Resilient Universities for Turbulent Times
Speaker: Dr. Rómulo Pinheiro, Professor of Public Policy and Administration, Deputy Head of Department and member of the research group on Public Governance and Leadership (GOLEP)
Moderator: Dr. Po Yang, an associate professor with tenure, chair of Department of Economics of Education and Administration, at the Graduate School of Education, Peking University
Time: October, 6
Introduction to Peking-Tampere lecture series
Event schedule:
14:00-14:15 EEST (19:00-19:15 Beijing Time) Introduction of Lecture Series by Yuzhuo Cai
14:15-15:00 EEST (19:15-20:45 Beijing Time) Lecture by Romulo Pinheiro, Moderated by Po Yang
15:00-15:30 EEST (20:00-20:30 Beijing Time) Q&A
Lecture description:
As the environmental conditions under which they operate become increasingly complex and volatile, universities the world over are being asked to become resilient. Resilience is the ability to retain function and identity while coping with adversity. Throughout their history universities have successfully adapted to major societal and technological shifts like wars, industrialisation, the rise of the nation state, and globalisation. Their functions and structures have gradually evolved to accommodate new stakeholders demands, but, as is the case of other public organisations, the fast pace of change is creating new challenges and dilemmas.
In this lecture, we review key concepts associated with universities as organisations as well as institutions, in the context of their inherent resilient features and an increasingly turbulent environment. In so doing, we provide new empirical evidence of the shift from a post-entrepreneurial towards an emergent resilient modus operandi.
The lecture concludes by suggesting that, if universities are to become resilient, they need to be given both autonomy and flexibility for adapting to emerging demands, and in some cases this implies providing society with what its needs (for the long run) rather than fully heartedly giving it what it wants (in the short run).
Recommended pre-reading:
Theory:
Folke, C., S. R. Carpenter, B. Walker, M. Scheffer, T. Chapin, and J. Rockström. 2010. Resilience thinking: integrating resilience, adaptability and transformability. Ecology and Society 15(4): 20. [online]
Frigotto, L., Young, M., & Pinheiro, R. (2022). Resilience in Organizations and Societies: The State of the Art and Three Organizing Principles for Moving Forward. In R. Pinheiro, L. Frigotto, & M. Young (Eds.), Towards Resilient Organizations and Societies: A Cross-Sectoral and Multi-Disciplinary Perspective (pp. 3-40). Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. [online]
Practice:
Pinheiro, R., & Young, M. (2017). The university as an adaptive resilient organization: A complex systems perspective. In J. Huisman & M. Tight (Eds.), Theory and method in higher education research (pp. 119-136). Bingley: Emerald. [online]
Young, M., & Pinheiro, R. (2022). The Post-Entrepreneurial University: The case for resilience in higher education. In R. Pinheiro, Frigotto, L., & Young, M. (Ed.), Towards Resilient Organizations and Societies: A Cross-Sectoral and Multi-Disciplinary Perspective (pp. 179-200). London: Palgrave. [online]
Speaker:
Rómulo Pinheiro is Professor of Public Policy and Administration, Deputy Head of Department and member of the research group on Public Governance and Leadership (GOLEP). He is also member of the Centers for Digital Transformation (CeDiT, ) Advanced Studies in Regional Innovation Strategies (RIS) and the Jean Monet Center of Excellence all based at UiA. Rómulo’s research interests are located at the intersection of public policy and administration, organisational studies, economic geography, innovation and higher education studies. More info at: https://www.uia.no/kk/profil/romulomp and Google scholar
Moderator:
Dr. Po Yang is an associate professor with tenure, chair of Department of Economics of Education and Administration, at the Graduate School of Education, Peking University, and a research fellow at China Institute of Education Finance Research, Peking University. She serves as the vice president of China Association of Education Finance Research, and has been working as consultant for the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and Ford Foundation. Her main teaching and research areas of economics of education, education finance, and vocational and technical education reform evaluation. She has working experiences in leading research universities in the U.S.A., and the Netherlands. She has published in peer reviewed SSCI journals and received research grants from China’s National Science Foundation and Ministry of Education.
Opening speech:
Dr. Yuzhuo Cai is Senior Lecturer and Adjunct Professor at the Higher Education Group (HEG), Faculty of Management and Business, Tampere University, Finland. He has been with the HEG for 20 years and was the Acting Professor of the unit from August 2013 to July 2014. He is Director of Sino-Finnish Education Research Centre, JoLii, and Deputy Director of Research Centre on Transnationalism and Transformation at Tampere University. He is Editor-in-Chief of Triple Helix and Co-Editor of the Journal of Studies in International Education. He has over 100 academic publications in the fields of higher education administration, internationalisation of higher education, comparative education and innovation studies.
Additional information on Lecture series:
At Peking University, the Lecture Series will be part of the GSE’s most distinguished school-wide lecture program, titled “Peking University Education Forum”. The program is a consorted effort of various departments at GSE to introduce internationally renowned scholars to graduate students to broaden their horizons and directly interact with leading researchers in their fields. The GSE has invited scholars from various disciplines to give lectures in the program, such as Prof. Andy Green from UCL-IOE, Prof. Simon Marginson from Oxford University, Prof. Susanna Loeb from Brown University, and Prof. Brian Jacob from the University of Michigan. The lecture program has already become a symbol of excellence in China’s education and public policy research.
At Tampere University, the Lecture Series will be part of the activities of the Sino-Finnish Education Research Centre (SFERC), which is part of the six centers of the Sino-Finnish Joint Learning Innovation Institute, a research network involving more than 20 universities from both China and Finland. SFERC also organizes other webinar series, such as Sino-Finnish Education & Society, Learning Education Science in Finland and China-Europe Innovation Cooperation. All the activities of SFERC receive financial support from the Global Innovation Network for Teaching and Learning (GINTL). GINTL is a network in which Finnish higher education institutions, together with partners from India, China and Africa, co-create research-based solutions to global educational challenges and collaborate in research and education. The network is one of the 9 Global Pilots in the Global Program (2021–2024) of the Ministry of Education and Culture of Finland.
Cover photo by Alicia Mary Smith on Unsplash