EXCLUSIV! Anunturi SPECTACULOASE ale rectorului UAIC, profesorul Tudorel Toader in Studioul BZI LIVE. Veste importanta legata de viitorul sau
Pe 14 mai 2019, incepand cu ora 15.00, in Studioul BZI LIVE a fost programata o emisiune, in EXCLUSIVITATE, cu rectorul Universitatii Alexandru Ioan Cuza - UAIC din Iasi • In platou a fost prezent prof. univ. dr. Tudorel Toader • Acesta a vorbi si oferit detalii despre proiectele pe care cea mai veche universitate din Romania le are in desfasurare, despre strategiile UAIC, despre ce inseamna investitia in infrastructura, a protejarii patrimoniului institutieu dar si despre diverse teme ce au legatura cu viata studenteasca si universitara • Pe de alta parte, rectorul a facut si anunturi SPECTACULOASE, in PREMIERA, ce tin de viitorul acestuia, daca va mai candida pentru un noua mandat la conducerea UAIC, despre una dintre cele mai valoroase si simboluri cladiri ale urbei cat si despre reabilitarea respectiv restaurarea Casei Universitarilor Iasi, demararea investitiei ce tine de constructia unei baze sportive ultra-moderne in Copou (pe o suprafata de aproximativ zece mii metri patrati - n.r.), Gradina Botanica sau pragatiri pentru ca Universitatea Cuza sa aiba o biblioteca noua si cu cele mai inalte si performante dotari •Emisiunea completa cu profesorul Tudorel Toader poate fi urmarita AICI
In ziua de 14 mai 2019, incepand cu ora 15.00, in Studioul BZI LIVE a fost programata o emisiune, in EXCLUSIVITATE, cu rectorul Universitatii Alexandru Ioan Cuza (UAIC) din Iasi. In platou a fost prezent prof. univ. dr. Tudorel Toader. Acesta a vorbi si oferit detalii despre proiectele pe care cea mai veche universitate din Romania le are in desfasurare, despre strategiile UAIC, despre ce inseamna investitia in infrastructura, a protejarii patrimoniului institutieu dar si despre diverse teme ce au legatura cu viata studenteasca si universitara.
"Am un dosar voluminos, documentat de specialisti, care arata ca Senatul fostului Institut Politehnic solicita sa-i fie prelungita gazduirea in Corpul A din Copou"
Pe de alta parte, rectorul a facut si anunturi SPECTACULOASE, in PREMIERA, ce tin de viitorul acestuia, daca va mai candida pentru un noua mandat la conducerea UAIC, despre una dintre cele mai valoroase si simboluri cladiri ale urbei cat si despre reabilitarea respectiv restaurarea Casei Universitarilor Iasi, demararea investitiei ce tine de constructia unei baze sportive ultra-moderne in Copou (pe o suprafata de aproximativ zece mii metri patrati - n.r.), Gradina Botanica sau pragatiri pentru ca Universitatea Cuza sa aiba o biblioteca noua si cu cele mai inalte si performante dotari. "As vrea sa va spun, legat de patrimoniu Universitatii noastre, faptul ca l-am rugat pe domnul profesor Gheorghe Iacob sa ma ajute intr-o documentare ce tine de Corpul A din Copou. Astfel, cu ajutorul muncii unor colegi istorici s-au facut cercetari riguroase inb Arhive. Aici, printre altele, am gasit date care prezinta o solicitare din partea fostului Institut Politehnic Iasi care solicita Senatului de la UAIC sa le mai permita prelungirea sederii in vechiul Palat Asministrativ al Universitatii din Iasi. Asta se petrecea inainte de 1990 si, acum au trecut ceva decenii si vom vedea ce se va intampla. Desigur, stiu ca, Statul a investit masiv intr-un nou sediu al actualei Universitati Tehnice Gheorghe Asachi din Iasi, din zona Tudor", a transmis, elegant, rectorul Toader.
Proces pentru cantina din Campusul Targusor - Copou
Pe de alta parte, rectorul UAIC a abordat si problema cantinei din Campusul Targusor - Copou si care, conmform documentelor, este proprietatea UAIC. "Avand in vedere toate acestea, am decis demararea unui proces care sa ne faca posibil ca acest spatiu sa ne revina. El acum este administrat de Universitatea de Agronomie. Pe de alta parte, si in diverse zone ale tarii, unde avem statiuni de cercetare iar, sa ne recuperam terenurile care sunt proprietatea noastra", a mai punctat profesorul Toader.
