: “We want their respect, but not to approve what we do. We’re a regulator.”

She acknowledged the “very close correlation between institutional autonomy and the success of our sector” and noted that legislation states that the OfS must have regard to institutional autonomy. But she added: “Does that mean we should not intervene where we see evidence of malpractice and poor quality provision? Absolutely not.”

In terms of the future, Ms Dandridge said: “We’ve said that we want to intervene at sector level in various areas. What will become clear in 2019-20 is what that will look like.”

The OfS has set up two funding programmes, “one looking at how we can incentivise and encourage…local graduates who choose to study and then work in their local areas” and the other on student mental health.

The next year should bring a “more balanced picture of who we are as a regulator” beyond the registration process, as well as a new phase in the OfS’ student engagement to reflect “past, current and future student interests”, said Ms Dandridge.

Asked about the switch from UUK to OfS, she said that “yes, it has meant I don’t have the same relationship with vice-chancellors and many others in the sector”.

But the switch has brought a “new and different relationship with students, which has been completely inspirational…I now see the higher education sector through a slightly different lens”, Ms Dandridge said.

Publicație : The Times

Dutch election victor’s university attack has roots in PhD thesis

Thierry Baudet’s anti-immigration, anti-European Union party had its ‘cradle’ in Leiden thesis, former supervisor says

The academic who led an anti-European Union populist party to a shock election win in the Netherlands and used his victory speech to attack universities for undermining “civilisation” based his movement on his Leiden University PhD thesis.

The success of the anti-immigration Forum for Democracy (FvD), led by 36-year-old Thierry Baudet, a former Leiden law lecturer, offers further evidence of how the rise of right-wing populism across the West is heralding an era of culture wars over free speech and supposed left-liberal “bias” in universities.

Some also regard Mr Baudet – who styles himself as an intellectual and defender of high culture, with a love of the piano and a hatred of contemporary architecture – as to some extent reaching beyond the traditional base of such parties, which has tended to be overwhelmingly non-graduate voters.

The FvD won the most votes in provincial elections held on 20 March for the Senate, the upper and less significant house of the Dutch Parliament, depriving the governing coalition of its majority (although, with a multiplicity of parties competing in the Netherlands, the FvD only won about 14.5 per cent of the vote).

The party, founded by Mr Baudet as a thinktank before it became a political party in 2016, traces its origins to his doctoral thesis at Leiden, published as a book in 2012 under the title The Significance of Borders: Why Representative Government and the Rule of Law Require Nation States.

The FvD is connected to a number of figures in Leiden’s law faculty. Paul Cliteur, professor of jurisprudence at Leiden, was co-supervisor of Mr Baudet’s thesis and was placed second on the party’s list of election candidates – meaning that he is now expected to become a member of the Senate.

Speaking to Times Higher Education in his office at Leiden, Professor Cliteur said: “Basically his [Mr Baudet’s] PhD dissertation became the cradle of a new political movement. All his ideas, the ideas of the party, are in that particular book.”

“The key idea of the thesis and also of the party is that you cannot throw away the nation state,” continued Professor Cliteur, who, as a conservative legal scholar and columnist known for attacks on multiculturalism, is a controversial figure himself.

“The second thing is what is threatening that nation state. Two things: from above, the EU; and bottom up, multiculturalism.”

In his election night speech, Mr Baudet said that “we stand…amid the debris of what was once the largest and most beautiful civilisation the world has ever known. We are destroyed by the people who should protect us.” He went on to say: “We are undermined by our universities, by our journalists, by the people who receive our art grants and who design our buildings.”

Asked what Mr Baudet meant, Professor Cliteur said: “Most universities do not honour diversity in the sense of ideological [diversity]…People interpret ‘diversity’ as difference in skin colour. But that is not what diversity is about. It should be viewpoint diversity.”

Ingrid van Engelshoven, the minister for education, culture and science, responded to Mr Baudet’s claim about universities, tweeting that it was “nasty”. The member of the centrist Democrats 66 party said: “Society is built on the work [and] knowledge of scientists [and] lecturers. We must protect academic freedom, not make it suspect.”

Later in the speech, Mr Baudet said that “people no longer believe in the Netherlands” or “in our language, which has…been abolished at our universities”. That was a reference to the long-running controversy over Dutch universities teaching some courses in English – a hot-button cultural identity issue for some on the right.

