Bucharest Dialogues Systems Thinking for Foresight: The Case of Romanian Higher Education System

1. Bucharest Dialogues Systems Thinking for Foresight: The Case of Romanian Higher Education System

2. Prof. Adrian Curaj Adrian Curaj is a Professor at the Automatic Control and Computers Faculty, and Director of the Centre for Strategic Management and Quality Assurance in Higher Education at the POLITEHNICA University of Bucharest. He graduated in Electronics and Telecommunications, and got his Ph.D. in Automatic Control. He has been working for more than 20 years in robots control. He graduated the EMBA international program of the ASEBUSS and University of Washington in Seattle-Business School. Adrian Curaj is the Director of the Executive Agency for Higher Education and Research Funding in Romania since 2000, and a Vice-President of the National University Research Council since 2008. He served as the Romanian Prime Minister advisor on Science and Technology, IT&C, and e-Governance, 2007-2008. Adrian Curaj was acting as coordinator of the first National Foresight in S&T, in Romania, (2005-2006), and coordinates the “Quality and Leadership for Higher Education” project, the national Foresight in Higher Education, 2009-2011. Adrian Curaj has been working as consultant with World Bank, UNESCO, UNIDO and EC for studies in Tertiary Education, Science and Innovation, and Foresight. He is a member of the External Advisory Board-PEOPLE, DG-Research, FP7 programme, since 2007. Adrian Curaj published in reputed journals as well as many books most of them in research management. One of his inventions received a gold medal at the Geneva Invention Salon 2009. Adrian Curaj is the recipient of a number of awards and received two Romanian National Distinctions, For Merits-Cavalier in 1999, and For Merits-Officer in 2008 for his outstanding contributions to Science and Innovation.

3. Prof. Adrian Miroiu Adrian Miroiu is professor and president of the National School of Political and Administrative Studies (SNSPA), Bucharest. He has a BA in Philosophy and Ph.D. at University of Bucharest.

4. Mr. Bogdan Florian Bogdan Florian is currently working as a research assistant at the Institute for Education Sciences in Bucharest, in the Department for Educational Policies. During the past few years he has also undertook teaching activities at National School for Political and Administrative Studies in Bucharest, where he is a PhD candidate. The main research topics in education in which he has been involved are related to undergraduate education. Bogdan Florian was involved in the research team assessing the impact of the Project for Rural Education funded by the World Bank, as well as in other research projects on specific topics. In the field of higher education he has worked in several projects regarding quality assurance and the institutional framework for quality assurance in Romania, as well as other projects assessing different areas of reform according to the Bologna Declaration objectives.

5. Mr. Campbell Warden Campbell Warden is an accountant, translator and international research administrator. He did a Master in Conference Interpretation (La Laguna University - 1992) and an MBA (UK’s Open University Business School, 1999- 2002). He served as the President of the European Association of Research Managers and Administrators (2000-2002). He worked as a Detached National Expert (on behalf of Spain) in the European Commission (at DG RTD) between 1998 and 2001. He currently serves as an advisor on Research Infrastructure policy for the Government of one of the new EU Member States and as an external expert, evaluator and trainer to UNESCO, UNIDO, DG-RTD & DG-ENTR. He has organised and participated in management training courses for over 15 years, especially in the fields of International Scientific Collaboration, Gender Equality, Intellectual Capital and Technology Foresight. He was a member of the High Level Expert Groups that produced the reports on “Women in Industrial Research” and “Reporting Intellectual Capital to Augment Research, Development and Innovation in SMEs” for the European Commission. He has been employed by the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias (Tenerife, Spain) since 1983 and is currently the Executive Secretary. Mr. Warden started the initiative HEROs (Managing and Reporting Intangibles by Higher Education and Research Organisations) in 2001 which has received widespread interest and support. Since 2007 he has been promoting the use of Foresight methods to develop the societal value of HEROs.

6. Prof. Cezar Bȋrzea • Cezar Bȋrzea is a full professor at the National School for Administration and Political Studies Bucharest, director of the Institute of Education Sciences. He is the coordinator of the courses “Introduction in European Studies” and “Educational Policies”, head of department “Political Sciences”. He is also rapporteur of the 6th Panel “Functions and internal structures of the system”, within the “Quality and Leadership for Romanian Higher Education System” project. • Expectations from the workshop: • To establish priority issues for the Romanian higher education, in a systemic vision • To validate the model proposed by the 6th Panel • To exchange tools and conceptual models with experts