"Nu am ajuns la momentul in care sa ma decid daca voi candida pentru un nou mandat de rector"
De asemenea, intrebat legat de modul in care vede viitorul UAIC pentru urmatorii patru ani, acesta a oferit un raspuns extrem de interesant. "Nu am ajuns la momentul in care sa ma decid daca voi candida pentru un nou mandat de rector. Acum, cand putem face aproape un bilant complet ce tine de ultimii patru ani la conducerea Universitatii Cuza alaturi de echipa pe care am ales-o, cred ca putem vorbi de fapte si lucruri realizate. Desigur, mereu totul e perfectibil si poate fi imbunatatit", a conchis rectorul Tudorel Toader. Emisiunea completa cu profesorul Tudorel Toader poate fi urmarita AICI
Publicație : Bună Ziua Iași
Universities told to refund half of students’ tuition fees for failing to make up missed lectures during strikes
'Some universities have done nothing and we don’t think that’s fair,' adjudicator says
Students should be refunded at least 50 per cent of their tuition fees for lost teaching time by universities that failed to minimise the disruption caused by last year’s lecturer strikes, the Office of the Independent Adjudicator has said.
The independent body which looks at complaints across higher education, said that was the “starting point” for those affected.
Fourteen days of teaching were lost when staff, including lecturers and academics, from 65 universities across the UK walked out early last year in a dispute over pensions.
The University and College Union estimated that the action, which was called off in April, affected more than 1 million students and a total of 575,000 teaching hours were lost.
Case summaries, published on the Office of the Independent Adjudicator (OIA) website, show that some universities have been better at making up lost learning by providing lecture recordings and podcasts.
“Others have done nothing and we don’t think that’s fair," said Felicity Mitchell, an independent adjudicator. "We have made recommendations in a number of cases for partial refunds of tuition fees and payments for distress and inconvenience where we have decided the student has not been treated fairly."
A batch of reports from the watchdog earlier this year showed that individual universities had been told to refund students hundreds of pounds each.
Experts said at the time that these reports could pave the way for more compensation claims from students, who pay up to £9,250 a year in tuition fees in the UK, and even more if they are outside the European Union.
“We have used a notional value of 50 per cent of the value of the teaching hours as a starting point for working out how much refund to recommend," said Sarah Liddell, head of the leadership office at the OIA.
In one of the new case summaries published, an international student on a master’s programme complained about missed teaching hours and the OIA told the university to refund £1,284 in tuition fees.
Students have up to a year to bring their complaint to the OIA after filing a complaint with the university.
Publicație : The Independent
UK universities told to compensate students over campus strikes
Ombudsman received more than 80 complaints about lost teaching hours during action
A group of British universities have been told to pay compensation for failing to make up for teaching hours lost during last year’s wave of campus strike action by lecturers and other staff.
The payouts, each worth hundreds of pounds, were ordered by the higher education ombudsman for England and Wales in a string of cases where students complained they had missed out on lectures and seminars or suffered distress from the university’s response.
The Office of the Independent Adjudicator said it has received more than 80 individual complaints relating to last year’s industrial action, which totalled 14 days across 65 campuses. It released details of 19 cases that have concluded, with nine upheld and one settled independently.
“Some providers have been better than others at finding ways to make up for the learning students have missed out on. Some providers have made lecture recordings, podcasts, and additional online materials available to students, or allowed them to sit in on other classes. Others have done nothing, and we don’t think that’s fair,” said Felicity Mitchell, the independent adjudicator.
“We have made recommendations in a number of cases for partial refunds of tuition fees and payments for distress and inconvenience where we have decided the student has not been treated fairly.”
In one case a university was ordered to give a tuition fee refund worth £1,154 to a student on a part-time course who said they had lost earnings because they had taken time off work to attend lectures and seminars that were cancelled during the strike.
The university rejected the student’s complaint, saying that the strikes were outside of its control. But the OIA partly upheld the complaint, saying the university had offered no additional material or recorded lectures to make up for the lost teaching.
In another case, a university had to refund £1,284 to an international student after they complained about lost teaching on their one-year master’s course. The university rejected the complaint by invoking a force majeure [unexpected circumstances] clause in its regulations.
