The role of cost accounting in the university performance measurement in Portugal

Cost accounting is aimed at emphasising those elements of costs and profits of original importance to the management board of an organizational unit. Therefore, cost accounting was initially understood as mere collector of costs and profits, using the traditional system of costing everything, a budget with a limited base. Originally, it was designed to calculate real costs with the aim to determine the results. In public organizations, the aim of cost accounting, costs or management, can be summarized as follows: o Obtain information of how costs are found, both the ones corresponding to the internal activities as well as those for external services rendered and the cost realized investments; o Obtain information for cost and control management, with efficiency indicators of how the planned objectives were achieved and the efficient use of available resources. This paper aims at knowing the role of cost accounting in the public sector of higher education, and checks its contribution for the establishment of the management indicators in public institutions of higher education.Cost Accounting, management, indicators, education

O capital intelectual no sector público

Com a denominação de Capital Intelectual pretende-se reconhecer o conjunto de activos intangíveis de que dispõe uma organização. Os administradores das entidades públicas gerem activos intangíveis, tanto ou mais que os seus colegas das empresas privadas, o que justifica o seu crescente interesse nos progressos do Capital Intelectual. É, de qualquer modo, um tanto difícil aplicar ao sector público modelos desenhados para as empresas, tanto mais que os objectivos das administrações públicas diferem das empresas privadas, como a maximização do resultado ou a criação de valor para o accionista. Os recursos humanos, com os seus conhecimentos, habilidades e atitudes são fundamentais para que a entidade atinja os seus objectivos. A determinação do Capital Intelectual permite o estabelecimento de objectivos realistas assim como a pronta resolução dos problemas. Este trabalho é de duplo objectivo: analisar os distintos critérios propostos na literatura para diferenciar entre tipos de Capital Intelectual e propor um modelo de Capital Intelectual adaptado às características especiais do sector público. Apresentam-se também alguns indicadores de gestão do Capital Intelectual destinados ao sector público, agrupados em várias categorias

Transparency and Accountability in Portuguese Public Universities

Universities are one of the most important institutions in our society. They are knowledge-creating organizations that contribute to the social and economic development of society through new concepts, ideas, applications, and inventions. They play a key role in social criticism, identifying key issues and contributing to informed public debates. Governance is a relatively new concept in the approach to the literature on public management. It is related to the way in which a society or organization is governed or to the creation of conditions for the existence of a social order, triggered by collective actions. In this article we will study the models of university governance and analyze the problem of accountability in its context, with a view to assessing the transparency with which financial information is currently disseminated in Portugal, by public Higher Education Institutions.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Corporate Governance and Internatial Audit in Public Higher Education Institutions in Portugal

Governance covers a comprehensive analysis of how higher education is governed. Governance comprises a complex set of aspects such as the legal framework, the features of the institutions, the form of relationship with the whole system, the funding model, as they are being held accountable on how money is spent and the less formal structures and relationships that affect behavior.The radical changes in the university environment, has imposed changes within the higher education institutions (HEIs). The massification of education and the reduction of the company's willingness to fund the decrease in government funding and increasing institutional autonomy have forced universities to adopt new forms of manageme In Portugal, the Legal Regime of Higher Education Institutions (RJIES) sought to promote meaningful change and a paradigm shift in the governance of these institutions in Portugal. The main objective of this article is to understand the consequences that the new regulations had in the governance of HEI and in the adaptation of processes, in a context of reduction of higher education funding

Analysis of GRI Sustainability Reports Issued by Portuguese Public Sector Entities

Issues such as social responsibility and corporate sustainability are now recognized by organizations and the community as very important to achieve sustainable development (SD). Given the increasing pressure from multi-stakeholders, organizations seek to disclose their “best practices” toward SD through a sustainability reporting tool that is prepared on a voluntary basis. Global reporting initiative (GRI) sustainability reports of the Portuguese public sector (PS) entities are used to perform a quantitative longitudinal study with the purpose of identifying the indicators currently disclosed and the GRI application levels. The study focused on the reports of 2008 and 2012. The findings show that Portuguese PS entities report mainly economic indicators, followed by social indicators. Despite the low level of external verification, entities are transparent when declaring their GRI application level

Integrated reporting in the public sector – special focus on portuguese public university

