„Student in comunism”, o expozitie incitanta, deschisa ASTAZI la Iasi
Muzeul Universitatii „Alexandru Ioan Cuza” (UAIC) din Iasi organizeaza expozitia interesanta si atractiva intitulata generic „Student în comunism„, al carei vernisaj va avea loc astazi, 20 februarie 2019, în Sala centrala a Muzeului Academic.
Expozitia prezinta tematic diversitatea vietii de student din acea perioada, de la provocarile reprezentate de admiterea în învatamântul superior si parcurgerea cursurilor ideologice, pâna la aspecte ale petrecerii timpului liber, desfasurarea practicii stiintifice sau primirea repartitiei la terminarea studiilor.
Vizitatorii pot admira fotografii, extrase din documente de arhiva, obiecte de epoca, insigne, medalii si pot asculta fragmente de interviuri luate câtorva profesori, fosti studenti ai Universitatii în perioada comunista. Aceasta poate fi vizitata pâna pe data de 25 aprilie 2019.
Publicație : Bună Ziua Iași
O noua editie in lumina reflectoarelor Studioului BZI LIVE de substanta si de interes public, in dialog cu reprezentativi profesori de la Universitatea Cuza din Iasi
Marti, 18 februarie 2019, incepand cu ora 15.00, in lumina reflectoarelor Studioului BZI LIVE s-a derulat o noua emisiune – dialog cu puternic impact in randul studentilor, dar si a celor care urmeaza sa isi aleaga o facultate • In direct, la BZI LIVE, au fost prezenti trei profesori universitari, din domenii cheie • Este vorba de prof. univ. dr. Costel Istrate, prodecan Facultatea de Economie si Administrarea Afacerilor – FEAA, conf. univ. Ilie Farte, Facultatea de Filosofie si Stiinte Social Politice respectiv conf. univ. dr. habil. Ovidiu Gavrilovici, Facultatea de Psihologie si Stiinte ale Educatiei, reprezentantii unora dintre cele mai atractive masterate din cadrul Universitatii Alexandru Ioan Cuza – UAIC din Iasi • Alaturi de acestia au fost dezbatute teme cu puternic impact social, economic si educational • S-a facut o analiza la rece despre situatia resursei umane, slaba pregatire a acesteia, dar si despre tutorat si cum poate acesta ajuta la acomodarea studentilor cu mediul academic • Pe de alta parte, invitatii din cadrul emisiuni BZI LIVE au explicat rolul parteneriatelor pe care Universitatea Alexandru Ioan Cuza le are, despre relatia cu studentul, dar si despre insertia pe piata muncii, finantarea de la bugetul de stat sau internationalizarea si promovarea celei mai vechi institutii moderne de invatamant a Romaniei • Emisiunea completa cu cei trei membri ai comunitatii academice de la Cuza poate fi urmarita AICI:
Pe 18 februarie 2019, incepand cu ora 15.00, in lumina reflectoarelor Studioului BZI LIVE s-a derulat o noua emisiune – dialog cu puternic impact in randul studentilor, dar si a celor care urmeaza sa isi aleaga o facultate. In direct, la BZI LIVE, au fost prezenti trei profesori universitari, din domenii cheie.
Este vorba de prof. univ. dr. Costel Istrate, prodecan Facultatea de Economie si Administrarea Afacerilor (FEAA), conf. univ. Ilie Farte, Facultatea de Filosofie si Stiinte Social Politice respectiv conf. univ. dr. habil. Ovidiu Gavrilovici, Facultatea de Psihologie si Stiinte ale Educatiei, reprezentantii unora dintre cele mai atractive masterate din cadrul Universitatii Alexandru Ioan Cuza (UAIC) din Iasi.
Alaturi de acestia au fost dezbatute teme cu puternic impact social, economic si educational. S-a facut o analiza la rece despre situatia resursei umane, slaba pregatire a acesteia, dar si despre tutorat si cum poate acesta ajuta la acomodarea studentilor cu mediul academic.
