In an interview with The Sunday Times of Malta earlier this month, University rector Alfred Vella made a powerful plea for more doctoral research to be carried out. He ensured he conveyed one crucial message: research benefits those conducting it, society at large and the University itself.
At the same time, he was honest about the deterrents for prospective researchers: the opportunity cost when you balance what you could be earning against what you have to pay to do a PhD in the first place; the scant facilities available – such as libraries; and the lack of academics who take on doctoral students.
Likewise, he was also honest about the amount of money that the University has to spend, calling the budget “extremely modest” in his vision entitled Forging Ahead Beyond 2016.
There is no way to get around it: it is primarily about money. Prof. Vella pointed out the University requires €150 million to get its research infrastructure up to scratch. Where will this money come from?
This extends the argument beyond the need for more research to a more fundamental one about the University itself, its financing and its autonomy.
Although there are already proposals to look at its financing, the arguments raised by the rector go well beyond – incentives for alumni to make endowments, the weighting given to research when assessing academics for promotion and even the links between the University and vocational training.
He argued that there was an imbalance between the amount spent on science, engineering, medicine and architecture and expenditure in the case of less ‘sexy’ subjects like agriculture.
As he noted, the researcher ultimately gains from his/her experience doing a PhD, because the skills learned go well beyond the linear, inculcating a scientific approach to problem-solving, teamwork and communication. These skills benefit society and Prof. Vella went so far as to point out that if society’s leaders had PhDs that there would be a quantum leap in outcomes. Doing so is not a mission impossible per se, though, of course, a lot of planning and foresight would be required.
More research is also what sets one university apart from another and serves as a magnet for interested scholars. Prof. Vella summed it up by saying that a training school disseminates knowledge while a university – through its research – creates new knowledge.
Therefore, for society to progress, whether in medicine or robotics, pharmaceuticals or economics, there must be new ideas, new approaches and, to get there, you will need people to come up with concepts and to challenge assumptions. You will also need a predisposition to encourage and incentivise any good ideas rather than dampen enthusiasm.
This is not an easy task and it is perhaps why so few of the academics at the University take on doctoral students. Prof. Vella wants to double the current ratio of doctoral students to staff from 0.55 – within the next five years – and even then it will lag more established research-intensive universities where the ratio is 1.3.
It will not be an easy ride for Prof. Vella to meet his target and he will need all the help he can get from all.
Sir Francis Bacon had said that knowledge itself is power. Imagine, then, how much more powerful new knowledge could be.