{"id":72311,"date":"2017-06-13T14:15:00","date_gmt":"2017-06-13T12:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/2017\/06\/13\/allocatie-allocatie-allocatie\/"},"modified":"2025-12-19T11:22:48","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T10:22:48","slug":"allocatie-allocatie-allocatie-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.erasmusmagazine.nl\/en\/2017\/06\/13\/allocatie-allocatie-allocatie-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Allocation, allocation, allocation"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The last two meetings between this year\u2019s University Council and the Executive Board will take place this month. The Council has achieved a great deal recently, often in very good cooperation with the Executive Board. This Council will use these final two Consultation Meetings with the Board to add to our list of accomplishments for the academic community at large. That also means that the Council will continue to challenge the Executive Board on the university\u2019s current allocation model.<\/p>\n

Let me give you a couple of examples of the Council\u2019s recent achievements. The \u2018Return after Pregnancy\u2019 policy is now accessible to (many) more new mothers among our university\u2019s academic staff. The University Council has developed a platform (Students4Students) that funds projects designed by students themselves to enrich, both personally and professionally, their time at EUR.<\/p>\n

Moreover, the University Council continues to facilitate and empower Faculty Councils and Programme Committees \u00a0in light of the new Higher Education Act. And, together with EUROPA and the Councils of\u00a0 the university\u2019s support services, the University Council has initiated a study to unpack and solve the problem of work pressure at our university. This study is currently being set up within four faculties and support services.<\/p>\n

Proud<\/h3>

These are all initiatives that this Council can rightly be proud of. They enable more equality, sustainability as well as better participation of the academic community in decision-making at EUR. And in all these initiatives we worked very well with the Executive Board. So it is all the more disappointing that the University Council and the Executive Board (continue to) disagree strongly with each other about the direction of a key issue: the University Allocation Model.<\/p>\n

During the academic year 2014-2015, the University Council asked the Executive Board to evaluate and revise this financial allocation model, which details how government funding to our university is distributed across the different faculties and services.<\/p>\n

Inequality<\/h3>\n\t
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\n\t\tThe model stimulates \u2018efficiency-thinking\u2019, as the money a faculty receives increases proportionally with the number of students that graduate in that faculty.\n\t<\/blockquote>\n\n\t<\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n

Back in 2014, and still in 2017, the University Council argued that Erasmus University\u2019s existing allocation model gives rise to financial and political inequality between the large and small faculties (and degrees). The model stimulates so-called \u2018efficiency-thinking\u2019, as the money a faculty receives increases proportionally with the number of students that graduate in that faculty.<\/p>\n

Consequently, small(er) faculties and degree schemes are vulnerable and restricted in their future and development because they do not \u201cyield\u201d as many student (as quickly). That is why the University Council was happy to \u00a0support the Executive Board\u2019s 2015 proposal to hire an external party to investigate avenues for altering the existing allocation model.<\/p>\n

However, the actual investigation, the preliminary outcomes of which were presented recently, \u00a0has two central limitations. Firstly, it proposes only a \u2018(cosmetic) update to; rather than a \u2018fundamental alteration of\u2019 the existing model. And secondly, it considers deans and faculty directors\u2014who do not believe that the model needs fundamental changing\u2014as key, if not only, \u2018stakeholders\u2019 in revising the allocation model. Faculty Councils and Programme Committees, to mention two key representative bodies, were not consulted at all.<\/p>\n

The University Council has raised concerns about these two fundamental flaws in the investigation on several occasions.<\/p>\n

Bound by a predefined consensus<\/h3>

The limited scope of the actual investigation and the remarkable use of the term \u2018stakeholder\u2019, have negatively constrained the actual investigation itself. For example, meetings that were held with faculty directors of education and research as well as pressure cooker\u00a0<\/em>sessions<\/em> that were organized with faculty controllers\u00a0<\/em>were bound by the predefined consensus (among Deans) that the basic principles of the allocation model were not up for discussion.<\/p>\n

And so these \u2018stakeholders\u2019 decided that a concrete alternative to the current allocation of funds, an alternative proposed by the University Council because of its potential to reduce inequity between large and small faculties, did not need to be considered.<\/p>\n

Status quo<\/h3>\n\t
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\n\t\tGo back to the interests of the academic community, or at least to the participatory bodies elected to represent them\n\t<\/blockquote>\n\n\t<\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n

The University Council cannot accept that, effectively, Faculty managers \u00a0can decide that maintaining the status quo<\/em>\u00a0serves the interests of the academic community at Erasmus University. In its last few months, this University Council wants to remind the Executive Board and Board of Deans who the real \u2018stakeholders\u2019 of this university are: its academic community of staff and students.<\/p>\n

The Council\u2019s message in our last two meetings with the Board is clear: Go back to the interests of the academic community, or at least to the participatory bodies elected to represent them \u00a0Let them participate in deciding<\/em>\u00a0as to which allocation model(s) will turn EUR into a fair, equal and sustainable university for all<\/em> its stakeholders.<\/p>\n

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