Electoral Commission: staff and Louvain Student General Assembly questions

My ambition is to bring this policy of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) to the forefront, and to give it a cross-cutting dimension within all our missions and each segment of the university community. UCLouvain must be recognised as an inclusive space capable of welcoming, respecting and valuing diversity, a space where it is possible to study, research and work in an enriching and satisfying environment.

One significant measure will be the appointment of a pro-rector responsible for DEI, assisted by a team and provided with resources. This person, in collaboration with the other Rectoral Council members, will be responsible for stimulating, promoting and evaluating a DEI policy embodied, among other things, by the following measures:

• make equality between men and women a reality, particularly during studies, with regard to access to PhD programmes, and throughout career progression (all profiles);
• further improve management of students with specific profiles (PEPS) by strengthening the PEPS-IN unit and linking it more closely to learning support activities;
• systematically train managers and members of recruitment and promotion committees to consider DEI criteria, and expand the training module to include combating racism and other forms of discrimination;
• making buildings accessible to people with reduced mobility and communicating this effectively;
• rapidly implement the recently signed COARA declaration, in order to better recognise and value the diversity of profiles in research;
• formulate a genuine policy for welcoming students and new recruits from abroad (particularly outside the EU) to make it a truly positive and mutually enriching experience;
• regularly highlight in the University’s news pages a country or region and the members of our community who come from there.

Continuous dialogue and a high level of understanding with the director generalre essential, in my view, as they are the only way to ensure that the necessary resources are made available to achieve the priorities we have defined together.

The first priority is certainly to take action regarding those who are overwhelmed with work, to invest in relief for teams and better support for students in difficulty, to maintain a work or study environment that ensures every individual thrives. The following actions should be financed:

• create forms of recognition beyond promotion, and career-end support;
• reduce promotion waiting times for administrative and technical staff;
• end disparities in PhD students’ operating costs;
• ensure that compulsory course materials are free of charge for scholarship holders;
• support students who have to work to pay for their studies;
• increase on a permanent basis support for dissertation supervision;
• support the reduction of of standard teaching hours via hourly paid academics;
• ensure the autonomy of the campuses in carrying out their specific projects;
• consider the benefits of using temporary teams, subcontractors or temporary staff for occupations facing recruitment shortages;
• strengthen logistical support for research.

The second priority reinforces the first, while enabling UCLouvain to fully assume its social responsibility. The following measures will have a cost:

• reinforce FSR funding for support in setting up and managing research projects, including interdisciplinary projects;
• create two research funds: a RESTART fund and a strategic opportunity fund;
• continue to expand and renovate housing stock;
• reduce the ecological footprint of the university and its members, particularly in the development of buildings (balance between renovation and/or new structures);
• optimise public transport between campuses;
• finance the implementation of the DEI policy;
• strengthen the PEPS-IN unit;
• improve reception conditions for all international students coming to UCLouvain.

Faculties, institutes, sectors, campuses...UCLouvain has never been so plural. Each of its three sectors is now involved in multicampus activities. This plurality is an asset, but it is also a challenge if we want it to be experienced by everyone as an opportunity. To meet this challenge, I believe we need to place the principle of subsidiarity at the heart of our decision-making and operational processes. By ensuring the autonomy of the university’s entities, without compromising the university’s ability to define clear and coherent objectives, the logic of subsidiarity aims to give responsibility for actions and decisions to the entities most directly concerned by them, be they faculties, institutes, sectors or the campuses themselves. Localising processes in the entities promotes administrative simplification, and should contribute to an institutional culture in which trust must play a central role. The following actions will put my vision into practice:

• evaluate, through a participatory process, the 2009 development plan that created our university’s current structure (governance, structures and their operation, sector organisation, relations between central services and the entities and between the entities themselves, the reporting line where necessary and the management of technology platforms);
• formulate genuine campus projects and ensure that campuses have the necessary resources and autonomy to implement them;
• enable each campus to promote differentiated research and teaching activities;
• streamline and simplify interactions between all campuses and central administrations, particularly for managing budgets and building maintenance work;
• provide everyone, including students, with the tools and access they need to do their jobs, and make workspaces available to everyone on all campuses.

