Argentine University Research Articles

Soluciones actuales al problema de las construcciones docentes en Iberoamérica. Batería de aulas de uso común

Synthesizing concepts set down on the prologue of the original work, the Architect Liliana Rainis says: «This work aims two aspects of undeniable merit: on the one hand, the unfolding of all the steps of a design process understood in its phases of: specific design, construction and use-verification, and on the hand, the explanation of a method of total design or ecodesign. Both aspects rarely find themselves together in architectural publications on «design», whether it is a matter of books or of specialized magazines; the first aspect, upon arriving at verification, allows the advance on that mere «analysis» or «interpretation» which the bibliography generally permits, in order to complete the true critique up to the evaluation stage, where the designer becomes his own critic. The second aspect develops an actual methodology based on a previous study, delineating a theoretical main part that could shape what the autor calls ecodesign. Coherent with the whole process it studies, the work is organized in the four parts which form that process: design, execution, verification, epilogue. It is therefore a matter of thoughts and explanations which first point out the almost permanent problems of the Argentinian university in its social and political context and within the difficulty to provide particular physical answers to a growing university population, problems which in themselves are interesting and of fundamental importance in our country. Finally, following the conclusions of the work, it is a stimulus to continue studying the problem, both in detail and in general, taking into account the world situation of the last decades where new universities has been developed whether on pedagogical plans or in its physical structures (let us remember the examples of Europe, the United States, Canada, etc.), supporting a wide and profound debate which would involve the university in its double aspect: as knowledge activity and as an architectural urban planning both complex and operational, with professionals, educators and students.

Programa de Estudios de Historia Social Americana (PEHESA), Buenos Aires

A research programme dating back to 1977, an offshoot of the Centro de Investigaciones sobre el Estado y la Administraci6n (CISEA), itself originally a branch (CIAP, Centro de Investigaciones para la Administracion Publica) of the Di Tella Institute, PEHESA is aimed at tracing the development of poor sectors of modem Latin American societies from the middle of the nineteenth century to the 1930s. Three areas have been singled out for research: the formation of labour markets, the living conditions and experiences of the popular sector and the rise of the labour movements. PEHESA's existence is yet another indication of the crisis afflicting universities in Argentina which has caused social science and historical research to seek refuge in private institutions that try to obtain funds from abroad. PEHESA's list of academic advisers include Jorge Balan, H. Giberti, Tulio Halperin Donghi and John Lynch, to name only those familiar to academic circles in the UK. Membership also includes other more junior names in keeping with what, after all, is a substitute for university research. Some of its members, like Hilda Sabato, already have reputations, others are less well known but equally promising in the light of their publications and research projects connected with the PEHESA focus. Some of PEHESA's work is listed below. The following titles have been made available for reviewing: Sabato, R., Korol, J. C. and Gonzilez, R. (1981). Los trabajadores y el mercado de trabajo en Buenos Aires, ciudad y campana, 1850-1880, PEHESA (Buenos Aires), 129 pp. This is the first instalment of a project sponsored by the Ford Foundation, CISEA and FLACSO. It aims to analyse the formation of the labour market in Buenos Aires (including both city and countryside), and to describe the features of the potential supply of labour while agrarian production changed and increased and the immigration influx began. This extended essay details the final stages of the adaptation of Buenos Aires, no longer the outlet and administrative centre of the short-lived Viceroyalty, to its essentially similar role as outlet and capital of a smaller hinterland. It is sensibly argued that Buenos Aires merits such a study both because of its well-known economic and political influence, and also because, given the course of politics, Buenos Aires followed a relatively autonomous path. It is then possible to study the labour market as a local phenomenon, and as a free market not preceded by a feudal past. A detailed-probably excessively detailed unless a demographic focus is

