ITALY: Mass protests against 'cuts' and reforms

Thousands of students and temporary teachers have taken part in protests in cities across Italy against education cuts and a university reform package under scrutiny in the Italian parliament, despite an eve-of-protest amendment to a budget 'stability' bill that will restore EUR1 billion (US$1.4 billion) to the higher education sector.

Gaetano Dammacco, head of the university teaching department of the CISL University Federation education union, said the money was only half good news: "The EUR1 billion is really EUR800 million directed towards general university funding, EUR100 million for researchers and EUR100 million for study grants and scholarships, but it is just not sufficient when you consider that over 18 months, EUR1.4 billion was cut from the sector.

"However you look at it, the university sector is still down over EUR400 million and next year will be worse," he said.

Student Dario Alba, a spokesperson for the Ferrara University Students Union, said that the protest was above all about dramatic funding shortfalls.

"In the chemistry department at my own university there is not enough money to buy chemicals for experiments and teachers are forced to simulate reactions with empty test tubes, resorting to substitutes such as recycled pantyhose for filters in experiments. It's an absurd situation," he said.

Italy's higher education sector has been the subject of protests over the past few months not only because of the cuts but also the major university reform package that the government is trying to push through parliament.

The so-called Gelmini reforms, named after current Education Minister Mariastella Gelmini, are a series of proposals seeking to modernise Italy's university hierarchy and organisation.

Performance-based research funding, salary increments and recruitment, as well as generational turnover, are priorities. Federation is also encouraged among smaller institutions, with incentives to fuse courses and staff. Other less popular aspects include provisions for the private sector to participate in universities through a presence on their boards of directors.

"We are seeing a gradual privatisation of the university," said Alba. "For example we could have a minimum but no maximum of three non-university representatives on a board of directors that consists of 11 people. In theory it could be five or six external figures and they could do what they like with the university."

Speaking earlier this year about the reforms, Gelmini argued that they would make Italian universities more meritocratic, transparent, competitive and international.

On Wednesday she said: "We need to have the courage to change...Today's protest seems to me a lot of old slogans from those who wish to maintain the status quo, from those who are already opposed to any kind of change."

She has had a hard time selling her package to assistant professors, around half of whom have been on strike since the beginning of the academic year over unpaid and unrecognised teaching hours.

Under the Gelmini reforms, newly recruited assistant professors can be employed on 3+3 year short-term contracts (three-year contracts with the possibility of renewal for a further three years), after which they can compete for a permanent post. But if they are unsuccessful they must leave the academy for good.

In an attempt to placate the striking assistant professors, Gelmini introduced an amendment to the reform bill for 9,000 new posts to be created over six years. But funding could not be found to cover the proposal and led to parliamentary debate being suspended until the completion of budget discussions.

The reform package might also be complicated by the fragile political situation facing the centre-right government of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.