Portuguese Public Higher Education Institutions Investment in Low Density Regions — Case Study (original) (raw)

The Impact of Higher Education Institutions in Low-Density Territories

Economies, 2021

This article highlights the relevance of the location of HEIs in low-density territories in Portugal, using the Polytechnic Institute of Portalegre as a case study. Based on the American Council Education model and following a surveying approach to faculty, staff, and students, this research accounts for the total spending of incoming academics, other nonlocal university members and their visitors, that positively impacts regional development. A demand-side approach was followed so that indirect and induced effects could also be estimated. The main aim of this research paper is to quantify the total impact arising from the location of the Polytechnic in a given region, measured by economic and social indicators such as the financial return from public funds invested in the region, the number of jobs created, and the impact on the local gross domestic product. The results show an impact of more than EUR 17 million in the territory where the Polytechnic operates, representing 3.68% of...

Supporting the contribution of higher education to regional development: lessons from an OECD review of 14 regions throughout 12 countries

Revista de Economia, 2010

Following decades of expansion in higher education, policy attention in OECD countries has begun to focus on the outcomes of higher education including how universities and other higher education institutions contribute to regional development. With the processes of globalisation and localisation, the local availability of knowledge and skills and the transfer of technology and innovation to SMEs are becoming more and more important. In recent years there have been many initiatives across OECD countries to mobilize higher education in support of regional economic, social and cultural development.

SUPPORTING THE CONTRIBUTION OF HIGHER EDUCATION TO REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT: LESSONS LEARNED FROM AN OECD REVIEW OF 14 REGIONS THROUGHOUT 12 COUNTRIES

UNESCO Forum on Higher Education, Research and Knowledge Colloquium on Research and Higher Education Policy “Universities as Centers of Research and Knowledge Creation: An Endangered Species?”

Following decades of expansion in higher education, policy attention in OECD countries has begun to focus on the outcomes of higher education including how universities and other higher education institutions contribute to regional development. With the processes of globalisation and localisation, the local availability of knowledge and skills and the transfer of technology and innovation to SMEs are becoming more and more important. In recent years there have been many initiatives across OECD countries to mobilize higher education in support of regional economic, social and cultural development.

Polytechnic Institutes in Portugal: research on the impact of twelve institutes on the local economy

Higher Education Institutions are recognized as important actors in regional development. The Portuguese higher education system comprises both Universities and Polytechnic Institutes, which face an increasing pressure to demonstrate that their presence has an impact on the surrounding communities contributing to their economic development. This paper presents the estimation of the economic impact of twelve Polytechnic Institutes, located in quite diverse regions, based on a shared model so that comparisons have a collective framework of analysis. The main results obtained show that the economic impact ranged from 1.8% to 10.6% of the local GDP and that these Institutes are major local employers. 3 Polytechnic Institutes in Portugal: research on the impact of twelve institutes on the local economy Presentation Polytechnic Institutes in Portugal: research on the impact of twelve institutes on the local economy

Restyling the Higher Education Landscape: Regional (A)Symmetries Across Portugal

INTED2019 Proceedings, 2019

This work studies the disparities found in higher education institutions across Portugal-in terms of geographical location, being polytechnics institutes or universities, and operating in the private or public sector-in relation to their offering of 1 st , 2 nd and 3 rd cycle study programmes and scientific areas. Bearing in mind that, on the one hand, any education institution must adapt to the surrounding population, and that, on the other hand, the population also ends up adapting to the existing educational offer, there is always some synergy between the characteristics of higher education institutions and local population/social context. Therefore, it is of surmount importance to characterize the educational system and verify the presence of asymmetries, by evaluation of the way it relates and is related to the physical and social setting. In Portugal, every study programme (newly submitted or running) is subject to evaluation by the Agency for Assessment and Accreditation of Higher Education-A3ES. At the initial stage of the evaluation process, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) submit a proposal to A3ES. The analysis of the characteristics associated with both the study programme and HEI submitting it, held by A3ES, allow an indirect characterization of the national HE landscape. Based on a descriptive analysis of the data associated with all the study programmes submitted to A3ES from 2009 to 2014 (= 2961), it was possible to cross-tabulate several variables and to do a thorough discussion, highlighting the influence of different internal aspects of the Portuguese Higher Education System. This data-based reflection is a contribute for future works aiming to understand the underlying dynamics behind such asymmetries. Knowing the regional asymmetries may provide opportunities to find innovative solutions that foster education on disadvantaged regions.

Higher Education and Local Economic Development

Strumenti per la didattica e la ricerca

It is an intellectual necessity for universities to be open to participation by scholars and students all over the world; despite this, their sources of funding are almost entirely domestic and primarily governmental. The downloading of universities from national to regional government means that funding is increasingly even regional or local. Policy makers, firms and students, who are increasingly funding universities, are not interested in the development of academic knowledge: they demand teaching, research and services that are useful for local economic development and employability. As a consequence there is a divergence between the aspirations of universities and their stakeholders' needs. Establishing beneficial relations between universities and their stakeholders is vital for the survival of European districts and clusters of SMEs. The research highlights how critical the dilemma is and suggests a theoretical framework for resolving it, through the introduction of a new...

Higher Education Institutions and Regional Development

Universities in Change, 2012

Growth theories generally acknowledge that innovation and knowledge generating activities play a crucial role in determining the growth dynamics and their trajectories in national and regional economies (Solow 1956; Temple 1999; Romer 1990). Innovation-the development of new processes, products, and organizational structures, which are both technologically feasible and commercially successful-is created through the continuous interaction between firms, research institutes, government agencies, financing organizations, and, what is particularly important here, higher education organizations. The exchange of knowledge, human and financial capital, and other resources while enabling innovation embeds the actors in a dense network of interactions at the national, local, and, most of all, at the regional level. This is because regions serve to accumulate and diffuse information and knowledge more intensively through social network formation and labor market mobility, than what is the case at national and international levels (Agrawal et al. 2006; Malmberg and Power 2005; Maurseth and Verspagen 2002). It has been shown that the variety of actors within a region is a strong determinant of innovativeness. This variety is fostered by entrepreneurship.

The Role of the State In the Internationalization of Universities In Catching-Up Countries: An Analysis of the Portuguese Higher Education System

Higher Education Policy, 2010

In this article the role of the state in the internationalization of national prominent universities in a catching-up country is analysed. Taking into account the changes in higher education in the last 60 years, including the changing relationship between the state and the universities, the article takes a longitudinal analytical approach on the importance of state-led science and higher education internationalization initiatives in the integration of Portuguese universities in the global higher education arena. It is found that the state played (and still plays) a critical role in the internationalization process of universities by supporting the build-up of institutional knowledge capacity and by rewarding internationally oriented scholarly activities. Although these public policies did not lead to the emergence of national prominent universities able to compete with global research universities, they allowed for the internationalization and integration of the Portuguese universities in the global higher education.