Strategies and phases of shaping governance structures in European Universities' alliances

Abstract

French President Macron in his speech of 2017 presenting his vision of Europe beyond 2024 initiated a process of creating pilot initiative of European Universities. The main idea is to create international, inter-institutional powerful universities which would create new quality in world's education and science. In two calls European Commission selected 41 alliances of 280 leading European universities. Each of consortia is supported by €5 million from Erasmus + programme and €2 million from Horizon 2020. During three years of the Alliances will build virtual campuses and will start joint education, initiate first steps in research and innovation together. Each of the consortia defined their areas of interest in education, tools supporting education process, mobility and integration of students, academic and administrative staff of partner institutions. Awarded Alliances had to present their vision for the period of project realization and for three years after projects' completion. Co-teaching by several institutions seems to be a feasible, still difficult task. The real challenge, however, is to build effective governance structures for a virtual campus made up of the existing resources and structures of several large universities. A virtual university is to carry out in the future the same tasks as a full-time university in the field of student recruitment, service and education, research, development, innovation and perhaps investment. An additional factor here will certainly be different academic and managerial traditions, different management models of partner universities, different legal models, language and cultural issues, various administrative tools and many others. An extremely important issue will be the scope of the legal and financial autonomy of the new virtual university. This article presents an overview of the philosophy and methodology of shaping governance strategies of pilot European Universities, with particular emphasis on the EURECA-PRO project. Paper presents proposed and tested structures' schemes, entities, groups of stakeholders, relations with mother-institutions on predicted phases of European University campus construction process.

Full text

STRATEGIES AND PHASES OF SHAPING GOVERNANCE
STRUCTURES IN EUROPEAN UNIVERSITIES’ ALLIANCES
Marcin Górski, Anna Waligóra
Silesian University of Technology (POLAND)
Abstract
French President Macron in his speech of 2017 presenting his vision of Europe beyond 2024 initiated a
process of creating pilot initiative of European Universities. The main idea is to create international, inter-
institutional powerful universities which would create new quality in world’s education and science. In
two calls European Commission selected 41 alliances of 280 leading European universities. Each of
consortia is supported by €5 million from Erasmus + programme and €2 million from Horizon 2020.
During three years of the Alliances will build virtual campuses and will start joint education, initiate first
steps in research and innovation together.
Each of the consortia defined their areas of interest in education, tools supporting education process,
mobility and integration of students, academic and administrative staff of partner institutions. Awarded
Alliances had to present their vision for the period of project realization and for three years after projects’
completion.
Co-teaching by several institutions seems to be a feasible, still difficult task. The real challenge,
however, is to build effective governance structures for a virtual campus made up of the existing
resources and structures of several large universities. A virtual university is to carry out in the future the
same tasks as a full-time university in the field of student recruitment, service and education, research,
development, innovation and perhaps investment.
An additional factor here will certainly be different academic and managerial traditions, different
management models of partner universities, different legal models, language and cultural issues,
various administrative tools and many others.
An extremely important issue will be the scope of the legal and financial autonomy of the new virtual
university.
This article presents an overview of the philosophy and methodology of shaping governance strategies
of pilot European Universities, with particular emphasis on the EURECA-PRO project. Paper presents
proposed and tested structures’ schemes, entities, groups of stakeholders, relations with mother-
institutions on predicted phases of European University campus construction process.
Keywords: European University, Erasmus +, higher education, project, EURECA-PRO.