Pe de alta parte, invitatii din cadrul emisiuni BZI LIVE au explicat rolul parteneriatelor pe care Universitatea Alexandru Ioan Cuza le are, despre relatia cu studentul, dar si despre insertia pe piata muncii, finantarea de la bugetul de stat sau internationalizarea si promovarea celei mai vechi institutii moderne de invatamant a Romaniei. De asemenea, universitarii au reliefat dificultatile pe care le are o universitate intr-o lume globalizanta, cat de important este sa fii deschis la necesitatile si expectantele studentilor. Emisiunea completa cu cei trei membri ai comunitatii academice de la Cuza poate fi urmarita AICI:
Publicație : Bună Ziua Iași
Detalii din culisele celui mai mare eveniment derulat in Iasi. Zeci de experti in securitate IT si-au prezentat planurile la Palatul Culturii
Intalnire de nivel inalt, derulata la Iasi • Palatul Culturii a gazduit ieri o prima sedinta in Capitala Moldovei, dupa preluarea presedintiei Consiliului Europei de catre tara noastra • Cei mai mari experti pe securitate cibernetica din Europa au fost prezenti la intalnire
Zeci de oficiali de rang inalt din tarile membre ale Uniunii Europene au fost in aceste zile in inima Moldovei, la Iasi. Experti pe domeniul de securitate cibernetica au ajuns la Iasi pentru a participa la conferinta din domeniul digital privind e-Guvernarea, eveniment derulat de tara noastra sub egida presedintiei Consiliului Europei de catre Romania. La eveniment au asistat reprezentanti ai statelor membre UE, ai Ministerului Comunicatiilor si Societatii Informationale, dar si din mediul privat.
„Când digitalizarea întâlneste administratiile publice, atât centrale, cât si locale, printr-o compatibilizare optima in beneficiul cetatenilor, definim practic conceptul de e-Guvernare. Consider ca o e-guvernare bine implementata reprezinta in termeni practici o guvernare transparenta, o guvernare eficienta si eficace – pe scurt, o guvernare buna, acesta fiind si dezideratul mandatului meu. Primul eveniment important in domeniu digital, reuniunea de astazi (ieri – n.r.), cu participarea expertilor in domeniu din Romania si din alte tari, a constituit un bun prilej de a analiza ultimele realizari europene în domeniul guvernarii electronice, precum si modalitatile prin care pot fi îmbunatatite calitatea si eficienta proceselor administrative si a serviciilor publice, dar si de a promova cooperarea între domeniul politic, administratie, societatea civila si cetatenii europeni prin intermediul tehnologiei informatiei”, a spus Alexandru Petrescu, ministrul Comunicatiilor si Societatii Informationale.
Pleiada de personalitati la Palatul Culturii
Printre cei care au vorbit la Iasi s-au numarat Frank Leyman, Belgia, seful Departamentului de Relatii Internationale din cadrul Serviciului Public Federal Belgian, prof. univ. dr. ing. Dan Cascaval, rectorul Universitatii Tehnice „Gh. Asachi” Iasi, Justyna Orlowska, Polonia, Director Programe GovTech Poland, membru al Cancelariei premierului polonez, Sven Rostgaard Rasmussens, Danemarca, sef in cadrul Agentiei Daneze de Digitalizare. In lista celor prezenti la Iasi au mai fost Peter Kustor, Austria, seful Departamentului de Digitalizate si E-guvernare din Ministerul Afacerilor Economice, letonul Edmunds Belskis, din cadrul Ministerului Protectiei Mediului si Regiunilor de Dezvoltare.
„Reuniunea va constitui un bun prilej de a analiza ultimele realizari europene în domeniul guvernarii electronice, precum si modalitatile prin care pot fi îmbunatatite calitatea si eficienta proceselor administrative si a serviciilor publice, dar si de a promova cooperarea între domeniul politic, administratie, societatea civila si cetatenii europeni prin intermediul tehnologiei informatiei. Structurata pe trei tematici cheie: Comunitati conectate, Guvernare mobila si interactiunea digitala si Comunitati reziliente, conferinta va cuprinde dezbateri la nivel de experti cu privire la beneficiile si importanta conceptului de guvernare electronica la nivelul Uniunii Europene”, au mai aratat organizatorii evenimentului.
Acesta a fost primul eveniment de amploare care a avut loc la Iasi odata ce Romania a preluat presedintia Consiliului UE. Ulterior, in luna aprilie, tot la Palatul Culturii din Iasi va fi organizata Conferinta „Expunerea Online a Patrimoniului Cultural European: Impactul Patrimoniului Cultural asupra Transformarii Digitale a Societatii”.