Asked why he thought that the FvD had achieved such success, Professor Cliteur said: “The people are looking for a new grand narrative, a cultural philosophy.”

Publicație : The Times

Research intelligence: how to improve team science

Work to encourage team science is gathering momentum, and a recent Academy of Medical Sciences report highlights key steps to be taken

Galactic: answering big questions increasingly requires global collaboration

From food security to microbial resistance and climate change, the complex research questions faced by today’s researchers increasingly require a team-based approach.

Many believe, however, that science has not updated its publishing, funding and promotion practices to reflect how research is often carried out by those working in two or more teams, sometimes in complementary fields in different countries, or as part of major collaborations involving thousands of researchers scattered across the world.

A recent report by the Academy of Medical Sciences – one of the UK’s four national academies – titled From Innovation to Implementation: Team Science Two Years On, has now suggested some radical new ways to improve the recognition and reward of team science.

Scrap author bylines

When hundreds of researchers are listed on a research paper, it is often difficult to discern the contribution of a co-author. And many of those who participated in the academy’s conference on team science, held in March 2018, believed that there was “still a reliance on first and last authorship” on a paper to identify dominant voices in that output, the report says.

One solution suggested is to “move away from authorship in bylines altogether, whereby detailed contribution information could be found elsewhere in the publication”.

However, significant progress towards this kind of more granular authorial credit has been made in recent years thanks to a “far-reaching uptake in recognition platforms and taxonomy” that can show who has done what on research papers. For instance, the Wellcome Trust now asks researchers to provide a 50-word narrative statement describing their role in each publication submitted in support of grant applications.

Initiatives to increase detail around authorial credit "have been adopted quite widely”, said Eleftheria Zeggini, director of the Institute for Translational Genomics at the Helmholtz Zentrum München, part of Germany’s largest scientific organisation.

“We often produce papers that might have hundreds of authors across five to 10 research groups,” the Greek-born geneticist, who was a member of the academy’s initial working group on team science in 2016, told Times Higher Education.

“Not everyone will contribute to the same level, so encouraging this type of taxonomy is important to ensure credit goes where it is due.”

New titles

Running a multimillion-pound research project is an onerous task for principal investigators. With the size and budgets of research groups increasing, however, several people may actually play a critical leadership role beyond the named research leader.

As such, the academy suggests that funding bodies might emulate the UK’s Medical Research Council (MRC) in establishing a “researcher co-investigator” status for those who have “made substantial intellectual contributions but do not have a university contract”, such as senior postdoctoral researchers. Indeed, all named individuals on a grant should be encouraged to clarify their contribution.

“Several funding bodies have introduced co-investigator status, and it’s a fantastic step,” said Professor Zeggini. “Postdocs don’t always get much visibility, so this is a good way to highlight the contribution of early career researchers.”

Technician ‘professors’?

From software engineers and data scientists to facility managers, technical staff with specialist skill sets have become a growing fixture in laboratories.

They often play “key roles in team science”, explains the academy’s report. But a promotion system based on publication metrics is “no longer fit for purpose”, particularly for those in support roles. In addition, the lack of career pathways for skill specialists has caused many to leave academia, often for similar and perhaps better paid work in industry.

As such, the University of Glasgow’s decision to create a parallel career track for traditional researchers and technical staff was described by the academy as an “excellent example of change, which could be mirrored across the sector”.

Under the scheme, technical staff can now reach a level comparable to senior lecturer, and there is an ambition to extend this to the level of professor. At the MRC, a similar proposed career framework would see technologists advance to become a “principal tech specialist or data scientist”, which would “go some way towards stimulating the cultural and system changes needed for better recognition of…interdisciplinary individuals and teams”, says Fiona Watt, the MRC’s executive chair, in the academy report.

Introducing a team science culture

While most academics consider themselves good colleagues, the competitive nature of academia can understandably bring out their more individualistic side.

As such, the academy’s report argues that more must be done to foster a team science environment. It praises the approach of the Centre of Membrane Proteins and Receptors, a cross-institutional group involving the universities of Birmingham and Nottingham, which has designated a proportion of its funding to improving team science.

Led by early career researchers, the push for team science has included an awayday to promote team skills, training grants to encourage interdisciplinary collaborations and an annual symposium staged by junior researchers to talk about team science opportunities.

