Proiectul „Formarea de competente profesionale prin stagii de practica pentru studenti”, la Universitatea Tehnica din Iasi
Selectie de partener în cadrul Programului Operational Capital Uman (POCU) 2014-2020 lansat de Universitatea Tehnica (TUIASI) „Gheorghe Asachi” din Iasi.
Concret, prin Facultatea de Constructii de Masini si Management Industrial se anunta organizarea unei proceduri de selectie a unui Partener pentru încheierea unui Acord de Parteneriat, în vederea elaborarii si depunerii Cererii de finantare aferente proiectului: „Formarea de competente profesionale prin stagii de practica pentru studenti”.
Scopul principal al acestei initiative este tocmai acela de a le oferi studentilor o serie de instrumente cu ajutorul carora sa poata gasi mai usor un loc de munca in domeniul studiat.
Publicație: Bună Ziua Iași
Racism in academia has major impact on BAME staff mental health
Providing mental health support that is appropriate and culturally sensitive is a first step in addressing the racism black, Asian and ethnic minority staff endure in academia, says Jason Arday
Higher education is a battlefield and the trauma inflicted in this war of inequitable attrition can leave lasting effects that compromise and exhaust mental well-being.
While all mental health is undeniably important, a context that receives little attention is how black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) staff experience mental illness in the face of continuous racial inequality and discrimination within the academy. This takes covert and overt forms, including lower wages, being undermined by colleagues, and hiring biases.
This type of visceral violence places many academics of colour in positions of vulnerability. Often, appropriate psychological interventions are not available for staff who encounter racism in all its sustained forms, and racial micro-aggressions resemble a death by a thousand cuts, which invariably has consequences for BAME staff.
Currently, university pastoral services are inundated with staff referrals to counselling services, with occupational health services equally severely under strain. While there has been much needed focus on student mental health, concerns about the mental health of BAME staff within higher education remain in the margins. There is little acknowledgment of the racialised terrain of the academic workplace or the fact that these experiences are compounded by a sense of victimisation, marginalisation and racial discrimination.
In many cases, universities are complicit in sustaining and maintaining the discriminatory cultures that so often disadvantage BAME staff. Racial harassment, barriers to promotional opportunities and career advancement, and the dearth of BAME senior leaders within the sector are all significant factors. The relentless, daily encounter with racial discrimination is a nuanced and complex experience that requires contextual psychological interventions such as cognitive behavioural therapy, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy or eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing.
But many BAME staff with symptoms associated with mental illness have had unfavourable outcomes from mental health intervention. Often their experiences reflect an attempt to dilute the perniciousness of racism, probably, in part, because of the lack of diversity among healthcare professionals within higher education pastoral services.
Indeed, racial ascriptions and conscious or unconscious biases can emerge when healthcare professionals probe, and can lead to attempts to decentre racism as the problem. This trivialisation and deflection has huge implications for BAME staff seeking psychological help.
Likewise, the racism that they experience recounting racialised episodes to colleagues, line managers or mental health professionals can be traumatic.
To address the gaps in adequate support for BAME staff, pastoral and counselling services on offer must be culturally appropriate, where necessary, and recruitment processes for healthcare professionals within universities must require cultural sensitivity as an essential component of their skill set.
Healthcare professionals should also undertake continuing professional development that supports them in understanding various types of intersectional discrimination and how these affect minority groups more specifically within the higher education sector.
Understanding the plight of BAME staff is important for the higher education sector’s wider goal of creating greater equity for ethnic minorities.
Part of the solution is developing institutions that are culturally representative in terms of race, class, religion, gender, sexuality and ability. Pastoral services comprising ethnically diverse healthcare professionals will recognise the need to cater to a diverse university populace.
This would also contribute towards a greater understanding of the extent of racism in higher education and its debilitating and sustained effect on BAME staff.
Publicație: The Times
Many universities ‘going backwards’ on gender equality in science
Decline in female representation reported at four in 10 institutions covered by study
Many universities are struggling to make progress on the representation of women among students, staff and invited speakers, a US study suggests.
Research published in Cell Stem Cell, based on data for 541 research institutions, found that about 40 per cent of students, staff and speakers across science, technology, engineering and mathematics were female, on average.
However, while 42 of the 71 institutions (59 per cent) for which data spanning two or more years improved their female representation over this period, 29 (41 per cent) went backwards. The magnitude of the average positive and negative change was similar – 7-8 per cent.
“Our longitudinal analysis revealed no appreciable trend in gender representation changes, albeit over a short period of time and in a relatively limited subset of institutions,” write the authors, from the University of Michigan and the New York Stem Cell Foundation Research Institute (NYSCF).
They collected their data by asking researchers applying to funding from NYSCF between 2016 and 2019 to complete a report card with data on gender representation at their institution and on policies to support women in science. A significant majority (72 per cent) of institutions covered were from North America, with 18 per cent from Europe and several others from Australia; most (86 per cent) were universities.
Women represented more than half of all students, staff and invited speakers at only 103 of the 541 institutions covered (19 per cent). On average, female representation was higher at European institutions (45 per cent) versus North American ones (37 per cent).
Reflecting existing datasets, gender parity decreased as the seniority of the position considered increased. Across all institutions, women made up 57 per cent of undergraduates and 52 per cent of postgraduates.
However, they represented 42 per cent of assistant professors, 34 per cent of associate professors, and only 24 per cent of full professors.
Women were also underrepresented among external speakers (35 per cent) and in committees for staff promotion (33 per cent).
Whitney Beeler, a radiation oncologist at Michigan and a co-author of the paper, said that she had been “disappointed we didn’t find more change over time”. She cautioned that other factors may have affected the figures, especially because the sample was smaller.
