BarcelonaNúria Montserrat (1978) has been an ICREA research professor and leader of the Pluripotency for Organ Regeneration group at the Bioengineering Institute of Catalonia (IBEC). She has been Minister of Research and Universities for two months and receives the ARA in her office to grant her first interview in the position.
You know the Catalan university and research system from the inside because you have worked there for a long time. Two months ago, what would I have asked the counselor?
— I must say that the previous councilors had called me to speak, and we are already starting to have conversations with researchers. At the time, I probably would have asked them for a little more flexibility and also some information regarding the academic and research career in Catalonia. I probably wouldn’t have talked so much about funding, because those who know me know that I’m more about talking about scientific strategy and sustainability. I would also have asked for some ambition from them. And all this, if it could be, with prudence.
This week the students went on strike because they still don’t know the PAU models for this year. What answers them?
— We have been working in the PAU since June 12 and have held 28 of the 35 meetings with high school teachers that are held for each exam model. We followed a schedule that established, from the very beginning, that this information would be provided at the end of October. I would tell the students to calm down, because this is a job that the house has been doing for a long time. The first PAUs that were organized in this way were in 1991 and we have a very well organized structure. People have every right to express themselves. I also have children and I understand this anxiety perfectly, but above all we have always tried to convey calmness.
This is the year in which we have had the most enrollments in Catalan universities in history”
One of the things he has already promised is to continue lowering university fees. How far should we reduce them? How much should it cost to go to university?
— By 2025, we will move to a model in which degrees will have a single price and qualifying master’s degrees will have the lowest value they have had so far. We are also working on other types of aid, such as those intended for single-parent families. We are making an effort to make a drawing that allows the university classrooms to accommodate the reality we have in society. It is an issue that worries us a lot and that we want to deal with in this legislature because we believe that it is very necessary for the university to be easily accessible.
Are there many people who are left out or who do not get a scholarship to study at university?
— They are analyzing how many students have been left out and this will help us a lot in making the next schedule. We must have the numbers very clear. This is the year in which we have had the most enrollments in Catalan universities in history. These values help us a lot to draw a future that is very changing. In the next 5 or 10 years there will be more students who will enroll because families too have been heading towards this scenario for two decades.
Reaching 1% of GDP is a mandate milestone that we see as feasible but that we will not achieve in one year”
Do you see it feasible to increase the budget of your portfolio to reach the 1% set by the Law of Science?
— Reaching 1% of GDP is a mandate milestone that we see as feasible but that we will not achieve in one year. In fact, we have gone a step further because, apart from access to universities, the infrastructure of universities also needs to be renewed. That’s why the next budget will grow to 1,500 million euros.
Both you and the president of the Generalitat have said that work must be done on a new university funding model. What should it be based on?
— It must be a sustainable model with clear milestones, evaluation and monitoring of indicators of excellence in terms of research, but also in terms of transfer, teaching… We have the advantage that Catalonia has a very rich, very diverse university system, and this also suggests that we have to create an evaluation system that adapts to the uniqueness of the universities. We want to be very careful. Not all universities have the same intensity in research or transfer. We cannot evaluate them in the same way, and we can only do this by creating an evaluation system with short-term and long-term monitoring. This weighting of the evaluations will not be done only from here, it will also be put in context with the rectors of the universities.
Some researchers argue that funding should not be based so much on the number of students at each university.
— We are looking forward to the chancellors participating in this new system of evaluation by objectives and by accountability in the form of the number of publications and the impact of the publications, in the number of students, but also in the objectives of open science, policies of gender, inclusion… The university is the house of knowledge and we have a whole journey, from the knowledge that is taught in the classrooms to how this knowledge is transformed into research and how this is transferred with an impact on citizens in the form of new products. All this is what we want to evaluate, but not only we say it, Europe says it.
We cannot evaluate all universities in the same way”
In the State there are already more university students who do the master’s degree in the private sector than in the public sector. Are you worried about this increase in interest in private companies?
— Before I worry, I think we have to understand the situation and what this drawing is due to, and we also have to see what consequences it could have. If it is because this offer does not exist in the public sector or if it is because they are master’s degrees that can only be done under certain conditions that the public sector does not have.
There is one element that is clear to us: many are master’s degrees that are done online.
