«A responsible, committed, plural and connected university community.»

Gardens of Ramon Turró building

UPF is a young university, focused on innovation and creativity, with the capacity to mature and to integrate new experiences. It is moreover large enough to enable an extensive network of relations among the members of the university community, yet small enough to provide a suitably scaled environment for collaboration and cross-disciplinary study. In order to further strengthen these relations, the university has to minimize its impersonal infrastructures, i.e. that which does not sufficiently promote human relationships, and instead increase the number of informal meeting spaces and formal initiatives to nurture the university community. With a view to strengthening its network and equipping all groups at the university with relational skills, it is increasingly important to place importance on participatory activities outside the classroom.

For their part, students also must play an essential role in the dynamics established at the university. Currently, many of them see UPF as a place of passage rather than as a lifelong point of reference. As for faculty, there is still room to improve the procedures governing tenure and career development. It is also necessary to think about the academic profiles we wish to have in the coming years.

Finally, with regard to the administrative and service staff, we face the challenge of helping them to adapt, develop and continuously improve their skills in order to meet the changing needs of public administration. In this sphere, in order to improve the services offered by the university, new professional pro- files will also be needed. The institutional sense of identity and the feeling of belonging of all groups at our university are notable, but they need to be strengthened even further, and the university community needs to be expanded to include those people interested in joining it, as well as others who have already moved on. With regard to this latter group, the relationship established with alumni must go beyond just services and fundraising.

 

«A community to serve as a lifelong reference for the professional and personal development of our alumni.»

The university community strategies

To consolidate a diverse and connected community:

Creating a unique discourse around the institutional profile that strikes a balance between the university’s youthful spirit and its established identity and that, going beyond the mere reporting of activities and results, integrates and promotes the university’s mission, vision and values.

Establishing effective channels of communication that value and increase the visibility of all groups at UPF, whilst at the same time enhancing both dialogue and communication between these groups and their networks.

Creating flexible, healthy, multi-purpose work spaces that facilitate interaction between faculty, students and the administration and help to prevent occupational hazards, with an open design and the participation of all of the university’s groups.

Promoting the creation of new infrastructure needed to expand and complement the university community’s activities in the spheres of teaching and research on all three of the university’s campuses, especially the Ciutadella campus.

Embracing multilingualism for all members of the university community, irrespective of their origin, through a responsible management of multilingualism that makes it possible to balance local identity, openness to the world and international outreach, whilst at the same time promoting knowledge and use of the Catalan language in all areas.

Fostering the connections between the university’s different academic and research areas in order to reduce their current level of fragmentation. It is necessary to facilitate interaction and to strengthen, through new initiatives aimed at developing relationships between disciplines and units, the sense of belonging to the UPF community.

Expanding the role of alumni in the university community. In order to promote a path for knowledge return to the university, it is necessary to strengthen students’ sense of belonging, so that, as alumni, they continue to harbor this feeling. We must also work to ensure that the university remains a reference for alumni throughout their careers and lives.

Strengthening UPF’s corporate identity, by creating for example a single brand name that can be used to raise the profile of the set of initiatives, programmes and services carried out or offered under this identity at the university and by the UPF Group as a whole.

Offering more athletic and cultural events that are of general interest for the university community at large and that can be used to facilitate relationships between university members, whilst at the same time promoting a healthy lifestyle.

To foster a participatory and socially responsible community:

Making participation one of the university’s hallmark traits, promoting commitment, dialogue and ongoing debate within and outside the governing bodies as a basis for enabling better decision-making. In this context, it is necessary to encourage social skills, participatory leadership and democratic culture.

Implementing policies of inclusion, with the aim of forging a socially responsible community that combats inequality and discrimination on grounds of gender, social class, ethnic or racial origin, sexual orientation or disability. Ensuring meritocratic access to education will contribute to making the university a tool for social integration.

Giving new impetus to staff training, in both the academic and management spheres, with a more innovative and flexible approach that alternates between various types of participation (such as active learning, in addition to ‘formal’ actions). This training must recognize talent and, beyond the formal criteria, must take all skills  into account, whether related to new teaching methods, new software or new communication tools.

Offering activities that demonstrate UPF’s commitment to social responsibility, that foster personal welfare, encourage volunteering and allow the members of our university community to obtain comprehensive training as citizens.

Designing and implementing policies for reception, support and continuous monitoring targeting the members of different groups at the university, whilst at the same time promoting the maintenance of ties with everyone who has ever been linked to UPF. It is also necessary to put into place a wide range of integration measures, in the context of the university’s growing internationalization and the strong cultural diversification such a process entails.

Àmbits estratègics comunitat

Some measures of success

  • To increase the percentage of members of the university community who  participate in athletic, cultural, association, volunteering, and other activities offered by the University to 20% by 2020 (up from 13% in the 2014-2015 academic year).
  • To make progress, by 2020, on gender equality, in order to achieve a more equitable male-female ratio, both with regard to administrative and service staff and to teaching and research staff (in 2015, the male-female ratio was 0.5:1 for administrative and service staff and 1.72:1 for teaching and research staff).
  • To revise the university’s Plan of Action for Multilingualism by 2020 to reflect the strategic areas of the Strategic Plan.
  • To increase the percentage of UPF alumni who  are members of the Alumni Programme to 50% by 2025 (30% in 2015).
  • To actively involve 15% of alumni with the university by 2025 through specific actions (mentoring, donations, specific support, volunteering, etc.).
  • To ensure that the entire university community has  sufficient knowledge of Catalan and English by 2025, and that 20% of its members also have knowledge of other languages.