Fostering excellence and entrepreneurship

The University opened its academic year on a strong theme - that of fostering excellence and entrepreneurship. The Rector, Professor Juanito Camilleri, in his address at the opening ceremony of the new academic year, stated that entrepreneurship is a state of mind. It is the art and science of informed risk-taking, particularly when venturing into unknown or uncharted domains.

How can academic staff and students alike adopt this state of mind when the University is often run in a colonial-style civil service manner? It is said that once a Minister of Public Works was asked: How is it that public works labourers are always left so idle? His answer was that if they were not so it would take less than one month for the funds allocated for materials in the yearly budget, e.g. paint, tarmac etc., to be all used up.

The University is in a similar state of financing. Some Science-based departments are allowed less than Lm50 per student per year to cover the cost of the materials needed to maintain equipment, acquire chemicals and examination utilities (including the paper on which students are expected to write their exams), communications expenses, host visiting staff, cost of computers, photocopiers and all that is needed to run a modern state-of-the-art department. What room remains to take an informed risk?

The Rector also rightly said that a University experience ought to be driven by the persistent pursuit of excellence. This excellence can be achieved by applying the best effort and talent to overcome difficulties which are tough and may even seem to be insurmountable at face value. This is exactly the right attitude that the new Rector is taking. Our University has been blessed with a Rector who is not accepting that the problems found at our University are insurmountable. However he needs all possible support, not only from the University Pro-Rectors, academic, administrative and supporting staff, as well as students (the new Rector has quickly gained the full backing of the student representatives) but also of the government.

It appears that the Opposition, although not openly supporting and backing this new appointment to the University, is tacitly accepting it as a step in the right direction. Certainly it is not putting spokes in the wheels and is agreeing with the general public that education should receive the highest priority in the budget to be announced in ten days' time. The Rector is certainly going to see to it that the country will get its money's worth back from the University through the achievement of having graduates with a first class attitude.

This year over 4,000 Maltese students and over 300 overseas students joined our University for the first time. A number of departments have responded to the country's needs and started the new postgraduate courses required. These courses range from Community Studies, Planning Studies, Cultural Heritage Management, Resource Management to Pharmacy.

Some of these departments took some informed risk in starting these courses which certainly have been carefully designed to allow the postgraduate students to achieve excellence in the selected areas. The response was encouraging, with some courses having a number of applicants over three times the maximum intake permitted; this maximum permitted intake is designed to allow the course to be run at a "first class" level.

The interest and support which tertiary education enjoys among the authorities has been shown this past week by the several distinguished visitors who came to the Campus during Freshers' Week, including President Fenech Adami, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi, Opposition Leader Alfred Sant, AD chairman Harry Vassallo, Education Minister Louis Galea and Shadow Minister Carmelo Abela as well as Simon Busuttil, MEP.

It is not only the government that must do its duty towards the University. The University administration, especially Council, Senate and faculty boards, must remove bureaucracy and realise that time never stands still. The world is advancing at a fast rate, including the new EU countries in Eastern Europe, which are overcoming the problems engendered by the Communist era and are now both our partners and our competitors.

Promotions, such as those to professorships and associate professorships must also be decided without further ado. It is true that the task of making the decision is an unenviable one. However it is the duty of the present professors to see to it that other deserving lecturers are properly promoted. Relinquishing this duty completely to foreigners is only a remnant of colonialism. The result of such an attitude is what all can witness: delay of over a year

If we expect the foreigner to do all our work we are certainly mistaken and on the wrong track. Do we leave it in the hands of foreigners to appoint our President, Prime Minister and Judges? Are these positions not as important as professorial appointments? We should use external assessors in the same way as we use external examiners, that is, in an advisory role.

Their advice must be given speedily. Can you imagine what would happen if the applicants were to take a year and over to correct and publish examination results? Taking over a year to examine applications for posts of professor by these same lecturers is totally unacceptable. This is no way to retain our lecturers and to attract the "best" to our University and certainly not an example of excellence and entrepreneurship.