— The digital element enters with great force, but it is the reality we have. what should we do Should we deny the current context? Digitization is here to stay and to transform the educational model in classrooms. Students are increasingly demanding these models and the university must make this adaptation. Are we ready right now to make a 100% digital turn? no Is it a model where we want to go? no It is a model that has to coexist in a hybrid way and is already doing so.
In the creation of new universities, the Catalan system is very stable, but new and mostly private ones are proliferating in the rest of the State. Are you concerned that this increase in supply could lower the level of training in certain centers or degrees?
— This is a state competence and these are situations that take place in other autonomous communities. If there was an exodus of students we should see where they are going and what degrees they are enrolling in. For example, if there are enrollments in distance learning degrees, then we will have to see if enrollment quotas need to be reconsidered. But we have to study it very well. In Catalonia we must see this trend as an opportunity so that public and private universities can fit together and we can strengthen ourselves.
The Spanish university law states that the temporary tenure of university staff must be reduced to 8%, in part, by stabilizing the associated teaching staff. Is it feasible for Catalonia to meet this ratio?
— Yes, I see it as very possible and we will soon announce new measures.
This week the ARA explained that 300 researchers were left hanging after being attracted by the María Zambrano program. How are they managing it?
— In Catalonia we have followed up these cases with the universities. We asked them about this topic specifically and how these professors who were on scholarships have integrated, because in some universities they have indeed integrated. We have also spoken with the Ministry of Science and Universities in Madrid to share this. Now what I want is to talk to these researchers as well.
We must consolidate Catalonia’s position as a powerful innovator in a scenario a few years from now.”
When we asked him what he had asked of the ministry two months ago, the first thing he said was flexibility. There are many researchers who complain that their hands are increasingly tied when it comes to hiring. How can this be resolved?
— This flexibility will take place when we equip universities and research centers with more technical support staff based on the demand required by researchers. Flexibility is given above all by the endowment, but endowment with strategy depending on the moment of the researcher’s career. When the teaching or research researcher already has a certain track record, they may need a type of help that is not so necessary at the beginning, or vice versa. We have to give a lot of flexibility when people start up and make sure that, when people are already landed in a research center, they have a structure that supports them. This already exists. What should be done is to gift it.
One of the outstanding tasks in Catalonia is the transfer of knowledge.
— It’s one of the barriers we have, but we also have to pay attention to that. In Catalonia there has been a European indicator that has positioned the region of Catalonia and moved it from a moderate innovator to a strong innovator. We could discuss how these are made scores, because they are done by measuring many things. Now, however, what we have to do is consolidate this positioning of Catalonia as a powerful innovator in a scenario a few years from now.
Com?
— With strategy and seeing what is needed. Catalonia is powerful in many things. In green technologies, in decarbonisation, in hydrogen, in biomedicine… Technologies that are necessary, because they are already positioning us as an important point of reference in the European region. We must bet on these types of research that bear fruit and give back to society. Does this mean that we will forget other areas of research? no What we have to do is to be studying continuously, however, those who are in a very strong maturation phase, push them more and more. We can do this with budget, with strategy and, above all, by copying models that work. We must work on an effective budget model that will help us to provide this support for transfers to universities and research centers. Another element that is essential is training the transferor. Here I would say that Catalonia is slow in this. Catalonia needs to make the transferor and the entrepreneurial culture already in the classrooms, at the university.
When we talk about the transformation of the university research system, we don’t say it because it is, we say it because we are ready to do it”
What incentives do those who are part of the university sector have to transfer?
— This evaluation is now starting to be done to incorporate the capacity you have within your research to do so. Until now the transfer also lived as a bit out of the way, as if it were the last element of the value chain. We have to put the transfer in the universities from the start and in some degrees it is already done by promoting the culture of entrepreneurship. Another key element is the Catalan business sector and how they will adopt these technologies. That is why we are also working on it with the Department of Companies.
Should private companies have a role in this transfer?
— Absolutely, because, in addition to companies, we have a model of industrial doctorate programs that works perfectly. what should we do Give it better. That is, the things that work must continue to work and even better. We have very good people and Catalonia has been identified as a super strong region in the field of innovation. Emergency therapies, clean technologies, digitization, artificial intelligence, supercomputing… these are elements that are identified as the engines of European transformation and that we have them here. When we talk about the transformation of the university research system, we don’t say it because it is, we say it because we are ready to do it. Now what we have to do is accompany and above all help to create more synergies.
Source: www.ara.cat