Conferinta respectiva este organizata de Ministerul Culturii si Identitatii Nationale. Tot Palatul Culturii din Iasi va gazdui un eveniment ce tine de drepturile omului. Este vorba de Reuniunea informala a COHOM, organizata sub egida Ministerului Afacerilor Externe (ME), eveniment care va avea loc in jurul datei de 13 mai 2019. Tot in luna mai, va avea loc o intalnire a Grupului la nivel înalt „Competitivitate”. Aceasta va fi organizata in jurul datei de 16 mai 2019, organizatorul principal fiind Ministerul Economiei.
Publicație : Bună Ziua Iași
MESAJ PRAGMATIC al rectorului Universitatii Tehnice din Iasi: „Tinerii au nevoie ca societatea sa se plieze pe interesele lor”
Reprezentantii Universitatii Tehnice (TUIASI) „Gheorghe Asachi” din Iasi au participat (ieri, 19 februarie 2019, la Palatul Culturii din Iasi – n.r.), în cadrul primului eveniment organizat în capitala Moldovei cu ocazia preluarii presedintiei Consiliului European (CE) de catre România.
In contextul dezbaterii despre e-guvernare, organizata de Ministerul Comunicatiilor si Societatii Informationale, ce a purtat denumirea „Moving towards digital communities”, rectorul – prof. univ. dr. ing. Dan Cascaval a transmis un mesaj de substanta. Universitarul s-a referit la rolul pe care ar trebui sa îl aiba Scoala, autoritatile centrale si comunitatile locale în conectarea la nevoile tinerilor de a se dezvolta, în contextul în care felul în care este structurata acum societatea nu este corelat cu lumea în care traiesc tinerii.
„Ma uit la tinerele generatii de astazi si la dificultatea pe care o au sa creeze punti, poduri de legatura, între lumea în care traiesc ei si cea pe care le-o oferim noi, ca societate. Tehnologia s-a sudat cu ADN-ul lor, cu bunele si relele care izvorasc din asta. Nascuti cu acces la informatie nelimitata, nefiltrata, cu posibilitati infinite de dezvoltare personala, tinerii au nevoie ca societatea sa se plieze pe interesele lor: sa-i ajutam sa-si înfiinteze companii on-line, fara birocratia ce pare înspaimântatoare pentru tinerii români care, asa cum ne arata studiile recente, spre exemplu, folosesc din ce în ce mai putin scrisul de mâna. Sa le oferim consultanta de cariera: sa îi ajutam de la vârste cât mai mici sa înteleaga ce înseamna responsabilitatea sociala, ce oportunitati au, cum sa-si foloseasca talentele”, a transmis, echilibrat si proaspat, rectorul Cascaval.
Pe de alta parte, seful Politehnicii iesene a punctat si faptul ca Scoala romaneasca trebuie sa se adapteze in a oferi cele mai noi tehnici de predare prin folosirea tehnologiilor moderne existente pe piata. „Încercam sa gasim solutiile în conditiile în care, în România, învatamântul superior nu are înca finantarea de care ar avea nevoie, sa tinem pasul cu tehnologiile si sa nu-i dezamagim pe tinerii care se înscriu la cursuri la cele 11 facultati ale Politehnicii iesene. Am descoperit, din spatele catedrei, ca în ciuda faptului ca tinerii nostri razbesc cu brio prin tavalugul informational pe care-l aduc noile tehnologii, nu ies mai puternici din interactiunea aceasta, iar încrederea le este foarte firava. Odata ce le-ai încalcat-o, e greu sa-i mai câstigi de partea ta din nou… Tinerii au nevoie ca societatea sa se plieze pe interesele lor”, a conchis prof. univ. dr. ing. Dan Cascaval.
Publicație : Bună Ziua Iași
Firmele cu sediul în Palas caută studenţi pentru practică şi intership
Un eveniment destinat celor care doresc să facă practică în marile companii de IT, Outsourcing, Bancare, etc. a avut loc ieri la Iaşi. „UBC intership day” a fost organizat la Palas Mall şi este primul eveniment de acest gen care se organizează în oraşul nostru.
