Nadal Farreras, Josep M.

Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert

U d G  
THE U N I V E R S I T Y  
O F  G I R O N A  
JN THE FOSEGROUND, FORMES CHURCH OF SANT DOMFNK, 
MAlN HALL OF GIRONA UNIVERSITY. 
THE UNIVERSITY OF GIRONA NEEDS TO BE A RADICALLY 
CATALAN UNIVERSITY, BECAUSE THIS IS THE ONLY WAY IT 
WILL BE ABLE TO FIND ITS PLACE IN SOCIETY. 
J O S E P  M. N A D A 1  F A R R E R A S  P R E S l D E N T  O F  i H E  M A N A G E M E N T  C O M M I T T E t .  U N l V E R S l T A T  D E  G l R O N A  
n 12 December 1991, the Cata- 
I lan parliament approved Law 
35/91 creating the University of 
Girona. It was a great day for those of 
us who had been fighting for an inde- 
pendent university for al1 the people of 
Girona, who identify with the autono- 
mous nature of an institution of this sort, 
born with a wish to serve and, as the 
city fathers wanted in 1484, to bring 
"such benefit and use to this city". 
It was the culmination of continued ef- 
forts that had gradually begun to con- 
solidate at the end of the sixties (when 
the School of Technical Agricultura1 En- 
gineering and the University College of 
Girona were foundedl and that go 
back, as does the present University, to 
the Estudi General founded by Alfons 
the Magnanimous in 1446. Later, Giro- 
na's university life had to endure the 
well known ups and downs of the 
country's history. To put it briefly: In 
171 7 Philip V ordered it to be closed; in 
1869 the Universitat Lliure de Girona 
was established; at the beginning of the 
century, classes were started at the Es- 
cola Normal; until we come to the re- 
cent moves, already described. to con- 
solidate university education in Girona 
íwhich previously depended on the 
Polytechnic University of Catalonia and 
the Autonomous University of Barcelo- 
na). 
The new University grew out of three 
separate traditions: humanistic, techni- 
cal and scientific. The result is  the five 
faculties making it up today: the Faculty 
of Arts, with courses in Philosophy, Ca- 
talan Philology, Hispanic Philology, 
Geography, History and History of Art; 
the Faculty of Legal and Economic 
Sciences, with courses in Law and Busi- 
ness Studies; the Faculty of Experimen- 
tal and Health Sciences, with courses in 
Biology, Chemistry, Nursing and Envi- 
ronmental Sciences; the Faculty of Edu- 
cational Sciences, with courses in Tea- 
cher Training, Psychology, Pedagogy 
and Social Education; and the Higher 
Polytechnic College, with courses in 
Technical Architecture, Industrial Engi- 
neering, Technical Engineering in Indus- 
trial Electronics, in Farming, in Technical 
Engineering in Farming and Food Indus- 
tries, in Computer Studies, Mechanics, 
Industrial Chemistry, and the Higher De- 
gree in Industrial Design Engineering. 
Apart from the teaching activities as 
such, the Research lnstitutes and the 
scientific work of the teaching staff form 
the basis for the research work, another 
of the University's central activities. 
These Research lnstitutes are the lnstitute 
of Educational Sciences, of Catalan Lan- 
guage and Culture, of Water Ecology, 
of Computational Chemistry and the Fe- 
rrater Mora Chair in Contemporary 
Thinking. These centres organise a se- 
ries of activities, either as part of the 
Summer Courses the University holds 
each year, or else during the academic 
year, which include the Congress on 
Computational Chemistry, that on the 
History of Language, and the seminars 
by guest speakers such as Noam 
Chomsky, Adam Schaff, W. Quine, P. 
Ricouer, Father Miquel Batllori, etc. 
From what we have seen so far, we 
need to convince others and ourselves 
that the "periphery" is a real alternative 
to the traditional university system. 
Without wanting to question the role of 
the large, consolidated universities, we 
must stress the undeniable fact that the 
new, small universities can and must, 
and in many ways already are, great 
universities. And this is  so, first of all, 
because they are young and, free of 
the bureaucratic stagnation that history 
and greatness tend to bring with them, 
have to base their strength on creativity 
and imagination, and secondly, be- 
cause they are small and are therefore 
especially fertile ground for intellectual 
sharing and exchange. 
Girona's must therefore be a great Uni- 
versity. To achieve this it must necessa- 
rily be integrated in the social fabric 
that sustains it (the rehabilitation of 
buildings in the old part of Girona, colla- 
boration with other citizen's organisations 
and the vitality of university life speak for 
this), but it must also fight against 
provincialism and open its arms to ev- 
eryone and to al1 ways of thinking. This 
means being universal. But it must not 
fall into the trap of thinking that it can 
form part of the world around it without 
being what it is. Ours must be a radi- 
cally Catalan university, because that is  
the only way it will be able to find its 
place in society. 
The university is a public service and this 
forces us to put the collective interest 
above al1 else. Seen in this light, 
teaching and research must form the 
two basic pillars of the new University. I 
would like the UdG to become known 
for its fight to correct the present trend 
in favour of stimulating research acti- 
vity, while little is  done to encourage 
improvements in teaching. A balance 
between the two would be to every- 
one's benefit. The University must also 
watch over the intellectual and human 
progress of its components. In a world 
in which financia1 gain is  often the only 
measuring-stick we have, a radical, 
technical and humanistic training for the 
sole benefit of the human being is  a 
challenge we must al1 face together. 


The University of Girona

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Revistes Catalanes amb Accés Obert