As part of his visit to the Boston area, Dr. Philippe Gillet, Provost of the Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL), was the special guest at the Café des Sciences, a monthly gathering of the French-speaking scientific community of the Boston area. Philippe Aghion, Professor of Economics at Harvard University, joined Dr. Gillet to discuss the future models of academic governance and the current measures undertaken by European countries – especially in France and Switzerland - to boost their higher education and research policies.

Prof. Aghion is the author of a comparative report on “The Academic Excellence and the Lessons of the International Experiences,” written for the French Minister of Research and Higher Education., In his report, Aghion stressed the need to set up more centralized governance in European universities, especially in France. Following the model of the American universities, those new board of trustees that are mostly composed of external qualified personalities would be in charge of naming the president and the executive committee. An academic senate should also be appointed to validate the decisions (assignment of new professors, promotions) coming from the different departments of the school. This stronger governance heading up the structure of the university would enable a better integration of external inputs, the creation of a strong brand and facilitate the emergence of a pool of excellence.

For the two speakers, grade schools are another core element of a pool of excellence where the scientific literature is produced. European universities should have a higher selection when it comes to delivering graduate degrees. Instead of having a graduate school on each campus, they should rather specialize in specialized areas of expertise and define a range of disciplines for which they would deliver PhD’s. European universities should also diversify the curriculum for the first three years (like in the US system with a clear separation between colleges and grad schools) to better assess the strengths and weaknesses of their students.

Philippe Gillet also insisted on the necessity to invest more in research and higher education in Europe as it has already been the case in a few countries such as like Switzerland. He also encourages the European universities to increase the level of competition among both students and professors by generalizing the evaluations and establishing a tenure track period for new faculty as  already experienced at EPFL. In sum, the upcoming challenges of Swiss or French universities in a global research environment will be to embed the flexibility for US teaching conditions in the European academic culture.

It was Provost Gillet’s first visit to Boston and not only did he use this opportunity to share ideas with his peers about science policy and management of higher education, but he also engaged into intense discussion about the possibilities for further collaboration with Boston-based universities. Finally, he also enjoyed interacting with a group of EPFL alumni that had very different projects, ranging from the exploration of collective intelligence to the development of new blades based on the observation of nature.

Dr. Gillet meeting with a group of recent EPFL alumni	Dr. Valerie Philippon (Director of Medical Affairs at Vertex Pharmaceuticals), Dr. Philippe Gillet and Prof. Philippe Aghion discussing the new models of academic governance at the Café des Sciences