Ofertele de stagii de practică şi intership-uri au fost oferite de companiile prezente în clădirile de birouri ale ansamblului urbanistic Palas iar studenţii în an terminal şi masteranţii au putut sta de vorbă cu specialiştii din aceste companii. Tinerii au putut afla despre numărul de locuri disponibil, modalitatea de selecţie, orarul de lucru, etc. „La Endava, acordăm o atenţie deosebită programului de internship, pentru că aduce, pe lângă tinerele talente, un suflu nou de entuziasm în companie. De-a lungul timpului, internii au crescut în Endava, au devenit oameni cheie în companie şi au ajuns să crească alţi interni la rândul lor. Mentorii implicaţi în acest program au oportunitatea de a creşte ei înşişi din punct de vedere profesional atunci când îi ajută pe cei nou veniţi să-şi dezvolte abilităţile. De aceea, ne bucurăm să participăm la UBC Internship Day şi să povestim împreună cu studenţii despre oportunităţile de învăţare pe care le oferă programul nostru de internship pe Full Stack Development, Applications Management, Automation Testing şi iOS Development, şi cum putem valorifica fiecare experienţă în parte.
Sperăm să cunoaştem cât mai mulţi tineri studenţi sau absolvenţi interesaţi de o oportunitate în Endava”, a declarat Iulian Antonovici, Delivery Unit Manager Endava. La evenimentul de ieri au fost disponibile aproximativ 100 de stagii de practică, din domenii precum IT, Outsourcing, Marketing, Economie, Financiar-Bancar şi HR. Iulius, Bitdefender, Veoneer, Endava, Fortech, OSF Global Services, Raiffeisen Bank, Banca Transilvania, Capgemini şi UniCredit Services sunt companiile care şi-au prezentat ofertele. Compania cu cele mai multe oferte este Raiffeisen Bank, unde se pot înscrie maxim 70 de tineri, apoi Endava, unde se pot înscrie la intership sau practică 30 de tineri.
La Capgemini sunt două locuri, însă anul trecut au fost 15 persoane care au făcut practică, dintre care o persoană a rămas în companie. La Unicredit sunt 16 locuri iar din cei 12 practicanţi de anul trecut, 10 au rămas să lucreze la această bancă. La Bitdefender anul acesta sunt 10 locuri, tot câte au fost şi anul trecut. „Din cei de anul trecut au rămas în firmă 5. Anul acesta, pe zona de Iaşi avem doar echipe tehnice”, precizează reprezentanţii Bitdefender. De asemenea, un număr de 320 de tineri, care s-au înscris în prealabil, au participat începând cu ora 10 la workshop-uri de dezvoltare profesională, susţinute de companii din UBC. „UBC Internship Day” este organizat de compania Iulius şi face parte din proiectul „Iaşi, oraşul viitorului tău”, care vizează creşterea atractivităţii Iaşului la nivel regional şi promovarea lui ca centru educaţional important şi oraş ce oferă multiple oportunităţi.
Publicație : Ziarul de Iași
30 de ingineri cu diplome false, descoperiti la Universitatea de Constructii din Bucuresti
Dupa scandalul declansat de medicii falsi, a venit randul inginerilor: 30 de persoane sunt cercetate pentru ca ar fi obtinut diplome, fara sa fi mers la cursuri si fara sa fi dat examenul de licenta, la Universitatea de Constructii din Bucuresti.
In urma unui control intern, s-a descoperit ca zeci de persoane au obtinut diplome de la Facultatea de Geodezie pentru a profesa in domeniu, desi nu au dat examenul de licenta si nici macar nu au fost la cursuri, scrie TVR.
Initial, s-a aflat ca unele dintre dosarele de burse sociale au fost falsificate de secretara-sefa a Facultatii de Geodezie, Mirela Bunea, care isi insusea sumele respective.
Conform Adevarul, in urma scandalului, femeia a demisionat la cererea conducerii si a inapoiat prejudiciul de 60.000 lei.
Ulterior, conducerea Universitatii a cerut verificarea diplomelor eliberate in perioada 2001 – 2008. In urma acestui control, a iesit la iveala faptul ca zeci de persoane, dintre care unele si exmatriculate, au obtinut diplome de licenta, fara sa fi mers la cursuri.
Tot secretara-sefa a Facultatii de Geodezie contacta studenti din promotiile anterioare, care nu aveau situatiile de an incheiate. In schimbul unor sume de bani, ea le completa numele in tabelul in care sunt centralizati toti cei care promoveaza examenul de licenta.
