The author examines the extent to which university–enterprise cooperation is part of a very complex set of operations for education and economic systems. He looks at the ways in which such cooperation developed significantly in the 1980s under the impulse of national and EU programmes, which led to a whole range of institutional instruments coming into being – such as liaison centres, science parks, incubators, teaching and research staff exchange, student placement schemes, joint training programmes and continuing education centres. He further examines the extent to which the 1990s have seen a decrease in this type of partnership and lists possible reasons from the point of view of both universities and enterprises. Finally, the author provides various scenarios for the future and argues that universities will need to review the basis of their organization and redefine their own mission and partnership with enterprises.
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References
1.
Tempered by the knowledge that in fact worldwide scientific output, as measured by publications output, increased steadily during pp. 1981–91, but then dipped in 1992 and 1993 back to the level achieved in 1987 (cf The European Report on Science and Technology Indicators 1994, European Commission, EUR 15897, October 1994.
2.
Accomplishing Europe Through Education and Training (English version), Report by the Study Group on Education and Training, European Commission, DG XXII, December 1996.
3.
In Germany, student numbers have increased by 80% since 1977, budgets by 10%, and staffing by 6%; in the UK over the last 25 years, the number of students in higher education has almost trebled, with the result that over 1.6 million were enrolled on higher education courses by 1995/96.
4.
The Commission published in October 1996 its First Report on Economic and Social Cohesion (ISBN 92-827-8877-6, 1996), which sets out a full account of how EU structural policies have contributed to human resource investment over the last three years (1994–96). Nearly one-third of the Structural Funds is spent on strengthening education and training systems, both mainstream and in research and development. Economically, the net result has been an impressive catch-up by poorer countries of the Union, with income per head increasing from 66% to 74% of the Community average. Improving the skills level and flexibility of people has been crucial in this process. Some examples: 22 000 new training places in Greece; overhauls of the apprenticeships system in Portugal and Ireland, with, respectively, 12% and 50% of the students in post-compulsory secondary education getting support; and support for continuing training systems in Spain and Ireland, putting them on a more structured and progressive footing, especially as regards certification of skills.
5.
The European Commission's Green Paper on Innovation, COM(95) 688, considers the placement of graduates in companies for the purpose of technology-related business research and development (as also in the UK Teaching Company Scheme, for example) to be one of the most prevalent and effective forms of university—industry collaboration.
6.
One pernicious effect of this has been the emergence of a whole array of small and rather unstable consultancy and HRD companies — often staffed by those who lost their jobs in the restructuring! — which have taken a whole lot of activity in the grey area between university and industry (eg to help access EU schemes; to develop continuing training; to improve technology-based delivery; to provide information and guidance).
7.
An amusing but disconcerting article about German higher education (Josef Joffe, Spiegel Special, No 11, 1996) argues that the four key stakeholders in higher education — the parents, the students, the professors, the politicians — are all engaged in a conspiracy of silence to ensure that nothing ever changes: the status quo is best for maintaining the peace. However, reform plans announced by the Education Ministers in late 1996 (cf Times Higher Education Supplement, 13 December 1996) include greater autonomy in financial management (including performance-related pay) and in teacher and student recruitment.
8.
The use of governing bodies to set and monitor distinct missions and strategies (a major role of the Boards of private companies) using powerful industrial members has not been much in evidence (perhaps slightly more so in Scotland). Change has as a result often relied heavily on the personality and ambitions of the vice-chancellor.’ (Draft working paper by the Council for Industry and Higher Education for the Dearing Enquiry, September 1996.)
9.
Sources inform me that the institutional contracts now presented under the new ERASMUS Programme rarely even include a university—enterprise dimension.
10.
The Commission's recent work on a Green Paper on Innovation throws up the case of the creation in North-Rhine-Westphalia of CAESAR, a specialized advanced European studies centre which has been established specifically as a private institute living from an initial financial endowment. Part of the thinking here is precisely to avoid giving tenure to researchers ('flexibility’ at work).
11.
Interestingly, the Commission's Study Group on Education and Training (para 188) identifies the training of heads of educational institutions as an important factor in making education systems more dynamic (and calls for innovative companies to play a role in such training), but has in mind the heads of primary and secondary schools only.
12.
Working Paper for DGV High-level Experts' Group on the Information Society by Mark Hepworth Associates, 28 May 1996.
13.
Ibid.
14.
A World Bank project to create a virtual university for Africa is reported to be having enormous difficulties in recruiting academics to construct the new technology-based curriculum since the groundrules (eg one course hour = transmission of 1 or 2 concepts) run counter to traditional practice.
15.
When a new EU Directive requiring a form of quality certification for all companies working in meat processing came to the fore, no-one in Denmark doubted for a moment that the country's higher vocational training system must design the required training and offer it free to companies, all of which were now required, in order to stay in business, to comply with the new Directive. Such a situation would not be credible in the USA or the UK.
16.
The ‘territorial pacts' being devised as part of President Santer's European Confidence Pact for Employment are a recent example of this approach.
17.
Cf the example of a small ‘Objective 1’ area in the UK — Merseyside, where the two large local universities are full partners in Structural Fund financed small enterprise support.
18.
The Council for Industry and Higher Education, A Learning Nation: Submission to the National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education, CIHE, London, November 1996.
19.
In relation to publishing, the STM (scientific, technical, medical) sector is already identified as the best candidate for totally paperless publication.
20.
Examples are provided by some of the Lotus Notes based systems being developed by IBM in relation to distance-teaching systems.