7. Mr. Costel Stavarache Costel Stavarache is coordinating manager at the Foundation Studies Institute of the People (ISP) from October 2008. His main responsibilities are coordinating programs, projects financing, training, events organizer, research, and publishing. He is also a researcher at the Center for Institutional Analysis and Development (CADI) from August 2007. His main responsibilities are public policies analyzes, translations, organizing events, research, publishing. As expert in the UEFISCSU project he has analyzed theories of economic growth (Solow, Romer) and economic theories of education. Strictly related to foresight he was interested in studies and analysis that are prospects of long-term effects of educational reform (20 years, 30 years). From the workshop "Systems Thinking for Foresight: The Case of Romanian Higher Education System" he expects a better familiarity with the foresight techniques, with theoretical arguments and empirical arguments of the wider paradigm of future studies and epistemic limitations of this domain. Also he is interested in a better understanding of the relevance of educational reforms for a country's economic growth and greater familiarity with positioning Romania in comparison with OECD countries, the developing and transitional countries in educational reform.

8. Mr. Dan Grosu Dan Grosu is employed as an expert in the project “Quality and Leadership for Romanian Higher Education” run by the Executive Agency for Higher Education and Research Funding. Dan has graduated from the Mathematics Department of the University of Bucharest, and he is currently pursuing doctoral studies in Political Sciences at the National School for Political and Administration Studies. His professional experience includes working as an Information Systems Analyst, and as an Expert in the Romanian National Technology Foresight Exercise. He is also a former fellow of the Paideia Institute from Stockholm.

9. Prof. Denis Loveridge Denis Loveridge is a honorary visiting professor at MIoIR, Manchester Institute of Innovation Research, Manchester University. He developed and directed an internationally known foresight course at MIoIR from 1999 to 2003. Denis Loveridge has published the book “Foresight: The Art and Science of Anticipating the Future”.

10. Mr. Dragoş Apostu Dragoş Apostuis a MA student in Administration of the funds of cultural institutions and a MA student in Training of trainers, both at the University of Bucharest. He has a BA in Public Administration at the University of Bucharest. He is currently employed as project assistant in the “Quality and Leadership for Romanian Higher Education” and executive secretary at TEMPUS Association for Continuing Education. He has taken an internship within the Department for Public Diplomacy at Ministry of Foreign Affairs and an internship at Romanian Embassy in the Republic of Poland. He is interested in negotiations, trainings and structural funds.

11. Mr. Florin G. Dragomir Florin G. Dragomiris a strategic consultant with extensive experience in multinational and multicultural environments. After working almost 10 years in some of the leading global players in FMCG, he decided to embrace the challenge to start his own consulting business focused on strategic projects. His current portfolio spreads from public sector, where he manages a project team within a national foresight program for higher education, to the private sector, where he constantly adds value to his local or multinational customers. His mantra is “vision, strategy, value” and, capitalizing on his ability to manage different sizes of businesses – from several hundreds thousands Euro up to tens of millions, large teams and multi-million budgets, he is constantly energized by new challenges and ready to create value through innovative concepts and tools.

12. Dr. Gabriel Hâncean Marian-Gabriel Hâncean has a PhD in Political Science (with a public policy specialization), a MA in Communication Studies and a BA in Sociology. Marian-Gabriel Hâncean is with National School of Political and Administrative Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Sociology Department, where he works as a teaching assistant. His main research interests are related to the following areas: social structure and social network analysis, organizational behavior analysis, occupational mobility and social statistics. Also, Marian-Gabriel Hâncean is interested in the study of public policy evaluation procedures and higher education quality assurance systems (with a special highlight on benchmarking methods). Since 2009, he is a member of the Romanian Sociologist Society, where he is the manager of the Organizational Studies Department. Also, Marian-Gabriel Hâncean is a member of the International Network for Social Network Analysis. Since 2008, he is member in the board of the Romanian Political Science Journal “Political Perspectives”. During the past two years, Marian-Gabriel Hâncean has been the institutional development manager for the master studies programme “Management and Governing”, of SNSPA Political Science Faculty. His latest articles are concerned with the issue of evaluating public spending, using a social network analysis approach, and of benchmarking Romanian higher education sector. Furthermore, Marian-Gabriel Hâncean has recently become interested in how trend analysis and scenario technique can be applied to modeling Romanian higher education dynamics.

13. Ms. Iulia Mărieş Iulia Mărieş is a doctoral student in the field of Economic Cybernetics and Statistics at the Bucharest University of Economics. The title of her thesis is “Collective Intelligence in Economic Cognitive Systems”. She is interested in collective intelligence domain, cognitive systems, and applications in multi-agent systems and complex systems. She is currently employed as work-package assistant in the “Quality & Leadership for Romanian Higher Education”, working on the development of a Foresight Wikipedia.