Acum, falsii ingineri sunt cercetati de politie, diplomele lor fiind anulate.
„Ei nu au notele consemnate in cataloage si in centralizatoare. Deci, un student din 2003 care a fost la un curs si l-a promovat are o nota in catalog si are o nota in centralizator. Ori unii dintre ei erau si exmatriculati de la noi. Erau transferati la alte universitati”, a explicat Radu Sorin Vacareanu, rectorul Universitatii de Constructii Bucuresti.
Dupa ce neregulile au iesit la iveala, conducerea unitatii de invatamant a facut plangere la politie si a sesizat si Ministerul Educatiei.
Dintre cei 30 de falsi ingineri, 7 au obtinut autorizatii si au avut dreptul sa realizeze si sa verifice lucrari de specialitate, mai noteaza sursa citata.
Amintim ca in ultimele saptamani au iesit la iveala mai multe cazuri in care persoane necalificate au obtinut diplome de medic false.
Publicație : Evenimentul și Adevărul
Oxford and Cambridge universities not doing enough to recruit poorer students, most Britons believe
Former education secretary Justine Greening warns results should be ‘wake-up call’ to Britain’s top universities
Nearly three-quarters of Britons believe Oxford and Cambridge universities are not doing enough to recruit students from disadvantaged backgrounds, a new study has found.
Research, commissioned by the former education secretary Justine Greening, suggests elite institutions must do more to ensure students from poorer backgrounds fulfil their potential.
The study, undertaken by the Social Mobility Pledge initiative, which was founded by Ms Greening, also found a belief in degrees as a launchpad for career success may be waning among young people.
Students at the Cuba’s National Ballet School (ENB) wait in line to enter a classroom in Havana, Cuba
Reuters
Meanwhile, nearly a fifth of respondents said they did not believe university degrees were a valuable pursuit – and young people are even less likely to see degrees as a good investment.
Of the over 55s surveyed, 88 per cent said degrees were definitely or possibly a good investment. But this dropped to 78 per cent in those aged between 18 and 24.
The study comes after an analysis last week revealed that fewer than 3 per cent of students enrolled at Oxford and Cambridge are poor and white.
On the new research, Ms Greening, who was the first education secretary to go to a comprehensive school, said: “These results are a wake-up call to Britain’s top universities that people feel they’re not changing fast enough to be open to all high-quality candidates.
“People want places more clearly offered on merit and potential and less on the basis of where a person grew up, if that’s what principally shaped their grades due to poor access to good education or on grades that frankly are not relevant to do with the course they want to do.”
The former education secretary set up the social mobility pledge after resigning from Theresa May’s cabinet last year after the prime minister tried to move her to the Department for Work and Pensions.
The pledge encourages employers to work with local schools and colleges and adopt open recruitment policies such as name-blind or contextual recruitment. John Lewis, Marks & Spencer and Nottingham Trent University are among the organisations that have signed up to the campaign.
The Conservative MP for Putney added: “Higher education providers have a crucial role to play in delivering the boost to social mobility that this country so desperately needs.”
A University of Cambridge spokesperson said the institution was making progress in reaching students from under-represented groups and had seen a rise in the proportion of state school pupils.
They said: “We are committed to making further progress but we cannot do it in isolation. As a country, we must focus on raising ambitions and attainment levels in schools and on changing perceptions among parents and teachers.
“All of our places are offered on merit – which is necessary to make sure that students can cope with the rigours of their course – but we pay close attention to contextual data on socio-economic background and schooling.”
The university unveiled a £500m fundraising campaign in October last year to support students and to ensure the university was fully inclusive of the most diverse talent.
The University of Oxford was approached for comment but had not responded at the time of publication.
Publicație : The Independent
Recruitment strategies are failing academics from ethnic minorities
If UK universities are serious about improving the diversity of their staff, they must begin by assessing their recruitment strategies and interviewing processes, says Roshan Doug
Striving for egalitarianism in higher education is not only commendable, it is something that we should all encourage and promote. After all, it’s only proper that there is a fair representation of people from all walks of life and from all sectors of our community on our campuses. This is particularly admirable in regard to the student population.
It is pleasing to see that in recent years equality of opportunities has been targeted with initiatives that have reached out to inner city pupils and provided them with opportunities which, only 20 years ago, were non-existent. The effect – albeit still relatively faint in some of our elite universities – has been discernible, with many more students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds entering higher education.
