- The president of the private university European University Gasteiz (EUNEIZ) has appeared before the Committee on Education of the Basque Parliament to explain the project they intend to implement. It indicates that they will not receive public subsidies, that they will create more than 400 jobs and that students will have the opportunity to learn Basque. LAB has asked for the university's bill for recognition to be suspended.
That the UPV/EHU will already give the titles it offers, that it aims to do business and that it will harm the public university. What has been accused, among others, of the trade unions STEILAS and ESK, of the public university that wants to open its doors in Vitoria-Gasteiz from September onwards. On this occasion, the former President of Euneiz, Jordi Roche, appeared in the Education Committee to explain that they will not receive public money and that the students will pay an average of EUR 8,000. She has also stressed that over 400 jobs will be created – direct contracts and the majority are indefinite – and that students will be able to study in Basque if at least 15 students do so.
The project, which has generated controversy since its inception, has received a negative evaluation from the Quality Agency of the Basque University System. Of the 6 evaluated dimensions, 4 have received a negative assessment.
The hearing involved CAV universities. Since the UPV/EHU, they have expressed concern about the lack of knowledge about future workers. Mondragon Unibertsitatea has called for coherence in the Basque university system and has considered that the University of Deusto can help improve the Basque university system.
“You want to authorize a classicist and elitist university”
The LAB trade union has also participated in the Commission and has denounced that the Basque Government intends with the bill to approve a new university for profit. “It is intended to authorize a classicist and elitist university that increases segregations.”
The union considers that the Basque country is going to be one of the big losers and that it is going to be a university that works with precarious working conditions.
It has called for the suspension of the bill and has called for the mobilization to do so.
In the same vein, ALS has also been critical of the current situation. According to the union, the opening of Euneiz "does not respond to any social need of academic university offers, but to purely economic and mercantilist interests". This project has no academic point of view."