“We were concerned that the clause was too wide in scope and that the university didn’t bring it to the student’s attention: a clause which permitted the university to cancel an entire programme could be considered a surprising or important term under the consumer protection legislation,” the OIA said.
But the ombudsman also rejected a claim by a second year undergraduate that the university had “broken its promise” over teaching hours, and who had turned down a £130 payment from a fund established to compensate students.
Another student on a master’s course received a £630 refund after the university offered to let them attend missed seminars the following academic year, but the student was by then in full-time work.
Publicație : The Guardian
Failure to support presses is a betrayal of the academic mission
Stanford University’s insistence that its press break even is another bleak milestone in corporatisation, says David Palumbo-Liu
As federal and state funding for US higher education has shrunk and colleges scramble to find other revenue streams, there has been persistent talk of the “corporate university”. Stanford University’s recent announcement of a dramatic reduction to its financial support for its in-house press indicates that the transformation may soon be complete – and the corporate university will have turned into just another corporation.
Stanford University Press is one of the oldest and most illustrious presses in the US. It published its first book in 1892, just a year after Stanford was founded. Since then, of course, the university’s wealth has risen astronomically – its current endowment is the third largest in the US, valued in 2018 at $26.5 billion (£20 billion). Yet Stanford is saying that it cannot afford to support the press to the tune of $1.7 million dollars a year, a minuscule slice (less than 0.03 per cent) of the institutional budget. It says the press should cover its own costs.
Only after tremendous public outrage has the university granted a stay of execution. But it still wants the press to downsize to a point where it won’t require any subsidy. This notion is shortsighted and dangerous. It is like reducing a person’s calorific intake to below 900 calories a day in order to lose weight. They will live on, but not for long; the only consolation is that they will be a very slim-looking corpse.
All this talk of downsizing or elimination assumes that the mission of a university press is distinct from that of the university itself. Nothing could be further from the truth. University presses are not meant to produce top-sellers and reap profits. They are meant to disseminate – at affordable cost to readers – the important ideas and knowledge created in the university. They are, thus, an integral part of the mission of an institution of higher learning, working – alongside our lectures and classes – to give the lie to the stereotype that academics are aloof elites.
One would think that a wealthy university like Stanford would pour money into such an important bridge to the public. By choosing to destroy that bridge, it is sending a terrible message to every other university in the world: that presses are unimportant, peripheral undertakings and can be amputated without any pain to the university.
But can’t the public just get the information they need from the internet these days? Actually, no. And this point cuts to the heart of not only education but also a free society.
The modern world is awash with false statements that pass themselves off as true. The political attacks on the media are in essence attacks on the idea of facts, since journalistic ethics demand fact-checking. In the academy, university presses perform the same function. Academic books are rigorously vetted for authenticity and soundness of judgement because that is of a piece with the ethics of education.
Where, if not to university presses, is everyone from policymakers to schoolchildren to turn for reliable and unbiased information on crucial issues such as climate change and poverty, history and politics, culture and the arts? Plainly put, to destroy university presses is to further erode the public’s access to truth.
If we allow the market to determine whether we have academic presses, the academy is gone. Presses will publish only profitable books, graduate students will write only profitable dissertations, and tenure will be awarded based only on profitable scholarship. Requiring a university press to become financially solvent is a direct attack on academic freedom and free enquiry. Such reasoning binds us to the trendy rather than the truth.
Any university administration or board that proposes or acquiesces to the dismantling of a university press has reneged on its fiduciary pledge to protect and nurture the university’s mission to educate its students and the broader public.
If university presses go, you can eliminate the word “ideas” from “marketplace of ideas”, at the same time as you erase the word “university” from “corporate university”. The loss will be felt by everyone – just at a time when we need free, well-funded university presses more than ever.
Publicație : The Times
China fears could feed broader US clampdown on research sharing
Senator suggests that universities might want to keep more of their findings to themselves
Concerns about theft of intellectual property by China could lead to a broader clampdown on dissemination of US universities’ research findings.
Chuck Grassley, the chair of the US Senate’s Finance Committee, is leading an effort to push federal funding agencies to explain how they are preventing “potential foreign actors” and “foreign threats” from acquiring research findings.
That campaign already has led to the expulsion of three Asian scientists from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center over concerns that they did not disclose foreign ties and had violated the confidentiality of the peer review process.
But Grassley aides described the senator’s work as taking no firm position on the key question of whether and to what degree the academic ideal of universal sharing must exclude scientists from outside the US.