It’s clear that universities have recognised the need to address their own cultural imbalance or their lack of socio-equilibrium. The same, however, is not the case for recruitment of academic personnel, particularly the representation of teaching staff from minority communities.
Statistics collected last year show that universities still have a long way to go in addressing this. According to Advance HE, out of 19,000 professors, a mere 90 were black while only one in four were women, and out of these, 92 per cent were white.
Although I have no concrete figures to back this up, the very few black and Asian staff (often sessional) are still predominantly (though not exclusively) involved in the delivery of courses such as race studies, sociology, health and social care, world literature, women/gender studies or postcolonialism. These are often described as “soft” options or disparagingly as “ghettoised” subjects.
It may sound disingenuous – and perhaps it is – but it is still very rare to find members of minority groups teaching courses in classics, archaeology, architecture, astronomy, English literature, history or philosophy. In some universities, even cultural studies and race studies – once exclusive domains of black and Asian academics – are chaired and occupied by white academics.
As the situation stands, I cannot see a concerted effort on the part of universities to reach out to a wide range of cultural and racial groups. I’m not suggesting that universities should adopt a US-style affirmative action approach. I am also against the idea that we should reduce standards for minority applicants for academic posts. Nor do I believe that government should intervene and set a quota for institutions. That would be absurd and deeply fallacious.
However, universities’ recruitment panels and their selection procedure are two components that need to be addressed. Do institutions monitor their selection criteria in a robust and transparent way? Do they interview fairly without bias or prejudice?
After all, there are more ethnic minority graduates today who have gone on to obtain postgraduate degrees, so shouldn’t this be reflected in academia?
These questions get to a larger point that asks whether HE institutions are doing enough to attract staff from a diverse sociocultural background. It could be, as some black and Asian people suspect, that universities are merely paying lip service to government directives that compel institutions to carry out the box-ticking exercises. Are they just going through the motions without a real commitment to adjusting the staff population?
As an Asian academic who has – up until now – staunchly refused to point at institutional racism for discrimination, and/or lack of opportunities, I am becoming very concerned at the number of people I have spoken to who state that recruitment is tinted with racial prejudice.
Colleagues say that often interviewing panels have little knowledge of what ethnic applicants bring to the table or how their experience enhances their perspective of a subject. This is because recruitment and interviewing criteria do not accommodate their background, history, race or experience. I have witnessed panels whose members have had fewer qualifications or a less distinguished record of publications than the applicants they’re assigned to interview.
The whole process is often skewed towards whiteness and a reluctance to address diversity in a serious way. And that should concern us all irrespective of our race or culture.
If universities really want to embrace diversity in regard to their academic staff, they have to look at their existing equal opportunities and monitoring data, recruitment strategies and the way that they interview applicants. When was the last time they reviewed their interviewing and recruitment formats? When did they ask applicants (after the interview) how they felt about the process? When did an external agency, in the form of a government body, assess the quality of a university’s interviewing structure format? I suspect, for most universities, it was a very long time ago.
Publicație : The Times
Sudden v-c exits raise big question: who should run universities?
Marketisation and intense competition a key underlying factor in spate of senior departures and suspensions, experts argue
When news (finally) broke that Dominic Shellard had resigned as vice-chancellor of De Montfort University, the reaction on social media was unprecedented. The sudden exits of vice-chancellors are not normally the cue for public outpourings of relief from some staff, or a Twitter autopsy on the supposed factors behind the demise. The De Montfort case has been explosive, but it is just one in a remarkable series of abrupt senior departures and suspensions at UK universities.
Some cases may be outliers, in which particular personal or institutional factors have been key. But many in the sector identify a clear underlying explanation: government policy on funding and, even more importantly, student number controls has ended an age of stability for higher education in England (with knock-on effects in Wales). In its place, ministers and policymakers have created intense competition for students, for research funding, for top researchers; with this has come pressure to raise external finance, needed to construct the buildings that will attract those vital student numbers. In the new market, performance is exposed as never before, and the financial complexity of universities is growing; governing bodies are under increasing pressure, and their trigger fingers are twitchy.
Only a small number of the UK’s universities have been hit by crises of governance, and the vast majority can point to a record of stability. But as the body count rises, the government and regulators may become eager viewers of the unfolding drama.