The university’s mission is often described in terms of the triptych “education, research, service”. My view is that this way of defining university policy is no longer appropriate. Research feeds into education and vice versa. They are both part of serving the community and society. This is the specificity of university education, which must be constantly reaffirmed in close collaboration with Belgian and international universities. Once properly oriented, each student must be able to find his or her place, flourish, benefit from individualised learning support and develop as best they can the skills that will be useful to them. For me, our university must also resolutely embrace a vision of lifelong learning (FTLV), the deployment of which emanates in part from the university’s ability to react and adapt to the emerging needs of a rapidly changing society.

This ambition will require:

• giving teachers time to evolve: optimising course offerings and combating bloated curricula;
• adjusting school and university calendars as effectively as possible;
• sharing lessons learned from the “Lutter contre l’échec, repenser la relation pédagogique” (“Combating failure, rethinking the educational relationship”) project carried out on the Saint-Louis campus and translating them into concrete actions;
• adopting a strong lifelong learning policy that gradually blurs the current division between standard higher education and continuing education;
• promoting effective teaching evaluation by students;
• promoting/developing the acquisition of cross-disciplinary skills;
• enhancing the investment and the teaching skills developed by students who take on representative or mentoring roles;
• encouraging the implementation of service learning systems wherever possible and justified.

As you know, our university’s social responsibility is one of my two priorities. In order to take it on, UCLouvain must stimulate, encourage and recognise the commitment of its students, researchers and teachers. I observe that serving society is sometimes felt to be a less valued mission. I would like it to become – for those who so wish – an integral part of teaching and research programmes. This means, among other things, being able to encourage, support and value the participation of our experts in public debate, by ensuring their training and the plurality of their points of view. The same applies to strengthening innovative teaching systems, such as service learning, and transdisciplinary research programmes, built around dialogue between different disciplines and mobilising participatory methods within the framework of partnerships with economic, political and non-profit actors in society. Faced with major difficulties, our university hospitals must be firmly defended so that they can continue to fulfil their role and missions.

• Create a new advisory body, the UCLouvain Advisory Board for Social Responsibility and Sustainability, which will ensure that our institution’s synergies with its economic and social environment are strengthened, and whose mission will be to firmly link our university to the other stakeholders in transition challenges.
• Create a space dedicated to methodological support, evaluation and the promotion of inter- and transdisciplinary research, with the dual aim of promoting research that is useful to society and relevant to the scientific community.
• Develop a community of practice and a specific training offer for academic learning through serving society.
• Take active part in debates on healthcare planning committees at both federal and federation level, and on university hospital council.

In its general sense, the term transition refers to the passage from one state to another, slowly and gradually, unlike a shock. The socio-ecological transition that underpins my second priority will take full account of this temporality and will ensure that it combines respect for planetary limits with the achievement of social objectives. Setting an example must become the norm in our education programmes and research, internal operations and commitments and partnerships with civil society, in Belgium and internationally. While I am convinced that UCLouvain must be exemplary and ambitious on these issues, I am fully aware of the practical difficulties that such a policy could encounter, the dilemmas that it will inevitably raise and the inevitable differences of opinion as to the solutions to be adopted. My concern in this respect will be to favour education over shaming, accountability over regulation, encouragement over coercion, and collaboration over authoritarian injunction. We will only be able to make effective progress if we succeed in integrating these issues into a collective narrative that brings the UCLouvain community together and sets it in motion towards a horizon that each and every one of us has been able to make our own.

I would like to:

• acceleratethe Transition Plan where we deem it necessary, including in light of the conclusions of the Transition Assembly;
• pursue a process of ongoing evaluation of the plan, with a view to adapting and continuing it, and considering new and emerging challenges;
• reduce the ecological footprint of the university and its members, particularly in terms of its buildings (balance between renovation and/or new structures) and mobility between campuses;
• supportthe teaching of transition issues, the acquisition of cross-disciplinary skills and the development of cross-disciplinary research.

This is one of my main concerns, as it is closely linked to my two priorities. Under the coordination of the vice-rector for student affairs, the Student Life Administration and the Student Support Service have made several advances in this direction, in particular with the Jobs Service and the extensive assistance offered to students. Despite this, the health and more particularly the mental health of our students remains a real concern and more needs to be done.

In particular, this will require:

• increasing support for students with specific profiles and students in precarious situations, including those who work to pay for their studies;
• a clearer definition of what is meant by “compulsory course material”;
• ensuring that compulsory course material are effectively free of charge for scholarship holders;
• continuing to expand the housing stock and renovating it on all campuses, and reflecting with students on the fairest way to define access priorities;
• optimising public transport between campuses;
• guaranteeing that every student is provided with the tools, applications and access necessary for their work, including suitable IT equipment;
• guaranteeing access to high-quality meals at the lowest possible price on all campuses;
• taking into account student precarity in the consideration of academic pacing.