Professor Zeggini explained that she had taken similar steps at her own centre. “It’s important to offer leadership opportunities to early career researchers whenever you can, so I will often put them forward to chair a seminar or showcase our research at a conference,” she said.

“Creating a culture of team-based science cannot be done overnight, but we can make gradual improvements and this is an area on which we need to be increasingly focused.”

Publicație : The Times

Blackface: le gouvernement «condamne fermement» l’annulation de la pièce Les Suppliantes

Les Suppliantes, une pièce du dramaturge Eschyle, a été annulée suite à l’appel au boycott d’associations antiracistes. Pour les ministres de l’Enseignement supérieur et de la Culture, il s’agit d’une «atteinte à la liberté d’expression et de création».

La pièce de théâtre Les Suppliantes devait être interprétée ce lundi 25 mars à Sorbonne Université. Elle n’aura finalement jamais eu lieu. Ce classique du dramaturge grec Eschyle, mis en scène par l’un de ses grands spécialistes Philippe Brunet, s’est en effet retrouvé au cœur d’une polémique après que le Conseil représentatif des associations noires de France (Cran) l’a accusé de «propagande coloniale». En cause, le fait d’avoir grimé en personnes noires ses comédiens lors de représentations précédentes.

Devant les manifestations d’étudiants et d’associations antiracistes, les comédiens ont donc décidé d’abandonner la scène. Alors que le Cran fustige un nouveau cas de «blackface», la direction de l’université défend férocement la troupe en estimant dans un communiqué qu’«empêcher, par la force et l’injure, la représentation d’une pièce de théâtre est une atteinte très grave et totalement injustifiée, à la liberté de création».

Dans un communiqué, la ministre de l’Enseignement supérieur Frédérique Vidal et le ministre de la Cuture Franck Riester estiment qu’il s’agit d’une «atteinte sans précédent à la liberté d’expression et de création dans l’espace universitaire». Ils font part de leur soutien à l’université ainsi qu’au metteur en scène et aux comédiens. Une nouvelle représentation des Suppliantes sera organisée «dans les prochaines semaines et dans de meilleures conditions» au sein du grand amphithéâtre de la Sorbonne, ont-ils également annoncé.

«Pratiques théâtrales antiques»

«La pièce fait partie intégrante du festival ‘‘Les Dionysies’’ qui a lieu chaque année», explique au Figaro le service culturel de Sorbonne Université. L’an dernier, elle avait été jouée avec des comédiens effectivement grimés en noirs, et avait accueilli «quelques commentaires» selon l’université. Pour cette édition, le Cran, accompagné du syndicat Unef, avait appelé au boycott de la pièce qui devait avoir lieu lundi soir, dans les locaux de l’université. Devant la cohue, les comédiens avaient alors précisé qu’ils joueraient cette fois-ci avec des masques, blancs et noirs. Mais la solution n’a pas convaincu les détracteurs. Ces derniers ont fait annuler la pièce. «C’était un parti pris de Philippe Brunet de baser sa mise en scène essentiellement sur des pratiques théâtrales antiques, dont celle-ci» se désole l’université.

Philippe Brunet, sur sa page Facebook, a également tenu à donner une réponse à cette polémique naissante: «Le théâtre est le lieu de la métamorphose, pas le refuge des identités, écrit-il. Le grotesque n’a pas de couleur. Les conflits n’empêchent pas l’amour. On y accueille l’Autre, on devient l’Autre parfois le temps d’une représentation. Eschyle met en scène à l’échelle du monde. Dans Antigone, je fais jouer les rôles des filles par des hommes, à l’Antique. Je chante Homère et ne suis pas aveugle. J’ai fait jouer les Perses à Niamey par des Nigériens (c’est dans le dernier film de Jean Rouch), Ma dernière Reine perse était noire de peau et portait un masque blanc.»

«Pratique raciste»

Ghyslain Vedeux, le président du Cran, ne voit évidemment pas les choses de cette manière. «Les étudiants de Sorbonne Université connaissaient nos campagnes contre les «blackfaces» et nous ont demandé notre soutien, explique-t-il. Nous avons donc fait un appel au boycott, qui a été particulièrement suivi, sur les réseaux sociaux et au sein de l’université. Ce lundi soir, il y avait énormément de monde pour empêcher cette pièce. Elle a donc été logiquement annulée.» Et Ghyslain Vedeux de rappeler la position du Cran par rapport à cette pratique: «Le blackface est une pratique issue de l’époque de la colonisation et de l’esclavage, qui hiérarchise les êtres humains et qui est donc raciste.»