Michael Shattock, whose book The Governance of British Higher Education will be published later this year, highlights “the anxiety that is clearly being shown by chairs of governing bodies”. He attributes this in part to “the rumours about the Augar review and what it may say [in bringing] future austerity”. The government’s review of post-18 education, whose panel is led by Philip Augar, is ongoing – and is expected to bring tuition fee and funding cuts.
But anxiety about the review stems from deeper roots. For his book, Professor Shattock, a visiting professor at the UCL Institute of Education and a former University of Warwick registrar, conducted research based on “large-scale interviewing” of governing body chairs. “In the old days, governing bodies wouldn’t take much notice of the latest Ucas figures on applications,” he said.
But now, with student number controls having been fully abolished in England by George Osborne in 2015, leaving some universities expanding while others lose huge chunks of their student numbers, chairs “regard recruitment as the killer risk”, Professor Shattock continued. “The question of recruitment is really getting to a significant number of governing bodies.”
Universities in Wales are also subject to this competitive pressure on student numbers, with data suggesting that many have lost students to expanding English rivals.
Aaron Porter, associate director for governance at sector agency Advance HE, agreed that “marketisation and fiercer competition means that university performance is more obviously exposed”. Governing bodies are thus “flexing their muscles a little more and taking decisive action where a university appears to have successive years of poor performance”, he added.
Gill Evans, emeritus professor of medieval theology at the University of Cambridge and expert on higher education governance, saw a key factor common to some, but by no means all, of the universities to suddenly change leadership. That is “mismanagement of the money – massive capital project overreach followed by trying to save money on staff with redundancies”, she said.
As public capital funding has dried up while competition to attract students has intensified, some universities, including De Montfort, have turned to bonds and other non-traditional ways of raising external finance. There is no evidence to suggest that such finance has been a direct factor in any of the vice-chancellorial exits – but undoubtedly, such finance adds to the complexity and pressure facing governing bodies.
There are three key elements to universities’ governance: the vice-chancellor and the executive; the governing body (a council or board of governors); and the academic board or senate (the former common to post-92 universities, the latter to pre-92s).
The Committee of University Chairs provides guidelines for governing bodies, which it revised last year. Importantly, the guidelines state that “the governing body must have a majority of external members, who are independent of the institution”.
Professor Shattock said that “more and more responsibility” is “being thrust on to these boards, and they are less and less able to cope with it”. While it is important to have external members on governing bodies, “they are not people who are familiar with what goes on in universities, for the most part”, he argued.
“I do think that the overall structure is fine, but the balance of power between the governing body and the senate or academic board has gone wrong,” Professor Shattock said.
The CUC’s revisions to its guidelines were driven by scandals over vice-chancellors’ pay, which is set by members of governing bodies who sit on remuneration committees. And if there was a case for saying that the current governance model is not up to the job, then the failure to rein in vice-chancellors’ pay, and not anticipating that this might damage public and political trust in universities, would be a big part of that case.
Whether one is a supporter or an opponent of the marketisation of higher education, it is undeniable that it has brought radical change to the way universities operate – and, arguably, governance has failed to evolve. But if a Labour government were to hold power in Westminster and replace tuition fees with a system entirely reliant on direct public funding, that would surely require another major shift in governance.
So how should governance evolve? One route ought to be “continued professionalisation”, suggested Mr Porter.
There is a debate within the CUC about the “need to pay governors to ensure that they spend more time doing it”, moving away from the “volunteer model”, he added. While paid governing body members would not be “a silver bullet”, for those universities struggling to extract the required “commitment” it “may help to professionalise the model”, he argued.
A different route – one that only has any prospect of emerging under a non-marketised system – would be to revive traditions of academic self-governance.
Matt Waddup, head of policy at the University and College Union, said that the time “has come for proper transparency in the key decisions being taken at the top table of our universities and a serious look at who is taking them”. “We need to have staff and student representatives on the major decision-making bodies if the sector is to start rebuilding trust,” Mr Waddup argued.
In 2016, the Scottish government passed legislation that ensured that chairs of university governing bodies would be elected by staff and students – and that staff and students would have guaranteed representation on governing bodies.