As such, one Grassley aide said, the senator was currently characterising his effort as a general matter of helping and encouraging US universities and their scientists to keep their government-financed work to themselves.
Some researchers, the aide said, “given the hard work and the dedication that they bring to the job, they want some of that information to remain in-house until they finalise what they’re doing”.
Universities can and should make similar determinations, even if the project is not classified, said the Grassley aide, who declined to be identified by name.
Such a position is counter to the official policies of the leading federal agencies distributing basic research funding, which generally want to see the universal sharing of research discoveries without any intentional delays. The National Institutes of Health says it expects a “timely” release of data, while the National Science Foundation wants dissemination done “promptly”.
Although US policymakers have been reluctant to publicly renounce such agency policies, they appear increasingly fretful as more authoritarian governments – especially China – move to restrict their own scientific sharing.
China last year issued regulations on its domestic scientific data that are designed to limit their export while increasing their sharing among scientists within the country.
An FBI agent, Edward You, told researchers at this month’s annual policy conference of the American Association for the Advancement of Science that US researchers’ continued widespread sharing of scientific findings could become dangerous “if we’re the only ones doing it”.
Although US universities are likely to be resistant to any limitations on research dissemination that might develop out of Mr Grassley’s efforts, they should be aware that the senator has a record of success: his investigation into unreported payments to medical researchers by pharmaceutical companies led to the introduction of tough new legislation in this area in 2010.
US lawmakers are pursuing a variety of measures aimed at reducing Chinese academic influence and standing in the US. One leading bill, called the Protect Our Universities Act, would create a task force within the Department of Education to monitor foreign students and keep them away from research projects regarded as sensitive.
US universities and their faculty have shown a range of reactions towards such political concerns, with administrators often more willing to accept government judgements about the risks. However, they appear to be growing more sceptical about federal proscriptions as security-minded policymakers make increasingly clear that they are looking beyond science with overt military and corporate applications, and expanding their focus into areas of basic research that have long been understood as open for worldwide sharing.
Acknowledging the difficulty of finding the proper balance, the Grassley aide said the senator – while urging tougher scrutiny by federal funding agencies – was not yet ready to propose any legislative solutions.
“We are in an ongoing fact-finding endeavour,” the aide said.
Publicație : The Times
London Met v-c: PM wants us to fail, but we’re not going anywhere
V-c who left school at 16 before entering university without A levels says university’s social mission is irreplaceable
Theresa May “probably hopes” that London Metropolitan University will “go under”, but the institution is “not going to be the Northern Rock of the HE sector” and its undervalued social mission is irreplaceable, says its vice-chancellor.
Lynn Dobbs told Times Higher Education that there “has to be” a place for London Met in an increasingly marketised and competitive sector. The institution prioritises its social mission in Islington, the north London borough that surrounds its Holloway Road campus, with 70 per cent of its students coming from the highest two deciles on the indices of multiple deprivation.
“Without London Metropolitan University and a small number of universities like us across the country there is no potential for social change,” said Professor Dobbs, who took over from John Raftery in October 2018 after serving as deputy vice-chancellor at the University of Roehampton. “It has to work. And that is the reason I wanted the job.”
However, Professor Dobbs warned that the combination of the government’s post-18 education funding review – expected to cut tuition fees and university funding – and Brexit “could potentially be catastrophic for a number of universities”.
“I think Theresa May doesn’t like London Met and probably hopes that London Met would go under – I’m putting words into her mouth there,” Professor Dobbs continued.
Mrs May was home secretary at the time of the Home Office’s dramatic 2012 decision to withdraw London Met’s licence to sponsor overseas students. But Professor Dobbs also cited government-enforced metrics like the teaching excellence framework, which she said placed London Met “in a particular position”. Universities that focus on widening participation have complained that they are disadvantaged by the assessment’s focus on graduate employment.
A “number of politicians probably think it’s going to be London Met that goes under”, Professor Dobbs said. But she added: “We are not going to be the Northern Rock of the HE sector…Although we’ve got ongoing operating deficits, we have enough money in the bank to weather a storm.”
Professor Dobbs, a former director of Northumbria University’s Centre for Public Policy, whose research focused on tackling social exclusion, said that if London Met did not exist “some of the students who come from directly around the university wouldn’t travel to another university”. They would then miss out on “transformation” in their lives, which could also have an impact on their “wider life in their communities and on their families”, she argued.
