Abstract
This chapter examines the role of higher education institutions (HEIs) in the promotion of social inclusiveness, both internally and externally. The empirical study is based on the case of Latvia, providing qualitative analysis of the official national policy discourse and the formal discourse represented by the medium-term strategies of the six public universities along with an identification of examples of socially inclusive innovative practices undertaken by these HEIs. The study concludes that, despite the pressing nature of the topic in the country, social inclusiveness of higher education occupies a comparatively marginal place in the official policy and university discourse. Nevertheless, the studied practices reveal that there is quite a wide spectrum of initiatives present in the field of formal and informal adult education, community engagement, counselling, as well as social assistance that are nonprofit oriented and make a notable contribution to promoting social inclusiveness by addressing diverse public needs.
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- 1.
Life expectancy at birth.
- 2.
This could also be attributed to the administrative and academic staff at universities; yet this dimension is out of the scope of this study.
- 3.
Gini index of 0 represents perfect equality, while an index of 100 implies perfect inequality.
- 4.
Later data show that the index value for Latvia decreased to 35.2 in 2013, but went up to 35.5 again in 2014.
- 5.
It implies being at least in one of the following three conditions: (1) at-risk-of poverty after social transfers, (2) severely materially deprived, (3) living in households with very low work intensity. The relative shares among the Latvian population in 2012 were 19.4, 26.0, and 11.5, respectively.
- 6.
See the portal of the “Social Innovation Europe” initiative funded by the European Commission’s DG Enterprise and Industry at https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/socialinnovationeurope/.
- 7.
The link between the upsurge of the notion of social innovation in the policy debate and the onset of the economic crisis has been noted also by Borzaga and Bodini (2014).
- 8.
A search for a keyword “social innovation” (in Latvian) in the portal of legislative acts adopted in Latvia (www.likumi.lv, accessed on 17.07.2014) retrieved only two entries, both pertaining to the Partnership agreement for the programming period 2014–2020 of the European Investment funds (adopted by the Cabinet of Ministers on 19 June 2014), which are related to the implementation of the “Europe 2020” strategy. As of 1 January 2014, Latvia has been granted access also to the EU Programme for employment and social innovation for 2014–2020.
- 9.
A significant drop by 18–38 % in the number of students in tertiary education in 2020, if compared to that in the early 2000s, is being projected (Cunska 2012).
- 10.
Australia, Canada, Denmark, England and Wales, Finland, France, Germany, Japan, Latvia, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, and the USA.
- 11.
In 2013/2014, 39 % of all tertiary students in Latvia had their studies funded from the state budget, while the majority (61 %) were paying a tuition fee (MoES 2014).
- 12.
“Institutions of higher education shall organise their activities in the interests of society , as well as inform society about their operations and the directions and possibilities of studies and scientific research by promoting the selection of study and scientific research according to the interests and abilities of the individual. They shall offer to society their scientific, artistic and professional findings and the methods and results of research” [emphasis added].
- 13.
In total, ten interviews with experts representing individual universities as well as several non-governmental organisations were conducted in January–May 2015.
- 14.
In 2013/2014, there were altogether 61 HEI in Latvia, incl. 25 colleges (MoES 2014). Three out of the six public universities are located in the capital city Riga, while the other three are located in regional centres.
- 15.
The share of foreign students at HEIs in Latvia has increased from 1 % in 2004/2005 to 5 % in 2013/2014 (MoES 2014).
- 16.
In 2007–2013, a special national programme funded from the EU Structural Funds was devoted to the modernisation of the premises and facilities of HEIs for the purpose of improving the quality of study programmes, inter alia aimed at ensuring accessibility of educational programmes also by persons with functional disabilities.
- 17.
See http://www.fonds.lv/par/ (in Latvian).
- 18.
See http://www.rsu.lv/par-rsu/rsu-fonds (in Latvian).
- 19.
One of the pre-accession instruments (programme) financed by the European Union to assist the applicant countries of Central and Eastern Europe in their preparations for joining the EU.
- 20.
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Acknowledgements
I would like to express my gratitude to all the interviewees for their time and responsiveness. Special thanks go to Dr. Anita Draveniece for her contribution in gathering empirical material for the analysis and sharing initial ideas on the topic.
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Adamsone-Fiskovica, A. (2017). Investigating Social Inclusiveness of Universities in Latvia: Policy Discourse and University Practices. In: Brundenius, C., Göransson, B., Carvalho de Mello, J. (eds) Universities, Inclusive Development and Social Innovation. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-43700-2_13
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