14. Dr. Katja Pook Dr. Katja Pook integrates business practice and research interests concerning intangible value drivers in organisations. This covers the areas of Intellectual Capital management, knowledge management, organisational and human resources development and process design. She is an independent consultant and a certified “Systemic consultant and psychotherapist” (based on systems thinking in social systems). For over 10 years, Dr. Pook has been working with companies of different sizes and business sectors in Europe, and participated in European projects as an academic researcher and consultant, a partner for practical application and currently as an external advisor. She is member of scientific committees for academic conferences and of the editorial board of the International Journal of Mobile Learning and Organisation (IJMLO). Dr. Katja Pook has been working on the integration of Intellectual Capital management and Foresight to foster participatory approaches in vision building and strategy management. She has participated in the initiative HEROs on managing and reporting Intangibles by Higher Education and Research Organisations. Combining different perspectives (human, organisational, technical), her main interest lies in unlocking and developing the intellectual potential of people and thus creating intelligent organizations and a human working environment to foster personal, economic and social progress.

15. Dr. Lik Meng Lee Lik Meng Lee is an urban planner registered with the Malaysian Town Planners Board. He obtained his first two degrees from Universiti Sains Malaysia and then worked for 3 years in private consultancy and local government before joining USM as a lecturer in 1985. In 1991 he was awarded a USM fellowship to pursue Ph.D. studies at the University of Washington, graduating in 1995 in the field of urban design and planning. In 1998 he was made an Associate Professor. As an urban planner, futures thinking is a requisite toolset. When USM undertook the series of futures workshops in 1985, Lik Meng was one of the original participants who has continued to explore the field advancing to become one of the facilitators for several workshops conducted by USM staff for external agencies. He has presented papers on scenario planning at the Malaysian Institute of Public Administration and a planning conference in Adelaide. Lik Meng was also a member of the USM team which drew up the document to bid for the APEX University programme and is currently one of the task force leaders to spearhead USM's transformation into a sustainability-led university.

16. Prof. Marian Zulean Marian Zulean is an Assistant Professor at University of Bucharest, where he holds public policy classes, policy of national security and social policy. He holds a Master in MPIA, University of Pittsburgh, doctorate in sociology and a postdoctoral Fulbright Fellow in the department of sociology at the University of Maryland. His area of expertise includes the analysis of public policy, the international security and the civil military relations. In the period 2001-2008 he held the title of expert in the Presidential Administration’s departments: International Relation and National Security, Officer in the reserve, specialized research.

17. Ms. Mihaela Cucu Mihaela Cucu has a BA in Economics at The Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies. She has experience in events organization. She is currently employed as expert in events organization in the “Quality and Leadership for Romanian Higher Education” project.

18. Ms. Mihaela Ghişa Mihaela Ghişais a member of the “Quality and Leadership for Romanian Higher Education” (QLHE) project team. She is assistant for WP1 “Vision and Strategy”, the package responsible for “elaborating a collaborative vision document of the Romanian higher education system at the horizon 2025”. Mihaela is also a PhD student in the 1st year at the Sociology Department within University of Bucharest. Her thesis is related to foresight for public policy. Prior to QLHE, Mihaela had been working in consulting – mostly related European Funding for ITC in public sector. She also used to work for youth and student organizations as well as non-governmental organizations. During her life as a student she attended several internships within Ministry of European Integration, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Romanian Parliament. Mihaela holds a BA degree in Political Science and a BA in Communication and Public Relations both from the National School of Political and Administrative Studies in Bucharest. She has a Master in Strategic Management for Social Development within the Sociology Department from University of Bucharest.

19. Ms. Oana Andreea Ion Oana Andreea Ion is a PhD student in Political Science at the National School of Political Studies and Public Administration in Bucharest. She has a M.A. in International Relations, Conflict Analysis and Management, B.A. in Political Science (minor in Sociology) and a B.A. in Communication and Public Relations within the same institution. Her primary research interests are connected to the European Studies area, in particular to the network governance theory and its applications in the European Union’s different policies. Since December 2008, she is assisting the coordination of the elaboration of quality assurance benchmarks and performance indicators within the ESF co-financed project „Quality Assurance in the Romanian Higher Education within the European context. Developing the quality assurance management at system and institutional level” carried out by ARACIS – the Romanian Agency for Quality Assurance in Higher Education. Moreover, since October 2006 she is working as university assistant in the Faculty of Political Sciences from the National School of Political Studies and Public Administration.