Professor Dobbs said that her own background in Newcastle – she left school at 16 and entered university without A levels in her early thirties after having children – informed her leadership of London Met. She studied politics because the timetabling of the course allowed her to juggle study with childcare.
At London Met, she is “championing the idea that first-years at the very least should have two days when they don’t study, to allow them to work and travel. And they shouldn’t start before 10 o’clock, so they can drop their kids off at school.”
But there are major challenges at London Met: a huge drop in student recruitment since the abolition of number controls – London pre-92 universities “have sucked all the numbers out of the post-92 sector”, said Professor Dobbs – and a deficit of £20 million in the latest accounts.
The university has rationalised its estate, bringing everything on to the Holloway Road campus, barring the Sir John Cass School of Art, Architecture and Design which will remain in Aldgate, a recognition of its impact for the creative industries in the area and the borough of Tower Hamlets more widely.
The university is “still dealing with one-off costs and some of the legacy of previous restructuring”, Professor Dobbs argued. The deficit is “mostly one-off costs, but I would also say [addressing it is] about getting our staff base and our cost base to fit the size of the university now”, with a plan to achieve a surplus in three years.
“Diversifying income” is one key aim, she said. This involves turning more overseas student applications – there were 3,500 last year – into actual recruitment.
Professor Dobbs is also working on a programme to enhance the university’s civic impact, and has had an “amazing response” from meetings with organisations including Islington Council, the Metropolitan Police and Arsenal Football Club.
She said the university can “make a real difference to the social issues facing London” by tying its work “into the priorities of the partners” – which could involve aspects such as London Met’s research on gun and knife crime, or its training for social workers and teachers.
London Met has a “bloody good estate, it’s got a fantastic science centre, the teaching facilities are good, the Cass is phenomenal, the cybersecurity research centre is off the map in terms of being fantastic,” Professor Dobbs said. “It’s absolutely great, unexpectedly great. It’s a hidden gem.”
Publicație : The Times
The university where half the professoriate ‘has never published’
Nepotism and the isolation of war have left Kosovo’s oldest university battling poor research standards, but transparency campaigners hope this is changing0
It’s hard to imagine a more alarming warning sign for a university.
At the University of Priština, the oldest institution in the tiny Balkan country of Kosovo, 208 of 465 professors have never published an article in a “legitimate scientific journal”, as defined by inclusion on indexing platforms such as Web of Science and Scopus.
“This is a very, very concerning number indeed,” said Rron Gjinovci, founder of the Organisation for Improving the Quality of Education (Orca), a Kosovan group that since 2016 has been shedding an uncomfortable light on an academic system trying to escape wider corruption in society and recover from a decade of war and isolation in the 1990s.
In a report released last October, Orca also revealed that 59 per cent of Priština professors had failed to hit publication targets required for their roles that were introduced in a 2011 higher education law. Assistant professors must have at least one paper in a “peer-reviewed international scientific journal”; a full professor must have five.
And a third of professors had published at least once in journals on Beall’s list, a now discontinued – and sometimes controversial – catalogue of allegedly predatory journals compiled by former University of Colorado librarian Jeffrey Beall, according to Orca’s report, Academic Integrity, Scientific Publications, and the Management of the University of Prišhtina.
“This is the shocking reality of the universities in Kosovo,” warned Taulant Muka, a cardiometabolic health researcher at the University of Bern and a campaigner for academic integrity in neighbouring Albania.
“Most…academic titles in Kosovo and other areas in the Balkans are not allocated because of [an individual’s] scientific achievements” but rather are doled out on the basis of loyalty to a political party, he said.
According to Mr Gjinovci, an investigative journalist, universities have been used as tools by politicians, who distribute positions with the aim of securing electoral support. “They would hire professors there without merit…in order to create influential people who would help them to gain votes,” he said.
Unqualified academics are also sometimes promoted as part of internal university power struggles, with factions trying to elevate their own supporters, he said.
For its part, Priština’s management has admitted that the university has serious problems, and it is cooperating with Orca to tackle the situation. “Until recently, requirements for promotion and tenure have been minimalistic and ambiguous,” acknowledged Marjan Dema, Priština’s rector. This laxity allowed staff to publish a “stream” of research of “disputable quality” in blacklisted journals, he said.
The university was founded in 1969 as a teaching institution with no focus on research, Professor Dema pointed out – and it has since endured war and genocide in the region.