Determinants of the Brain Drain

In 1973, over forty-one thousand professionals and technicians emigated from other countries to the United States (U.S. Immigration Service, 1974). A few years ago, a Pan American Health Organization research team estimated that some three thousand university-educated persons had migrated from Latin America to the United States in a period of five years. Calculating the cost of training each such person at roughly U.S. $20 thousand, the study concluded that Latin America had contri? buted to the development of the United States with about $60 million in professional personnel over the period (Kidd, 1967). A study in Argentina placed the total loss of professionals and technicians to the country via permanent emigration at four thousand over a ten-year period. This figure represented roughly 8 percent of the total output of graduates from Argentine universities during the decade (Horowitz, 1962). In Britain, a report by an ad hoc committee of the Royal Society concluded that the rate of permanent emigration of recent Ph.D.'s in the sciences is about 12 percent of the annual production of British universities; about one hundred forty British scientists leave the country on a permanent basis each year, with the bulk destined for the United States (Royal Society, 1963). Similar figures are frequently reported in the growing literature on the brain drain?the continuing loss of highly qualified personnel from certain countries and the corresponding windfall gain to others. Almost invariably, recent research has focused on emigration to the United States as the major component of the professional flow from most boundaries.

The Argentine Professorate: Occupational Insecurity and Political Interference

IN A RECENT STUDY of the Argentine professorate, professors, whether fullor parttime, foreignor locally trained, repeatedly expressed concern with their job security in the university regardless of their discipline affiliation.' Almost consistently, authoritarian regimes (common phenomena in Argentina) have attacked the sovereignty and autonomy of the universities. Professors in all the national universities have seen their positions and careers threatened with each change of government. Many report watching the political scene carefully, fearful that another change may bring about still another attack on the universities. In the present university climate in Argentina, the professor works at a disadvantage with the pervasive fear of losing his job. Insecurity in the university is heightened, moreover, by an ineffective tenure system, by the common practice of inbreeding, by the low incidence of geographical mobility of Argentine professors, and by limited numbers of available full-time positions throughout the university system. This article attempts to treat the sensitive issue of occupational insecurity in the Argentine university system and to suggest its effect on the future development of the academic community in Argentina.

The Argentine Universities and the Study and Improvement of Public Administration

The Argentine Universities and the Study and Improvement of Public Administration

Computing capabilities at Argentine and Chilean universities

The author reports on a trip to universities in Argentina and Chile during November 1968, describing university conditions and computing activities. As elsewhere, these universities are experiencing student discontent with the status quo and the solutions they are attempting contrast: Argentina is excluding students from participating in university government; Chile is allowing such participation. University computing service and academic activities are limited. The number of computers is small and so is the capacity, none larger than an IBM 360/40; with some exception, computing science academic programs are rare. This situation is by no means attributable to those responsible for computing developments, who strive for excellence; rather the “system” is hard to overcome. Universities, especially those with strong European traditions, adapt slowly to new academic resources and disciplines; superimposed are the severe technological and economic constraints of the developing nation. Consequently, in the absence of conscious government emphasis on strengthening computing capabilities, future progress may be retarded.

The Intellectual Background of the 1918 University Reform in Argentina

IN 1918 THE Argentine University of Cordoba inaugurated a set of reforms which became one of the most significant developments in the history of Latin American education and student politics. The Cordoba Reform produced a renovation and reorganization of universities not only in the Plata area, but also throughout most of Latin America. Furthermore, the events of 1918 made Argentina's university students an important political force in the Republic and established models of student expression and action which have persisted into the 1960s. Also, the student leaders of the 1918 movement eventually became important members of the nation's political and intellectual leadership. Finally, there emerged from the reform a philosophy concerning social, economic, and political issues which characterized student thinking in Argentina for several decades. The students who carried out the reform were influenced by many factors-internal changes in Argentina's economic and political structure, developments in Europe and Latin America, the conditions of the universities themselves, and the current of new ideas prevalent in the Republic during the first decades of the twentieth century. The purpose of this paper is to examine particularly the intellectual background out of which the university reform developed. More specifically it will focus on two principal arguments: 1) that the prevailing intellectual climate in Argentina in the two decades prior to the Cordoba movement had a significant impact upon the Argentine university students in their actions and thoughts of 1918; and 2) that although the reform was initiated and carried out almost solely by the students themselves, with little aid or encouragement from the faculty, several prominent intellectuals served as maestros de la juventud, providing inspiration and stimulation for the students. Because the protagonists of the 1918 reform in some ways intended their movement to improve the quality of Argentina's uni-