1 INTRODUCTION
Since the beginning of year 2021 the European Universities are a fact. The idea sketched 4 years earlier
by president Macron in his speech in Sorbonne while presenting the vision of Europe beyond 2024 [1]
had materialised in form of 41 European Universities. European University Initiative founded in
Erasmus + scheme [2] in two calls chosen strongest and most promising consortia of European leading
universities to pilot projects. This nuance is of greatest importance here – pilot projects, not real
universities. Founders did not provide any guidance how those created in projects virtual international
and inter-institutional campuses should be governed, which governance model should they follow, which
organs should be set. There is no other expressed expectation, then the hope that projects will find their
way and inspire European authorities to form governance model of those new, very complex Higher
Education Institutions (HEI). During many meetings and conferences representatives of European Union
institutions underline that European University Initiative is an experiment were instead of traditional
methods out-of-the-box approach is expected and highly recommended. Indeed, there are no
precedencies in the history of education in creation sustainable, effective international universities,
funded on the base of individual and impactful themselves universities. It is also expected, that the
effectiveness of new pan-European would be as high that should pave the road for future Europe as
world leader in education, science and innovations. It is then very ambitious task itself. It becomes even
more ambitions when we realize the how different are the individual HEIs associated in European
University consortia and in how much different situation they are. Just to say, prepared by European
Proceedings of EDULEARN21 Conference
5th-6th July 2021
ISBN: 978-84-09-31267-2
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University Association (EUA) report on University Autonomy in Europe analyses 29 EU countries and
the situation of universities in context of their autonomy, which in fact is strictly linked with governance
model. Aspects taken into consideration as for example:
- organisational autonomy and governance models,
- financial autonomy, staffing autonomy (including freedom and methods of recruitment, salaries
level, possibilities of dismissal and promotion of the staff),
- students’ number, admission mechanisms,
- possibility of shaping own content of studies,
- capacity of choosing the language of studies
- and many others,
shows the complexity of the challenge faced by European University consortia [3]. Nevertheless, those
mentioned above indicators are not the only to be taken into consideration. Some of the other ones
seem to be obvious, as the profile of the university:
- comprehensive universities,
- universities of technology,
- universities of applied sciences,
- art schools,
- industry-branch-linked High Schools,
- and others – specific types in each of the countries.
European University consortia are puzzled from various types of universities, in unique, individual way.
Some other factors are not easy to see on the first sight, but the first year of projects’ realisation shows
clearly, that they are affected by:
- form of ownership of the HEI: state university, private university,
- size of university, in this number also the budget of the university,
- infrastructure (teaching, research, digital, etc.),
- structure of HEI,
- bureaucracy level,
- academic tradition,
- study fee,
- implemented long-term strategy,
- history and the position of the university in regional, national, international scales,
- openness of the society,
- national policies on regulation of professions,
- level of governmental support,
- level of regional authorities’ support,
- involvement of educational and scientific organisations,
- political, economic and social situations in the country of university location.
- others.
The realisation of EU projects shows also that governance model is affected also seriously by the
number of universities creating the alliance, their will or lack of will for deeper integration after the project
and the personal attitudes and relations of project staff.
It has to be underlined also, that the initial phase of European University projects’ realisation had been
seriously affected by COVID-19 pandemic. Pandemic shown however “that deeper cooperation across
borders, disciplines and cultures is the only way to recover from the crisis and build resilience” [4].
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Facing all listed above facts, the European Universities consortia shape their virtual campuses and set
governance structures. The paper pictures this process, with special attention to original solutions of
EURECA-PRO project [5], referring it also to types of governance structures in European HEIs.
2 GOVERNANCE STRUCTURES MODELS
Despite of the uniqueness and complexity of the situation of each HEI, theorists on governance in HE
classifies governance models in general groups:
• The state-centered model, which characterizes hierarchy, limited autonomy, regulation,
bureaucracy, central management, strict formal control. In Europe this model, in different however
forms exists in France, Poland, Portugal or Spain;
• The self-rule mode with decentralized collegial organization. In Europe present in Germany and UK;
• The market-oriented model, [6].
Another type of classification divides university governance in two main groups:
- Unitary governance structures,
- Dual governance structures,
a) Traditional dual governance structures,
b) Asymmetric dual governance structures, [3], [7].
2.1 Governance models in European HEIs
In Europe there are all listed above models represented. There is no dominant model, the contrary, all
of the models are represented in similar scale.
Figure 1. Governance structures models in Europe [3].
2.2 Governance models in European University projects
Consortia of the first call of the European University Initiative started the realisation of projects between
June 2019 and January 2020. Wining consortia of the second call started the realisation at the end of
2020. At this phase most of the European Universities consortia concerned on the current realisation of
the project, also in terms of establishing governance structure of the project. The realisation had crashed
with the COVID-19 pandemic, so in majority of the cases projects had been significantly delayed. Almost
all of the projects decided to set the governing entities only within the project, taking typical for project
management central-structure solutions, as for example (in various projects under different names):
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- Project Management Board/Governing Board,
- Lead Coordinator/Secretary General,
- Steering Committee,
- General Assembly,
- WP Leaders.
