Fear among teachers associated with the limits to the teaching load they can teach
The university reform aims to put an end to the temporary nature of the teaching staff, in constant increase since a decade ago limits were placed on the offers of places. The law establishes that the maximum temporary employment rate must be reduced by more than half, from the current 40% (in the UMU this percentage is even exceeded) to 20%. At UPCT, the percentages of associates and temporary staff are lower because it is a very young university. The official teaching staff, on the other hand, must rise from 51% of the workforce to 55%. The figure of substitute teacher is created to replace the permanent ones in permits or dismissals. The LOSU, as the minister insisted yesterday, intends to end job insecurity, stabilize the system and rejuvenate the workforce, since the average age of doctors is 40 years, and the stabilization age is between 45 and 46 years.
To this end, it is stated that teachers with a temporary employment contract may not exceed 20% of the teaching and research staff (PDI). The figure of the associate professor is also modified, whose teaching will now be limited to 120 hours, as well as the figure of the visiting professor, whose contract duration will be limited to two years. That limitation, the associates of the UMU fear (more than 800 out of a staff of 2,600), could endanger their permanence in the universities. “Our conditions are not good, but still many associates prefer to keep their 180-hour contracts than to be limited; the solution is more complex”, lamented yesterday one of the spokespersons for the Platform of Associates, Ana Aldaz.
The rector of the UMU, who insists on denouncing that “associates have been hired because the cuts have prevented taking places”, remarks that the conversion of these positions into stable ones goes through “financing and more financing”.
Academic career
The law designs a more stable and shorter academic career. The idea is that in 10 years a person who becomes a university professor becomes stable in the system: the candidate enters the University with a 4-year predoctoral contract to do the thesis, and once finished, he or she will be able to access one of the contracted postdoctoral through a 6-year contract. If at the end of those 10 years, the teacher has accreditation for any permanent figure, then he will become part of the system.
Joan Subirats also insists on internationalization, and the Law requires communities to establish strategies for the university system to advance in this field. It allows the visa for foreign students to be granted for the duration of the studies, not for each year as is the case now. In addition, when these students finish their degree or postgraduate course, they will have two years to be able to do internships or work in Spain. “It is a way of attracting talent,” the minister said yesterday. Also, regardless of the source of funding, all research done at public universities will be open access and free of charge.
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