For me, it’s time to act and I’m committed to doing so. The time for observations and reflection is over; the community expects concrete action, and rightly so. With due consideration of the work of the Tulkens Committee and the DEI General Assembly report, proposed measures will have to be discussed with the community, particularly at the level of the recently created DEI Council. In my view, it will be essential for the adopted measures to be based on a comprehensive vision, in order to gain the support of the majority of us and to address all facets of our university life. These actions will bind the institution. The necessary resources will be devoted to them. In my view, the measures should also be extended to cover bullying and the various forms of discrimination. It will be essential to get people talking and to ensure that problem situations are dealt with quickly and transparently, while recognising the need to assume a reasonable risk.

In particular, I propose to:

• in the fight against harassment, discrimination and racism, identify and correct institutional violence where it occurs, and rethink proactive support for vulnerable groups;
• when it comes to harassment and gendered violence, work actively on prevention (training), protection (of victims, witnesses, whistle-blowers, the right of defence) and prosecution (a disciplinary committee acting in accordance with clear and verifiable procedures);
• implify and clarify the channels for lodging complaints and ensure they are monitored completely independently;
• as rector, ensure excellent coordination between the vice-rector for personnel policy and the vice-rector for student affairs, as well as with the DEI pro-rector and their respective teams.

For me, research is the very essence of a university. It is in constant interaction with education, and both serve society. The time and conditions for carrying out high-quality research must absolutely be respected, as must the freedom to carry out research. And this must be done in the same way in all three sectors, while recognising the diversity of obstacles specific to each of them. As many of you have experienced, the commitment to serving society, the institution or education activities sometimes results in a significant reduction in the time available for research. It also seems important to increase the responsiveness of research to changes in society and our university’s ability to respond to requests and seize opportunities coming from social actors. Finally, temporary scientific staff have too often been forgotten in terms of initiatives and concern, and this is no longer acceptable. My proposals are to:

• clarify the structure for supervising theses and postdoctoral fellowships and their excessively diverse status;
• continue to take determined action in training supervisors, particularly by stressing the importance of the “Integrated Leadership Training Programme” and the prevention of harassment;
• disseminate best practices regarding the accounting of supervisory duties carried out by teaching assistants;
• value the investment and teaching skills developed by teaching assistants, in particular through a “teaching development file”;
• develop a tool for monitoring the termination of theses and the reasons for such terminations;
• end unjustified disparities in the PhD student operating costs;
• propose to the Research Council the creation and endowment of two new research funds: a RESTART fund and a strategic opportunity fund;
• increasing FSR funding for support in setting up and managing research projects;
• increase administrative and/or technical support for research teams where necessary.

The development and well-being of every individual at UCLouvain is the driving force behind all the actions and successes of our university. They must therefore be the focus of all our attention. I want the institution to “care” for the people who constitute it rather than simply “cure” the problems that emerge. That’s why I will ensure that the proposed actions are part of a framework borrowed from the prevention of psychosocial risks in the workplace, taking up five levers on which we can act: work organisation, work content, working conditions, working life and interpersonal relations. I will ensure that staff and students are fully involved in this process. The very term “university community” will thus (again) have meaning. The following actions will be given priority:

• redefining the measurement of academic staff workload in such a way as to incorporate more effectively the diversity of situations and workload components, and implementing a multiyear plan to reduce it;
• developing a tool to objectify student work overload;
• increasing support for the supervision of master’s theses in all sectors on a permanent basis, using methods specific to the diversity of practices;
• encouraging widespread communication about the Charte d’équilibre des temps de vie (“Lifetime Balance Charter”) and the Convention collective de Télétravail (“Telework Collective Agreement”), as well as the dissemination/promotion of good practices aimed at “quality in-person work” and a “right to disconnect”;
• developing recognition at work by promoting a comprehensive career management policy: encouraging and supporting training, improving feedback, introducing recognition outside of promotion, etc.;
• guaranteeing that each staff member has access to the tools, applications and access necessary for their work;
• providing greater support for deans and institute presidents and all team leaders in their managerial roles, particularly in the face of the difficulties they encounter.