Almost all of consortia established also the Board of Rectors, but with various profiles, sometimes as
organs with real power, in other cases as prestigious, supporting and representative body.
Many of the alliances created also central units supporting the realization of projects’ aims, units also
know from typical project management methods:
- Dissemination Team,
- Communication Task Force.
Specificity of the project, directed to set up common educational and in the future – scientific facilities
driven the alliances to establishing special bodies as:
- Education Council,
- Research Council/Research Task Force,
- Innovation Council,
- Languages Center.
Some of the projects decided to involve additional bodies, involving other important stakeholders and
beneficiaries of the project as:
- Student-Centred Co-Creation Group/Students’ Council,
- External Advisory Board/Council [8].
It has to be bolded, that despite the name of the EC initiative using term “European University”, in fact,
the newly-created alliances act as large international educational projects. Thus, majority of the alliances
treats this phase as project, consequently building the managing structure due to project management
tools, where project’s implementation, goals and deliverables shape the daily schedule and operability.
Figure 2 presents well the governance structure for the project phase.
Figure 2. Visual representation of EU alliances’ governance structure [9].
The European University project shall last 3 years and it is expected to last at least 4 years after its
termination. The post-project phase it is expected to be designed during the project. Therefore, each of
the European University alliance conducts the studies on various aspects, mainly legal and financial
issues to find best governance structure model for expected new international, intercampus, multilingual,
self-sustaining HEI of new type.
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Majority of the projects take into consideration only this relatively close time horizon, building the future
solution in daily practice and collaboration with partners.
There are however individual examples of European Universities projects which plan already log-term
vision. One of interesting examples is Una Europa project which funded the Una Europa Association.
The Association is based in Brussels and was created to ensure the success and sustainability of the
alliance. It is responsible for:
• pursuing integrated cooperation between its university partners in high-quality education
research, and services to society,
• creating a culture of excellence in education and research and fostering best practices,
• contributing to the development of the European Higher Education Area and the European
Research Area [10].
This Association is already the legal representation of the entity, which may be treat as future funding
and governing body of future united University. The Association is governed by the General Assembly,
which consists of the eight partner universities and eight university-related members represented by
their Rectors or Presidents. The General Assembly is the highest decision-making body for Una Europa.
Another governing entity is the Board of Directors, that consists of the eight partners’ Vice-Rectors and
is responsible for the management oversight of Una Europa. The board appoints its own President,
Treasurer and Secretary-General.
The Executive Committee is responsible for the management of the 1Europe project. The members of
the Executive Committee are the same as the Board of Directors, in order to ensure synergies between
management of the three-year project and the longer-term goals of Una Europa [10].
2.3 Governance models in EURECA-PRO University
Another interesting and unique approach for building a long-term sustainable governance structures is
EURECA-PRO project. EURECA-PRO short-term vision covers the years 2020 to 2023 and is endowed
with concrete, project-based actions (Figure 3). The Alliance looks however dearly forward, not only till
2027, but way further – beyond 2040.
The Alliance defines four critical milestones since the beginning of the project realisation until the
establishment of fully self-sustaining European University. Realisation of each of the phases should be
supported by individually designed governance structures models permitting smooth transition from full
dependence on the founding universities to independence within a specific framework.
This evolving, guarantying long-term sustainability of the consortium, Governance System is based on four
stages:
• Phase I. Foundation of EU Virtual Faculties, 2020-23, (Figure 3),
Figure 3. EURECA-PRO project – governance Phase I, 2020-23.
EU-FAC – European University Faculty; MUL, TU BAF, SUT, UP, ULE, HSMW, TUC – funding universities [11].
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Consortium created Project Management Board, supported by the Board of Rectors and External
Advisory Board, created by representatives of external stakeholders (enterprises, NGOs,
authorities, etc.). Main entities for project implementation are Education Council supported by the
Research Task Force and Student Centred Co-Creation group. An important role in the phase of
the project realisation plays the Communication Task Force. Funding Universities create virtual
faculties. The structure in the project phase was thought as the base for further development to
enhance their transformation in the future to the final shape.