20. Dr. Ozcan Saritas • Ozcan Saritas is a research fellow at PREST/MIoIR Manchester Institute of Innovation Research, University of Manchester. He is also editor of "Foresight" journal. There are two main expectations from the first Mutual Learning Workshop: • To enhance the Foresight knowledge through a creative dialogue process which will be achieved in the first day of the MLW. The main goal will be to improve the systemic view of Foresight and kick off a first discussion for the understanding of the Romanian HE system with the involvement of respected researchers and practitioners in the field. In line with this goal, this first MLW will suggest ways of working with systems in Foresight. • The demonstration of the ideas developed in a workshop focusing on the Romanian HE System. This effort will aim to support the ongoing Foresight project on HE in Romania. Through the appreciation of the HE system, its complex and multifaceted nature will be explored. The outputs/outcomes produced will then constitute input for the entire the HE Foresight exercise.

21. Dr. Philine Warnke • Philine Warnke is a senior researcher within the Fraunhofer Institute of Systems and Innovation Research (ISI) in Karlsruhe, Germany. The institute’s 120 researchers are investigating innovation processes at the interface of technology, economy and society in various realms. Thereby, they provide insights and processes underpinning strategy building and decision making in policy, industry and civil society. • As a core member in the institute’s Foresight group Philine is conducting the German BMBF-Foresight process that was setting out to explore adequate long-term priorities for the German research and innovation landscape. • Before joining ISI, Philine was working as a senior researcher on foresight with the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre Institute for Prospective Technological Studies (JRC- IPTS). At IPTS she developed the FORLEARN-Online-Foresight-Guide and set-up a “Mutual Learning Process” where Foresight practitioners and users from all-over Europe discussed how to enhance the impact of Foresight on policy-making. • Philine’s educational background is in engineering but since her PhD she is working within a framework of interdisciplinary science and technology studies (STS). Her research is focussing on foresight, innovation policy, innovation studies and value creation patterns. She was involved into numerous prospective studies as well as foresight exercises both on a national and European level and contributed to several Foresight trainings in various European countries. • Expectation on the Romanian Mutual Learning Workshop: • Understand the current evolvement of Romanian Higher Education System and the findings and approaches of the HE excellence project • Exchange on latest foresight concepts in particular systems thinking and explore how it can contribute to the Romanian HE context • Discuss the experience of the German foresight in introducing systems thinking within research landscape

22. Mr. Radu Gheorghiu Radu Gheorghiu is a researcher at the Institute of World Economy in Bucharest and since 2003 he is also collaborating with the Executive Agency for higher Education and Research Funding on foresight projects.  Among these projects,  in 2005-2006 he has been in the coordinating team of the consultations for the elaboration of the Romanian Strategy for Research, Development and Innovation 2007-2013, while for the period 2008-2011 he is involved in the coordination of the foresight project “Quality and Leadership for Romanian Higher Education”.

23. Dr. Riel Miller Riel Miller is a global specialist in designing and implementing strategic foresight projects. For over twenty five years his work has concentrated on how to assess and direct the potential for socio- economic transformation in the private and public sectors. His clients span the private and public sectors from Cisco Systems and Philips to the Government of Ireland, the state of Catalonia, the Government of Canada and the European Commission. Riel is widely published on topics ranging from the future of the financial sector and the internet to the future of schooling and social equity. He teaches around the world and is currently a faculty member of the Masters in Public Affairs, Institut de Sciences Politique (Sciences-Po), Paris, France. Riel is also currently a board member of the Association of Professional Futurists; a Fellow of the World Futures Studies Federation;a member of the board of Strax, The Research Unit for Strategic Intelligence and Exploration of the Future, Helsinki University of Technology; Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, UK; a member of the American Economics Association; and an Associate at Demos, London, UK.See: www.rielmiller.com

24. Prof. Paul Şerban Agachi Paul Şerban Agachi is involved in academic leadership, Member of the Council for Quality in HE, General Chancellor and Vice-rector of Babeş-Bolyai University, President of the Academic Council of Babeş-Bolyai University – with attributions of strategies and foresight and Member of the Consultative Commission of ARACIS. His expertise include positions such as Professor of Theory of Systems and Process Control, Higher Education expert for UNESCO, Program Oil for Food, Iraq, Higher Education expert for UNESCO, in the Phare Program of Reform of Higher Education in Romania, Coordinator and member of the Working Groups of elaboration of the Romanian Research and Development Strategy and elaboration of the National Research and Development Plan (PNCDII 2007-2013), Member of the team of the project of assessment of the results of the first National Research and Development Plan (PNCD I 1999-2006), Coordinator of the Working Groups of „Differentiation of the Universities in Romania” (Project Quality and Leadership for HE in Romania) and „Programs of excellence for supporting research of excellence” (Project Doctoral programs in Schools of Excellence), Strategic planning, university by-laws. Paul is a member of Romanian Academy of Technical Sciences, member of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, member of European Federation of Chemical Engineering, member of International Association of Automatic Control, member of International Ranking Expert Group and member of the Strategic Committee of the Region North-West of Romania. His expectations from the meeting “System Thinking for Foresight: The Case of Romanian Higher Education System” are related to application of the systemic approach to the HE system in Romania.