“But if there had been real change and big change, we would have picked up on it and there really wasn’t over a four-year period,” she said.
The paper also shows that, at the time of report card submission, only 8 per cent of institutions required a minimum number or percentage of women on committees, just 16 per cent had general policies promoting gender diversity, and 77 per cent had no policy at all.
The findings show that “it will take an enormous amount of leadership and creativity, and persistence – not just from women but men too – to enact real change in female representation”, Dr Beeler said.
“But we know the more diversity you have in a team, the better the intelligence and the more likely you will be successful, so this is good for science, it’s good for everybody,” she said.
Publicație: The Times
Inadequate support ‘contributes to foreign students’ alienation’
Chinese students’ misunderstanding of their host society thwarts their efforts to integrate in Australia, says academic
Cursory pastoral care leaves Chinese students bewildered by the practicalities of living and studying in Australia, intensifying their estrangement from the locals that many hoped to call friends, according to an academic.
Fran Martin, reader in cultural studies at the University of Melbourne, says inadequate welfare and resettlement advice for Chinese learners, who comprise one in 10 students at the average Australian institution, leaves many “floundering”.
In an essay to be published this month by the Asia Society Australia, Dr Martin says some universities may advise freshly arrived students about navigating the health and legal systems, and about dealing with exploitative employers and landlords. But the guidance “is generally provided all at once” and usually only in English.
“At that time and in that format, it can be difficult for students to take it in. When a crisis strikes, they often find themselves unprepared,” she writes.
This leaves Chinese learners “struggling to know where to turn” in emergencies, Dr Martin told Times Higher Education.
The “linguistic and cultural gap” also affects students grappling with more mundane issues from stress to the flu. Chinese students do not necessarily know, for example, that the first port of call in Australia’s health system is not a specialist or hospital but the local doctor.
Dr Martin cited a “petty crime wave” two years ago in Melbourne. “Chinese students had their phones stolen by local youths and felt the police were ignoring them because the response was different to what they would have expected in China. On social media they were saying: ‘They don’t care about us. It’s because we’re not local. It’s because we’re not white,’” she said.
“There are hundreds of thousands of young people coming here from a completely different system and misunderstanding the Australian response to various issues. A sense of belonging or being cared for – that’s often what’s missing.”
This exacerbates the “mutual disengagement” afflicting many Australian campuses, where different groups of students practice forms of “self-segregation”. Dr Martin, who is researching the experiences of 50 Chinese students at eight Australian universities, said that this was the opposite of what the visitors had envisaged.
“I interviewed my participants before they left China. Almost with one voice they said they were looking forward to making local friends,” she said.
“After they arrived, there was a period of disillusionment. The locals were really hard to engage. They seemed polite but not warm – basically uninterested in forming deeper friendships.”
Dr Martin said that Australian academics needed guidance in building intercultural bridges. “As academics, we need to be trained in how to manage the international classroom,” she said.
Publicație: The Times
Le Campus Samsung annonce l’ouverture des candidatures pour sa prochaine promotion
L’école de développeur web Samsung Campus a ouvert ses candidatures pour sa 6e promotion qui débutera le 2 décembre 2019. Cinquante élèves seront retenus. Cette année, la formation a été enregistrée niveau III au RNCP.
Le Samsung Campus de Saint-Ouen (93) a annoncé l’ouverture des candidatures pour la prochaine promotion de son école de développeur web dont la rentrée se fera le 2 décembre prochain. Pour sa sixième année, le campus accueillera en priorité des non-bacheliers, âgés de 18 à 25 ans. Les candidats ont jusqu’au 20 octobre minuit pour postuler sur le site www.samsungcampus.fr. Cinquante étudiants seront retenus. Avant la rentrée, ils suivront une «piscine» (immersion totale dans le code, NDLR) pendant trois semaines, de façon à acquérir les bases nécessaires avant de commencer la formation, dispensée gratuitement.
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Né en septembre 2014, le Samsung Campus est «une initiative sociétale réfléchie pour répondre au chômage des jeunes», indique Florence Catel, co-fondatrice du Samsung Campus en tant que directrice de l’engagement sociétal de Samsung France. La formation se déroule sur deux ans, dont une année en alternance. «Le rythme est de trois semaines en entreprise, et une semaine au campus», explique Florence Catel.
Financée par Samsung, la formation est mise en œuvre par l’école d’information et d’innovation Epitech, dirigée par Emmanuel Carli et appartenant au groupe IONIS Education. Elle est située en France dans plus de 13 villes et sur quatre autres campus en Europe. La formation est également portée par l’association ZUP de Co, fondée par François-Afif Benthanane, qui vise à réduire les inégalités à l’école et réduire le décrochage scolaire. «Sans Samsung, la formation n’existerait pas, mais sans Epitech et Zup de Co non plus», insiste Florence Catel.
Des cours de marketing menés par l’école de commerce Essec ainsi que trois heures de cours d’anglais sont également au programme. De nombreux professionnels interviendront également auprès des jeunes pour se familiariser avec le monde de l’entreprise.
Cette année, la formation a été reconnue au titre d’intégrateur-développeur web enregistrée niveau III au Répertoire national des certifications professionnelles (RNCP), équivalent au niveau Bac+2. Depuis cinq ans, le Samsung Campus a déjà formé 230 personnes au métier d’intégrateur et développeur web, débouchant «sur un emploi rémunéré 35.000 euros bruts en moyenne», indique l’école dans un communiqué. Selon les chiffres fournis par le Samsung Campus, le taux d’employabilité des certifiés de 2016, 2017 et 2018 serait de 97%. Toutefois, Florence Catel précise que «cette formation n’est pas un vivier de recrutement pour Samsung. Nous n’embauchons pas nos étudiants, et ne les prenons pas en stage».
Publicație: Le Figaro