• Phase II. Introduction of Virtual Administration, 2024-30, (Figure 4),
The second phase if meant as initial post-project stage of the cooperation EURECA-PRO
partners. On this stage it will be required to set self-sealing virtual administrative units responsible
for management, finances, recruitment of Governance is additionally supported by a Transversal
Skills Council that ensures the integration of these skills is minded all along the way. The Project
Management Board will be replaced by an Implementation Management Board.
Figure 4. EURECA-PRO project – governance Phase II, 2024-30 [11].
• Phase III. Deep Demonstration of Structures, 2031-40, (Figure 5),
Figure 5. EURECA-PRO project – governance Phase III, 2024-40 [11].
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The Phase III is meant as the period of creation of stable and self-sustainable virtual
administration and Student Services. The Implementation Management Board will be replaced by
the Supervisory Board, which indicates that the real governing entity shall be set independently
by EURECA-PRO university electing its own Rector and running its own policy in terms of
financing, infrastructure, students’ admission, etc.
• Phase IV. Beyond 2040, (Figure 6).
In final - Phase IV establish self-sustaining virtual European University with its own Joint Council
and Executive Board of Deans and Directors, still linked with founding member HEIs through the
Governing Board of Rectors. This concept bases on the organic integration of founding
Universities with EURECA-PRO Virtual Campus.
Figure 6. EURECA-PRO project – governance Phase IV, beyond 2040 [11].
3 CONCLUSIONS
41 European University alliances created between 2020 and 2021 are expected to be pilot plants for
new standards in European Higher Education. More, it is expected, and loudly expressed, that they
should be a shifting point in Higher Education in global dimension, allowing Europe to play the first fiddle
in education, science and innovation. This, indeed, ambitious goal shall be achieved by 260 universities
from all EU state members, representing all types of universities, all academic traditions and unique
governance structures and managerial traditions, functioning in different legal frames, financing
schemes and national – social, economic and political realities. The situation became even more
complex with COVID-19 pandemic.
The paper refers dominant governance models in Europe and focuses on the governance strategies in
European University alliances. This task is uneasy as most of the projects do not reveal openly their
policy, thus the material is limited. Thanks to still very few elaborations on this issue and many meetings
of the Authors of the paper with representatives of several projects it may be stated, that majority of the
alliances established the governing entities for the phase of project realisation, on the daily bases,
treating them as large international educational projects. Governance structure in most of the cases is
supported by the bodies created by the students by stakeholders, including internal as students and
scientists and also external recruited from associated institutions.
All of the alliances analyse organisational, legal and other obstacles but also study financial
opportunities to create self-sustainable Virtual Campus in the post-project phase. It is worth to bold here,
that European Commission demands 4 years period of the continuation of the alliances’ collaboration
after project’s termination. As the projects started recently, there is no clear vision and loudly expressed
declarations or plans showing the path of the financial and legal enhancement by EC after 2023 when
all projects will end. The is also the reason why the alliances do not plan long-term vision of the European
University development beyond this caesura, concentrating on very complex and demanding realisation
of their projects.
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There are however examples of projects which shape such long-term visions. One of interesting
examples referred in this paper is Una Europa project, which created an Association of project partners,
which is a base for the future central structure of Una Europa European University.
The second interesting example presented in the paper is EURECA-PRO project which prepared unique
path of evolution from the project to virtual university. The roadmap of EURECA-PRO development is
planned in 4 stages: project phase – 2020-23, post-project phase – 2024-30 with established
independent administration, deep-demonstration phase – 2030-40 with own governance structure and
supervising role of the partner universities and last phase – beyond 2040, which is meant for
independent governing entities and organic link with funding universities. Each of this phase
characterizes with different governance structure, there is however visible the link between initial project-
phase managerial structure and final governance structure model.
European University Initiative is, with no doubt, a visionary idea with great potential. After revolutionary
Magna Charta, Bologna Declaration and creation of European Education Area, this is new important
chapter. It already brings results, giving the impulse to discuss current state and the future of universities,
education and science in Europe. The vision brough by President Macron, electrified not only educators
and politicians but also other active members of the society.
The realisation of this vision has to be observed by the experts and subjected to multidimensional
analysis.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Authors express their gratitude to Project Management Center at the Silesian University of Technology.
The paper was inspired by ERASMUS + LEAD 2 project and European University EURECA-PRO
project.
REFERENCES
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[5] EURECA-PRO project website: www.eurecapro.eu
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