Most of the full professors at Priština were educated at unrecognised Albanian-language universities during the 1990s, and so “unsurprisingly they found it very difficult to publish anything outside the immediate region”, said Dennis Farrington, a visiting fellow at the Oxford Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies who has helped to devise new rules on academic misconduct in the region. “It is unrealistic to think this problem can be resolved until a new generation of professors with international exposure get into positions of authority.”
Of the 208 professors with no “legitimate” paper to their name, many are approaching retirement age, having been appointed when Kosovo was part of Yugoslavia, explained Mr Gjinovci. Younger faculty, on the other hand, are “becoming ever more capable and prone to deliver good research”, Professor Dema said.
And if Kosovan universities are not meritocracies, that simply mirrors the situation in wider society: Kosovo was ranked 93 out of 180 in Transparency International’s corruption perception index.
Meanwhile, Orca’s attempt to capture the value of Priština’s professoriate in a simple measure of papers published has its own pitfalls, as Mr Gjinovci acknowledged. Local, niche journals that specialise in Albanian culture and language are not listed in Scopus or Web of Science. Book chapters and conference proceedings are excluded, too.
But having strict, if imperfect, criteria for classifying valid research is currently a necessary evil, Mr Gjinovci argued. “Right now, this is the only way that we can control it,” he said.
The direction of travel, nevertheless, is seen as positive. “In two years, it changed rapidly. Now nobody is talking any more about not having these kinds of lists and these kinds of criteria,” Mr Gjinovci said.
The proportion of professors without sufficient published articles to justify their positions fell from 72 per cent in 2017 to 59 per cent last year. Some of this is down to academics updating their CVs, Mr Gjinovci acknowledged, but a flurry of papers secured publication in legitimate journals in 2017-18. “We are in a good direction right now,” he added.
Publicație : The Times
Parcoursup : une saison 2 sous surveillance
Les candidats inscrits sur la plate-forme d’admission dans l’enseignement supérieur, qui a essuyé un difficile baptême du feu en 2018, vont découvrir les réponses à leurs vœux d’orientation mercredi 15 mai.
Une deuxième édition de Parcoursup plus apaisée : l’espoir est largement partagé dans la communauté éducative, à la veille des premières réponses aux vœux d’orientation des candidats. Mercredi 15 mai, à partir de 19 heures, les 898 000 inscrits sur la plate-forme d’entrée dans l’enseignement supérieur découvriront le sort qui leur a été réservé à l’entrée des formations. En 2018, alors que cette nouvelle procédure d’admission vivait son baptême du feu, le choc avait été conséquent lorsque la moitié des candidats s’était retrouvée sans aucune réponse favorable de la part d’un établissement du supérieur, au premier jour du processus d’affectation. Qu’en sera-t-il cette année ?
« On attaque la saison 2 en ayant l’expérience, souligne-t-on au ministère de l’enseignement supérieur où l’on se veut confiant. Ce nouveau système s’est maintenant installé dans le paysage, chacun a pu se l’approprier. » Dans les coulisses des commissions d’examen des vœux, le tri des dossiers s’est opéré de manière moins chaotique, particulièrement dans les universités, qui découvraient l’exercice en temps réel en 2018, alors qu’une partie de la communauté était opposée à cette nouvelle forme de sélection et qu’un mouvement étudiant contre la réforme avait duré plusieurs mois. « Il y a eu moins de stress chez les jeunes », affirme Philippe Vincent, secrétaire général du syndicat national des personnels de direction de l’éducation nationale (SNPDEN).