25. Dr. Susana Elena-Perez Susana Elena is a Scientific Fellow in the Knowledge for Growth Unit in the Institute for Prospective and Technological Studies (IPTS), a Joint Research Centre of the European Commission. She has been an Associate Professor, in the Department of Business Management (2003-2007), at the Pablo de Olavide University in Seville (Spain). She is a member of the PRIME Network of Excellence and has been involved in various competitive European and national projects. She holds a PhD (European award) in Economics and Management of Innovation and Technology Policy from the Autonomous University of Madrid (focus on how to improve universities' internal management and governance) and was a visiting PhD student at SPRU (Science and Technology Policy Unit), Sussex University (UK). Her main research interests are higher education institutions, management and governance of public organisations, intellectual capital, and science and technology policy.

26. Mr. Tiberiu Turbureanu Tiberiu Turbureanu is student in the field of Computer Science at University Politehnica of Bucharest. He is a community leader and contributor to free technologies. He is currently employed as technical expert in the “Quality & Leadership for Romanian Higher Education”, to develop FORWiki, a MediaWiki based platform for Foresight Studies.

27. Mr. Viorel Proteasa Viorel Proteasa has a BA in Physics, Masters in Physics of the Condensed Matter. He has also graduated Management, but has not defended the thesis yet. He was a member of the Executive Committee of the European Students’ Union. His quality assurance experience involves evaluating universities against Institutional Evaluation Programme methodology with ongoing missions at the Pamukkale University of Denizli, Turkey and the University of Evora, Portugal; coordinating ENQA external evaluation of quality assurance agencies in higher education against the ESG, evaluated agencies: NEAA – Bulgaria (June 2008), PKA - Poland (October 2008); coordinating first ESU audit of a national quality assurance agency, ARACIS – Romania, the agency was evaluated against the ESG, with special focus on enhancing student participation; writing the QA chapter of the Bologna With Student Eyes 2009 edition. He is also a lecturer for the Romanian Quality Assurance Agency on the Self Evaluation Process and Report.

28. Ms. Zoya Damianova Zoya Damianova works as program director in charge of the strategic development of ARC Fund, aiming to further develop activities in policy studies and strategic analyses , as well as policy development in the areas of research and innovation. Her current research focus is on foresight studies, regional dimension of the European Research Area, gender issues in science and innovation, innovation financing, innovation infrastructure, regional development, employment, and renewable energy sources. Ms. Damianova holds MSc degree in heating, ventilation and air-conditioning from the Technical University - Sofia and MBA in corporate finance from the University of National and World Economy. She has participated in a fellowship program on technology transfer and SME growth in the USA (1998), and in trainings on foresight (2004, 2006 and 2008), organised by UNIDO and DG JRC-IPTS of the European Commission. For six years, from 1997 till Oct. 2002, Ms. Damianova coordinated the activities of IRC-Bulgaria. Since 2001 she has been coordinating a number of projects in the field of research and innovation policy , incl. the pilot "Development of a Regional Innovation Strategy for the South Central Region of Bulgaria" project, the pilot foresight project "Technology and Innovation Foresight for Bulgaria and Romania - ForeTech", “Annual Report on the Bulgarian National Innovation Policy 2006 ” and “Annual Report on the Bulgarian National Innovation Policy 2007 ”, both commissioned by the Ministry of Economy and Energy of Bulgaria, the country report “Strategic Evaluation on Innovation and the knowledge-based economy in relation to the Structural and Cohesion Funds, for the programming period 2007 – 2013”, under contract for DG Regional Policy, and was the manager of a most recent study for 16 EU regions titled “Contribution of policies at the regional level to the realization of the European Research Area” (completed in August 2009). Ms. Damianova had been previously employed at the Bulgarian-American Enterprise Fund (1994-1996), the Agency for Economic Analysis and Forecasting (1992-1994), and the Central Institute for Computing Techniques and Technologies (1990-1992). She works fluently in Bulgarian, English and Russian.