A Note on Contextual Effects and the Political Orientation of University Students

Data are presented to illustrate the importance of contextual effects in the determination of student political behavior. In order to identify contexts, the sample population of 999 Argentine university students was divided into relatively homogeneous subgroups by utilizing a factor analysis of student responses to a variety of questions dealing with their political behavior. University departments were characterized by the mean of the factor scores for the students in that department, and then grouped into six contexts on the basis of the departmental mean scores. This technique permitted the identification of widely varying contexts in the political beliefs of the students. By use of an analysis of variance technique, the independent effect that variation in the contexts of learning has upon students' political behavior is demonstrated. This effect is manifested even when taking into account such other factors as level in school, the amount of time spent in the school situation, the level of father's education, and the individual's own political orientations.

A Report to the American Academic Community

The following article is excerpted from A Report to the American Academic Community on the Present Argentine University Situation. The full text of the report is available from the Latin American Studies Association, Austin, Texas.

The Crisis of Argentine Science

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Additional informationNotes on contributorsTheresa TellezTheresa Tellez is a member of the Science Organization Development Staff of the Office of the Foreign Secretary, National Academy of Sciences. Just after the coup d'etat took place Miss Tellez was in Buenos Aires attending a Unesco-sponsored meeting of representatives from Latin American national research councils. More recently, following the Argentine University upheaval which caused many scientists to resign their posts at the University of Buenos Aires, Miss Tellez has been in close contact with U.S. and Argentine scientists on these developments.

Letters: The Argentine University

Letters: The Argentine University

Letters: The Argentine University

Letters: The Argentine University

The Argentine University: A Defense

The Argentine University: A Defense

The Argentine University

The Argentine University

Argentine University Libraries in 1956

Argentine University Libraries in 1956

Mitteilungen aus chemischen Gesellschaften

On October 10, 11 and 13, 1952, there took place in Buenos Aires, the Second Session in microchemistry in Argentina. There were four sections. In the section of organic and biological micro-analysis 13 papers were presented, in the section of inorganic micro-analysis 10 papers were given, while in the section of applied microchemistry and ultramicroanalysis 7 papers were delivered and in the section of general aspects of microchemistry 6 papers were offered. The Meeting was well attended and faculty members of all the five universities in Argentina participated actively in the presentation of the papers, which aroused general interest and are a living example of the present day advances in the field of micro-chemistry in Argentina.

ARGENTINA

<h3>First University Congress of Medicine.</h3> —The University of Córdoba, the oldest university in Argentina, was founded in 1623, but the medical school was organized only 75 years ago in 1877. The first dean was Dr. D. H. Weyenbergh, a Dutch physician and professor of comparative zoology and anatomy. The authorities of the medical school have organized a Congress of Medicine in commemoration of this occasion. The members of the organizing committee are the presidents of five of the six national universities and the deans of the medical schools. All these authorities were appointed by the national government. The president of the republic, General Perón, has been asked to give the closing speech. The congress will be held in Córdoba on Oct. 10, 1952. There will be simultaneous meetings in the three schools of the faculty: medicine, pharmacy, and dentistry. The university announced that it has adopted the principles of the

The Situation in Argentine Universities

The Situation in Argentine Universities

British Engineers Abroad and their Prospects

IN the past, an important source of British influence and prestige has been the large number of British engineers occupying responsible positions in all parts of the world. One serious result of the many changes in world conditions since the Great War is that the position of the British engineer abroad is no longer what it was. The development of technical education in the Dominions and in India now enables these countries to dispense almost entirely with engineers from Great Britain to undertake ordinary engineering work, and from similar and other causes, including nationalistic pride, the openings in the United States, South America, Egypt and other States have been very greatly restricted. Young Argentine engineers, educated in Europe, now occupy responsible positions in their own country, which is developing very rapidly on the industrial side. In the Argentine, also, no engineer is allowed to practise on his own account unless he has graduated in, or has had his foreign qualifications revalidated by, an Argentine university: for this a very high fee is charged.