Sustainability reporting began to emerge in the 1990s, with the aim of providing stakeholders with information on the company's performance through social, governance and environmental aspects (Eccles and Spiesshofer, 2017). The relevance of non-financial information has grown significantly, as more and more investors argue that financial information is not enough to understand the performance and value of the organization. At a time when companies want greater transparency, it is necessary that social justice and environmental protection are increasingly a reality. Information users, on the other hand, are more aware of the need to promote sustainable long-term profitability. Focusing on universities, these are essential pillars of society. Its main mission includes two main aspects, which are teaching and research; however, these entities were also called upon to contribute to society through the provision of services, their third mission. Do all public universities in Portugal produce sustainability reports? Or will it just be a few? The aim of this study is to carry out a survey of the accounts of these institutions, to assess whether they include sustainability reports, through which they convey to stakeholders their practices in this area

Challenges Of Intersectionality In Gender, Science And Technology

Este texto reflete sobre os avanços alcançados e desafios ainda vigentes na discussão sobre as inter-relações entre gênero, ciência e tecnologia (GC&T). O contexto do evento comemorativo dos 20 anos do Núcleo de Estudos de Gênero – Pagu foi um ambiente propício para tal debate, permitindo que fizéssemos um exercício coletivo de análise sobre a trajetória desse campo temático no Brasil e no exterior e, especialmente, sobre a importante contribuição do Pagu nas últimas décadas.4

Ethics and deontology of medical education and nurses in Portugal

This article discusses deontological issues of health care professions in relation to their ethical foundation. We present four models of teaching ethics and deontology in doctors’ training and the results of a PhD research on the teaching of these subjects in nurses’ training in Portugal. Given the importance of bioethics in deontological training of health care professions, we present a comparative analysis of. bioethical principles enunciated by Beauchamp and Childress (1979), related to ‘ethics of justice’, and Kemp’s(2000) proposal, associated to an ‘ethics of care’. Given the ambiguity of these bioethical expressions, we focus on the analysis of its contents and the need to discuss the fundamentals of ethical training of doctors and nurses in relation to the ethical theories they are derived from. Utilitarian ethics, duty ethics, virtue ethics, when the analysis of bioethics’ fundaments is not trained, the duty of caring of suffering can be put at risk

Public participation and rural management of Brazilian waters: an alternative to the deficit model

The knowledge deficit model with regard to the public has been severely criticized in the sociology of the public perception of science. However, when dealing with public decisions regarding scientific matters, political and scientific institutions insist on defending the deficit model. The idea that only certified experts, or those with vast experience, should have the right to participate in decisions can bring about problems for the future of democracies. Through a type of "topography of ideas", in which some concepts from the social studies of science are used in order to think about these problems, and through the case study of public participation in the elaboration of the proposal of discounts in the fees charged for rural water use in Brazil, we will try to point out an alternative to the deficit model. This alternative includes a "minimum comprehension" of the scientific matters involved in the decision on the part of the participants, using criteria judged by the public itself

Ao encontro do isomorfismo pedagógico: aprender por projetos

Nesta comunicação apresentamos um trabalho desenvolvido nos últimos dois anos no âmbito da formação de educadores e professores cooperantes da Universidade de Évora. Este projeto surgiu, considerando, por um lado, que a educação da maioria de nós, influenciando comportamentos e aprendizagens, nos tem permitido a reprodução de práticas docentes tradicionais enquanto educadores/professores. Por outro lado, a oportunidade ao nosso alcance, de imprimir através de formação estruturada, o princípio do “isomorfismo pedagógico”, como forma de romper com um ciclo recorrente que parece dificultar, e muitas vezes impedir, mudanças e práticas inovadoras em sala de aula, nas escolas e nos jardins de infância. O curso de formação denomina-se “Aprender por projetos no Pré-escolar e no 1º ciclo do Ensino Básico”. Face aos objetivos, impôs-se-nos a adoção de formas de trabalhar, em tudo semelhantes aos modos de construção de conhecimento, numa homologia de actividades e processos que proporcionasse experiências e vivências mobilizadoras da apropriação da própria metodologia de trabalho por projectos. Apresentaremos o percurso de dois grupos de formandas (2012 e 2013), evidenciando o modo como desenharam e concretizaram os seus projetos de aprendizagem, bem como o sentido que deram ao conjunto das experiências motivadas pela ação. Por último partilharemos algumas reflexões sobre os desafios presentes na formação de professores no contexto da Universidade, intentando delinear caminhos futuros