Universities and internal participation «Diario y Radio U Chile

The Rector of the Catholic University of Chile, Ignacio Sánchez, announced that, after 40 years, the student representatives of this campus will recover their right to expression and vote in the Superior Council of the same . A decision that, although belatedly, we must celebrate when other public and private universities still do not recover, nor grant this opportunity to the larger body of higher education.

It should be noted that many entities are still governed by the statutes imposed by the dictatorship which erased all the achievements of the 1967 university reform, with the exception of the University of Chile, which has given a new regulation, even though here the Student Federation (FECH) has not yet the vote of its Representatives to the Council of the University

It is to imagine how many conflicts, demands and setbacks could have been avoided and pursued if the universities gave their students a voice and a reasonable degree of decision among their governing bodies. The majority of these mobilizations were probably healthy, but they provoked undeniable disruption of the educational process and the prestige of many entities, notably those of the State but, as we know, of the fiscal budget.

It is conceivable that the decision of this pontiff the University will encourage other schools to take the same step, but will also adopt another series of reforms institutionalizing the participation of teachers, students and administrative staff or collaborative. Especially when they are often the ones who work the longest in universities and their enormous solvency and experience in university management must be recognized.

The one who performs the function of rector in the universities is responsible for all the administration of the university. their campuses, in addition to representing them before various state and society organizations. Then, just and consistent would be, after granting some degree of sovereignty to the students, we will go towards the election of these authorities by a weighted vote of the three areas. Something that was practiced before our institutional rupture of 1973.

Indeed, rectors and deans must govern the present and the future of professors, researchers, professionals, students and students. a large number of administrative officials. It is therefore anachronistic and abusive that only academics have the right to vote on their election. In a practice that, incidentally, explains the deep asymmetries between wages, for example, those who perform various functions in our study homes. With flagrant degrees of injustice and manifesting the same inequalities in Chilean society, where parliamentarians, as has already been proven, earn about forty times more than workers with minimum and average employment.

It is obvious that the editor-in-chief of our civil code should be the pioneer is to practice a better distribution of income, as well as remove a series of privileges and loopholes so that academics improperly supplement their income, while so many staff members must receive salaries that are truly offensive to their dignity and productivity. Certainly, an evil that is prevalent in our system of higher education.

We know that for years the University Senate of our campus has advocated reforms in this regard. To consolidate a better representation and participation of students, as to enhance and improve the condition in which thousands of civil servants work. It would be a question of the Rector Ennio Vivaldi, in his new administration, and after the maelstrom of campuses and schools taken and paralyzed (which, finally, seem to normalize their activity) would be now entrusted with the task of bequeathing a campus more fair and united In the relations of his three states.

However, in addition to evaluating what the Catholic university has done, state universities should take several more decisive steps if you want to recognize what forty years ago had consolidated and if you want to face the challenges of the present and the future. For example, there are already universities around the world that have institutionalized the participation of graduates in their decisions. With whom their professional experience is recognized and the opportunity to collaborate very effectively in updating curriculum meshes and curricula.