On May 6, Manuel Castells published a provocative article on these pages, a stimulus for this one, on teaching and research at the university.
I agree with Castells that teaching is the primary responsibility of higher education institutions. For very good reasons that I will not dwell on now, the prescription has also been imposed that research must also be an essential part of the work of the higher education sector that we call university, and that it identifies with the entities that in the repertoire of its training activities include that of doctors, the qualifying title for research.
Universities are teachers and researchers. The rest of the higher education institutions are basically teachers. In the world, the proportion of higher education covered by universities varies greatly from country to country.
In Spain, in the period 1975-2000, two clearly beneficial phenomena occurred. One was the absorption of a large volume of new students by new and old universities, which thus became the dominant institution in higher education.
The other was the joint, by J.M. Maravall and J. Rojo, of powerful policies aimed at making universities effectively researchers. Some policies that are at the root of the great leap in research that Spain has taken.
But now we are faced with a delicate situation. Populations with more and more free time and economies that require permanent recycling are creating higher education teaching needs that are increasing at a rapid and sustained rate. Given this growing centrality of training throughout life, many of us, including our political authorities, think that universities are optimally equipped to lead the massive training programs that will be required.
However, the research effort has led to the establishment by organic law of the requirement that not only the university as a whole be a teacher and a researcher, but also each and every one of the members of its permanent teaching staff.
The result has been a boon for research, but one that is more quantitative than qualitative. It does not compensate, in my opinion, for the difficulty that it will create for the exercise of the new teaching responsibilities. How can universities be the protagonists of the new teaching with a teaching staff that, in contrast to secondary schools, has to dedicate part of their working time to research?
Its cost is going to be a very limiting factor. The consequence will be that either we will not generate enough training or the universities will not be the protagonists. Certainly not the public ones.
In conclusion: if, as I believe desirable, the universities adopt a leading responsibility in covering the teaching needs of higher education, including professional and continuing training, then the universities must incorporate 100% teaching profiles into their stable teaching staff. All universities would be teachers and researchers –and promoters of innovation–, but all of them would also have, in varying proportions, teaching staff and teaching and research staff.