Ce n’est pas la première fois que des «blackfaces» se retrouvent sur le devant de la scène. Antoine Griezmann avait du s’excuser après une photo de lui déguisé en basketteur noir américain. Plus récemment, le créateur de la marque The Kooples Laurent Elicha a été également accusé pour s’être «déguisé» en «membre d’une tribu africaine».

 Publicație : Le Figaro

L’université de Yale renvoie une étudiante admise grâce à un pot-de-vin de 1,2 million de dollars

L’université est la première à procéder à une exclusion liée à un large scandale de corruption d’admission dans les universités américaines.

L’entraîneur de l’équipe féminine de football de l’université de Yale, Rudy Meredith, est accusé d’avoir recommandé l’admission d’étudiantes en échange de pots-de-vin versés par leurs parents. DOUG ENGLE / AP

La prestigieuse université américaine de Yale a annoncé, mardi 26 mars, avoir renvoyé une étudiante admise grâce à des pots-de-vin versés par ses parents, objets d’un vaste scandale de corruption pour entrer à l’université révélé à la mi-mars. L’université du Connecticut, membre de l’Ivy League, groupe rassemblant les huit établissements privés les plus réputés du pays, est la première à faire part d’une exclusion due à cette affaire, dans laquelle cinquante personnes ont été inculpées.

Parmi elles, des entraîneurs sportifs, des administrateurs d’examens déterminants pour l’admission dans les universités américaines réputées, et 33 parents accusés d’avoir payé jusqu’à 6,5 millions de dollars de pots-de-vin pour garantir l’admission de leurs enfants.

Dans un communiqué publié sur son site Internet, la direction de Yale a expliqué avoir été informée de l’affaire pour la première fois en novembre 2018. Le procureur fédéral du Massachusetts, qui a mené l’enquête, demandait alors des informations sur l’entraîneur des équipes de football féminin, Rudy Meredith.

Etats-Unis: Une enquête révèle les tricheries des riches et célèbres pour forcer la porte des meilleures universités

D’autres entraîneurs mis en cause

Selon l’université, M. Meredith, qui a quitté Yale en novembre et a été inculpé pour corruption en bande organisée, aurait fourni des recommandations bidons à « seulement deux candidates ». Une seule a été acceptée à Yale, en janvier 2018. Ses parents auraient versé environ 1,2 million de dollars de pots-de-vin, selon l’acte d’accusation contre Rudy Meredith.

Après enquête, Yale a décidé de révoquer son admission, selon le communiqué. L’université n’a pas dévoilé les noms des deux étudiantes, identifiées dans l’acte d’accusation contre M. Meredith comme « candidates n^o 1 et n^o 2 ». Elle a précisé continuer à enquêter pour mettre au jour toute autre malversation éventuelle. M. Meredith doit comparaître devant le tribunal fédéral de Boston jeudi.

D’autres entraîneurs sportifs de prestigieuses universités, publiques ou privées, comme UCLA, University of Southern California ou Georgetown, ont été mis en cause dans ce scandale. Ils sont accusés d’avoir désigné comme recrues sportives de choix des étudiants dont les parents les avaient corrompus.

Argent et privilèges sont au centre de ce scandale qui a éclaboussé de nombreuses personnalités américaines, dont deux actrices connues, Felicity Huffman (Desperate Housewives) et Lori Loughlin (La Fête à la maison). Celles-ci doivent comparaître le 3 avril.

Publicație : Le Monde

Important:

• Revista presei conţine fragmente preluate, fără nici o modificare, din articolele despre învăţământul superior ce apar în presa locală, regională şi naţională.
• Revista presei este o reflectare imparţială a presei educaţionale, cu misiunea clară de a prezenta noutăţile şi ştirile cu adevarat importante pentru mediul academic.
• Universitatea "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" atrage atenţia că nu îşi asumă responsabilitatea pentru corectitudinea informaţiilor apărute în presă, redate pe această pagina exact în forma în care au aparut în publicaţiile respective.
• Responsabilitatea juridică pentru conţinutul articolelor aparţine în totalitate autorilor acestora (sursei).

Serviciul de monitorizare a presei

Realizator: Dr. Bogdan Baghiu
Contact: promovare@uaic.ro