At Oxford and Cambridge, the only two English universities where academics and administrators still constitute the governing body, this community “has a stranglehold because it cannot be ignored by the management, and there are avenues through which its members can speak out publicly”, said Professor Evans. Extending academic democracy to other universities would mean throwing out principles about small governing bodies with external member dominance, which have ruled in higher education since they were advocated by the Cadbury Report on corporate governance in 1992, she continued.
Professor Evans said: “Which is the only community within an [institution] likely to be asking awkward questions? Academics.” But she then added, more sceptically, that “the proportion [of academics] with secure-till-retirement jobs is shrinking and the introduction of line management brings with it patronage and robber baron attitudes”.
Some would argue that the Conservative decision to turn polytechnics, latterly governed by their local authorities, into universities in 1992 ended a vital connection between regional economies and higher education.
In terms of the consequences of the spate of perceived governance crises, Professor Shattock thought the Westminster government would be unlikely to issue any sector-wide response. But “whether the Office for Students – which has got to prove itself in the public eye – is so sanguine – I’m not sure,” he added. There will be “a tendency to want to make examples where there has been some evidence of poor management”, he suggested.
The OfS has said that it is “looking into a number of regulatory matters relating to De Montfort University, following the university reporting an issue to us in the autumn”.
Meanwhile, some in government are pursuing a hostile agenda against universities and are eager to wield the ongoing post-18 review as a weapon. If a university is judged – fairly or unfairly – to have failed to run itself properly, then the political timing could not be worse.
More optimistically, this is a time when big questions are being posed about what universities are for. The civic role of universities in their towns, cities and regions must be renewed, not only to help revive the UK’s regions but to renew public support for universities, many argue. A good time, then, to ask: who runs universities?
Publicație : The Times
Grade point average misses the pass mark in the UK
Key working group no longer active and grade inflation consultation makes no mention of initiative
Efforts to introduce a grade point average system of degree classification in the UK appear to have run out of steam.
In 2015 more than 50 institutions expressed an interest in using the US-style average mark scheme alongside their existing degree classes, and the following year about 10 providers told a Higher Education Academy survey that they planned to start running GPA pilots.
However, Times Higher Education understands that the GPA Advisory Group that led these efforts, chaired by Sir Bob Burgess, former vice-chancellor of the University of Leicester, is no longer active. Meanwhile, the HEA’s successor organisation, Advance HE, said it was no longer involved in efforts to encourage uptake of GPA, which takes an average of students’ marks throughout their course to give a final score between 0 and 4.25.
A key factor appears to have been declining interest from the Westminster government. In their 2015 higher education Green Paper, ministers said that the system of firsts, 2:1s and so on was, on its own, “no longer capable of providing the recognition hardworking students deserve and the information employers require”. The government said it would “like to encourage” greater uptake of GPA and proposed that uptake of the new system should be a factor when considering teaching excellence framework assessments.
But the subsequent White Paper – the basis of the Higher Education and Research Act 2017 – made only passing reference to GPA and left it to universities to decide whether to mention it in their TEF submissions.
More broadly, concerns over degree classifications appear to have shifted away from “granularity” and towards grade inflation – a problem for which GPA is not regarded as a solution. A consultation on changes to the degree classification system by the UK Standing Committee for Quality Assessment, which was prompted by concerns over grade inflation and closed on 8 February, made no mention of GPA.
Waning government interest was clearly a blow to the GPA movement, said Matthew Andrews, university secretary and registrar at the University of Gloucestershire, who was closely involved with the introduction of GPA at Oxford Brookes University. However, it was also true that GPA did not have the capacity to fix all the problems people hoped it would, Dr Andrews said.
For example, a key question was whether first-year marks should be included in the average score or not.
“People could not come to an agreement on the rules and without the impetus to do it [from government] they just didn’t,” Dr Andrews said.
Oxford Brookes and Abertay University are thought to be among the few UK universities that provide students with a GPA alongside their degree classification.
William Hammonds, policy manager at Universities UK, said the group “keeps GPA under consideration as part of our wider discussions on grade inflation, as an alternative way of classifying degrees”. However, the work on grade inflation was “designed to protect the sustainability, integrity and comparability of the degree classification system in the UK as it is”.
“GPA comes with its own set of questions, such as which GPA system you use. There would be work to do in the UK if a case were to be made to replace the current established and well-understood model,” he said.
Publicație : The Times