Les modifications décidées par le ministère participent évidemment de ce climat apaisé. Désormais, la procédure principale s’achèvera le 19 juillet, et non plus le 5 septembre comme l’an dernier, ce qui avait provoqué une interminable attente pour certains bacheliers, et des difficultés dans les formations à organiser la rentrée. Les délais laissés aux candidats pour répondre aux formations ont aussi été raccourcis. « On est plus serein, confie Alain Joyeux, président de l’association des professeurs des classes préparatoires économiques et sociales. Certains candidats ont pu se décourager l’an dernier à cause de l’attente, le système devrait être plus rapidement débloqué. »
« Ne pas dramatiser l’attente »
Toutefois, malgré ces améliorations, ici et là, personne ne se risque à prédire les réactions au 15 mai. « C’est au moment de la publication des résultats que le stress est vraiment monté l’an dernier, rappelle Philippe Vincent, du SNPDEN. Impossible de savoir si nos lycéens seront aussi inquiets. »
Car le ministère de l’enseignement supérieur l’anticipe déjà : il n’y a pas de raison de croire que le nombre de candidats sans réponse sera très différent de l’an dernier, au premier jour des propositions – ils étaient quelque 400 000 sur 812 000. « Il ne faut pas dramatiser l’attente, insiste-t-on au cabinet de Frédérique Vidal, la ministre. C’est le principe même du système progressif et continu. » « C’est mécanique avec cet algorithme au fil de l’eau, confirme un chercheur, il y aura dans les premiers jours beaucoup de “sans-proposition” : les meilleurs candidats concentrent les propositions favorables au départ, puis la situation se solde au fur et à mesure des réponses validées, qui libèrent des places à d’autres. »
Néanmoins, plusieurs nouveautés devraient permettre aux lycéens de se retrouver un peu moins dans le flou. Avec Parcoursup, version 2, ils pourront évaluer leurs chances d’admission, en comparant leur rang de classement sur la liste d’attente d’une formation, avec celui du dernier candidat ayant reçu une réponse favorable en 2018 (excepté en écoles d’ingénieurs, de commerce et IUT). Des points d’étape plus réguliers, ainsi que la mise en place d’un répondeur automatique après le bac, dans lequel les jeunes pourront hiérarchiser leurs vœux puis laisser faire la plate-forme, doivent permettre plus de « tranquillité », espère-t-on au ministère, qui a placé cette nouvelle édition sous le signe d’un meilleur « accompagnement » des candidats.
Un indicateur sur les tableaux de bord ne manque pas cependant d’interroger sur le terrain : les candidatures sur la plate-forme ont explosé, passant de 812 000 à 898 000 inscrits cette année. Une progression qui s’explique moins du côté des lycéens – ils sont 10 000 de plus, soit 640 000 – que des étudiants en réorientation, dont les candidatures ont crû de près de 35 000, ainsi que celles des inscrits en reprise d’études (+ 42 000). Difficile d’expliquer le phénomène : est-ce l’arrivée de nouvelles formations sur la plate-forme, tels les Instituts de formation en soins infirmiers ? Ou des étudiants déçus de leur orientation en 2018 ? Le ministère y voit lui un meilleur accompagnement des réorientations dans les universités, ou encore une demande particulièrement forte d’accès à l’enseignement supérieur.
« Cette augmentation ne veut pas forcément dire qu’il faudra des places supplémentaires, ce n’est pas mécanique », estime-t-on au cabinet de la ministre, tout en promettant que les ajustements seront pris selon les besoins. Côté universités, on affirme que l’ouverture de places supplémentaires ne pourra être que « marginale ».
« Rebattre les cartes »
Reste un point d’interrogation, qui sera particulièrement scruté : l’Ile-de-France. C’est l’un des principaux changements de cette nouvelle édition, la région est désormais désectorisée. Les candidats venant des trois académies – Paris, Créteil et Versailles – sont considérés comme appartenant à un seul et même secteur, alors que des quotas géographiques limitaient jusqu’ici les candidatures à l’université d’une académie à l’autre. Ce qui avait pu participer au sentiment de discrimination exprimé par de nombreux bacheliers de Seine-Saint-Denis, à l’entrée des établissements parisiens.
Mais dans les facs situées en banlieue parisienne, on craint déjà l’effet d’attraction de Paris qui pourra aspirer les meilleurs profils des autres académies. « On aurait préféré une approche plus graduelle, en attendant encore un an en faisant évoluer les pourcentages [des quotas] », dit Gilles Roussel, à la tête de l’université de Marne-la-Vallée (Seine-et-Marne). « Cela va forcément rebattre les cartes », souligne un universitaire. Dernière évolution : les quotas de boursiers, fixés à l’entrée de chaque formation, vont être augmentés pour correspondre aux proportions de boursiers parmi les candidats et rehaussées de deux points – avec un taux plancher de 5 %.
Parcoursup : les dates-clés
15 mai
A 19 heures, les 898 000 candidats (dont 640 000 lycéens) découvriront les réponses à leurs vœux d’orientation. Cette année, les délais de réponse des candidats ont été raccourcis. Ils ont cinq jours pour se prononcer sur chacun de leurs vœux au départ. Puis, au gré des réponses reçues, ils devront valider leurs choix en trois jours, jusqu’au 19 juillet. La procédure est suspendue durant la semaine des épreuves du bac (du 17 au 24 juin).
