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Tuesday, April 06, 2010

ECUADOR’S CORREA CALLS FOR KEY ROLE OF UNIVERSITIES IN DEVELOPMENT

QUITO, March 22 (NNN-PRENSA LATINA) – President Rafael Correa reiterated the issue of the role of universities to which his administration assigned a budget of US$873 million dollars.

“Without a University Revolution in Ecuador there will not be development”, Corea said when speaking in the small town of Mira, Carchi Province while questioning the quality of higher education in relation with the investments that the country assigns to it and their professional needs.

He said the budget for universities is four times higher than what the country assigns to basic education and that the government is investing over US$2 million dollars per year for every college student to receive an education of dubious quality.

“We cannot continue this way”, said Correa who stressed that the universities ought to give an account on what they are getting from the government. “We have the right to demand and the universities the duty to give much more to the Ecuadorian people”, the President stressed.

According to a recent academic assessment just 11 universities of 73 are in category A. Some 30 of them must undertake reforms and 26 are in category E, which means they cannot work as such.

Correa underlined that the three main characteristics of the new university are the pursuit of excellence, the link between university and society and giving an account from the financial to academic level. — NNN-PRENSA LATINA

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