Butlletí

A bimonthly publication of AQU Catalunya

70

January 2014

EDITORIAL

Common position of the AQU Board of Management regarding CORA Report

The Board of Management of AQU Catalunya expresses its total disagreement with proposal measure 1.07.004, together with its specific objectives, proposed by the Commission on the Reform of Public Administration (CORA report, November 2013), for the reasons set out below.

With regard to the objective defined in the CORA report that proposes the setting up of a "national (state) strategy in higher education quality assurance for the assessment of contract teaching staff and university degree programmes and awards", the Board of Management of AQU Catalunya believes that:

This represents a regression in autonomy for the universities as regards university degrees in that the aim of the measure is supposedly to avoid significant differences in the characteristics of any one degree entered in the Spanish Register of Higher Education Institutions, Faculties and Degrees (RUCT), regardless of the Autonomous Community (region) in which the degree is delivered. This intention contradicts the philosophy of the EHEA, as well as Spanish legislation, which places on the universities themselves the responsibility of producing degree curricula. The measure would appear to revert back to the pre-listed catalogue, and it would limit the universities as regards the possibility of their delivering courses and programmes that make best use of their innovative capability and that are capable of adapting to a demanding environment that is in constant transformation, at both local and international level, and on equal terms, like all other European universities.

AQU NEWS

• Meeting of the Quality Assurance Commission30.12.2013
• Results of the june-july 2013 call for the assessment of research work by teaching staff27.12.2013
• 2014 deadlines for the assessment of tenure-track lecturers27.12.2013
• Training for experts in programme review20.12.2013
• Launching of IMPALA project02.12.2013
• AQU Catalunya at the 8th European Quality Assurance Forum (EQAF)28.11.2013
• Meeting of the ISLAH project in Barcelona19.11.2013
• Revised assessment criteria for tenure-track lecturers in Life Sciences12.11.2013
• Head of AQU Catalunya's Quality Assessment department intervewed by UOC11.11.2013
• Josep Grifoll, new Vice-President of ENQA04.11.2013

ARTICLES

• Start of the fifth survey on the labour market outcomes/destinations of graduates from Catalan universities
  Knowledge generation is one of the strategic areas for the activities of AQU Catalunya. The mission of the Agency is to make headway in new scenarios that present themselves and play a dynamic role in the quality assurance and enhancement of the Catalan university system, which means providing relevant information on the running and functioning of the university system and thereby contribute to the successful fulfilment of each university's strategic vision.
  Editorial board - AQU Catalunya
• Activities in 2014
  Approval for the Agency's Action Plan for 2014 was given on 17 December 2013 by the Board of Management of AQU Catalunya, the drawing up of which was not easy as the current scenario calls for extreme caution when taking on any new activities that imply an associated economic cost. This however did not prevent the Agency from being more daring and innovative in all of the other activities in which resources were freed up or, at the same time, from focusing on matters that provide increasing added value to the Catalan university system.
  Editorial board - AQU Catalunya

OPINION

• The Catalan university system (CUS) and the challenge of the internationalisation of higher education
  

  Sebastián Rodríguez Espinar
  Professor Emeritus, University of Barcelona (UB), and advisor on innovation and development in quality assurance to AQU Catalunya

  There is no doubt that the process of globalisation is affecting, and will increasingly affect, university systems around the world. The internationalisation of higher education, which began with arguments of cooperation and aid to developing countries (fellowship programmes), has turned into a multi-million dollar business in which competition is becoming increasingly refined in order to "win customers": action plans at national level (e.g. Australia and Canada), strategic alliances between HEIs and programmes for "multiple exchanges of goods and services" between countries all rule the day. As various experts, concerned about allegations of fraud in relation to the award of "international" degrees (e.g. double degrees) have pointed out, and to paraphrase the words of Philip Altbach, director of the Center for Higher Education at Boston College, a certain "chaos" has become evident in the world university system.

AQU RECOMMENDS

• ENQA has a new redesigned website
• Fifth survey of the labour market outcomes