25 juin
Les candidats peuvent s’ils le souhaitent classer leurs vœux et laisser faire la plate-forme pour y répondre automatiquement, en utilisant l’outil du répondeur automatique. S’ils n’ont aucune réponse favorable, ils pourront saisir une commission académique, au lendemain des résultats du bac, afin qu’elle leur propose une formation.
19 juillet
La procédure principale de Parcoursup s’achève. Les candidats peuvent effectuer de nouveaux vœux au sein d’une procédure complémentaire, qui s’étale du 25 juin au 14 septembre
Publicație : Le Monde
Erasmus, l’antidote européen au repli sur soi
Un documentaire remonte le fil de plus de trente ans d’existence de la plus belle machine à produire de l’intégration.
ARTE - MARDI 14 MAI - 22 H 20. DOCUMENTAIRE
Ils façonnent l’Europe. Ils sont étudiants, apprentis, bénévoles ou enseignants. Depuis 1987, 9 millions de jeunes hommes et femmes ont quitté le confort de leur nid pour tenter l’ailleurs. Plus d’un million de bébés européens sont nés des rencontres du programme d’échange Erasmus, qui n’ont pourtant pas empêché la montée de l’euroscepticisme. A quelques jours des élections européennes du 26 mai, un documentaire proposé par Arte remonte le fil de plus de trente années d’existence de la plus belle machine à produire de l’intégration à travers les aventures humaines d’une poignée de ses acteurs sur le continent.
Dans toutes les épopées, il y a des éclaireurs. Pascal est de ceux-là. En 1987, l’étudiant en marketing figure parmi les premiers à participer à un tout nouveau programme au nom improbable qui fleure bon la technocratie : European Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students. Erasmus pour faire simple. Avec deux compères, direction Sligo, bourgade un peu perdue du nord-ouest de l’Irlande. La vieille GS (Citroën) blanche immatriculée en France et ses singuliers occupants attirent les regards. Le natif de Montluçon rencontre la belle Irlandaise Siobahn. Elle le trouve « exotique ». Il lui passe la bague au doigt trois ans plus tard. Siobhan, devenue Mme Bonnichon, s’installera en France, tissant un fil de plus entre les deux républiques. « Etre loin de sa maison, je le souhaite à tout le monde. Cela permet de faire sa propre vie », explique Pascal en souriant.
Pluriculturels et polyglottes
L’Europe des années 1980 n’a plus rien à voir avec celle que connaissent les primo-votants des élections de mai 2019. Le pacte de Varsovie est un lointain souvenir, les postes-frontières ont disparu de Lisbonne à Helsinki, la monnaie est unique et la libre circulation des personnes assurée. A cela s’ajoute donc : Erasmus, « un programme d’acquisition de compétences par l’expérience, analyse Maurizio Ascari, professeur de littérature à l’université de Bologne. Les étudiants se retrouvent confrontés à des institutions, un système éducatif et aussi une société différente de celle dans laquelle ils ont grandi ».
Ces enfants Erasmus sont mobiles, urbains, pluriculturels, polyglottes. Ils sont des citoyens agiles qui déambulent sans mal dans la mondialisation. Mais il reste les autres, ceux que le programme n’a pas embrassés. « Ceux qui se sentent ignorés et exclus aussi bien culturellement, qu’économiquement et socialement, souligne Timothy Garton Ash, historien à Oxford. Les populistes ont réussi à exploiter avec une grande habilité la misère et le mécontentement de cette partie de la société. »
La liberté de circulation, qu’Erasmus symbolise si bien, n’est plus un acquis. « Les jeunes voyagent de pays en pays sans contrôle aux frontières et en même temps ils votent pour des partis populistes, constate amèrement Adam, 45 ans, professeur d’histoire à Bielsko-Biala en Pologne, cela m’horrifie. » Les jeunes peinent à reconnaître ce que l’Europe leur a apporté, et les Français ne font pas exception. Selon un sondage IFOP pour le réseau national d’acteurs et d’élus enfance jeunesse (Anacej) et les Jeunes Européens France, publié le 9 mai, l’abstention des 18-25 ans pour le prochain scrutin se monterait à 77 %.
Publicație : Le Monde
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