Резюме. Across Europe and the wider OECD area there are growing signs of a transformation of the ‘traditional’ model of a university, which focuses its efforts on teaching and research, towards an innovative and entrepreneurial higher education institution (HEI), which is designed to empower students and staff to demonstrate enterprise, innovation and creativity in teaching, research and third mission, directs its activities to enhance learning, knowledge production and exchange, in the dedication of creating public value via processes of open engagement (HEInnovate, 2014). The entrepreneurial university concept was developed in the early 1980s and was used as a method to examine the ways in which HEIs contribute to wealth creation and sustainable growth. Many attempts have been made to define the concept, but a single, generally accepted consensus has yet to arise. Whilst this renders it difficult to use the concept for research purposes, it turns it into an excellent lever for HEIs to guide and steer their organisational change processes. The higher education system in Bulgaria is undergoing a significant change process. Access to higher education has been eased and has raised enrolment rates. At the same time, HEIs are confronted with multiple challenges: growing rates of graduate under- and unemployment, attractive study options abroad, and largely underdeveloped links with businesses. These challenges are pressing HEIs to change. To facilitate this change process, the Ministry of Education and Science of Bulgaria approached the European Commission Directorate General for Education and Culture and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in January 2014 with a request to undertake an external review of the barriers, challenges and opportunities in the higher education system. This started a one- year collaborative review process which included an in-depth peer-review of five case study universities in March and May 2014, an online survey of leaders and students in the period May to September, and a final workshop - involving all HEIs - to discuss the findings of the case study peer- reviews and the surveys, organised in Sofia in the end of September 2014. This report summarises the key findings and recommendations resulting from this review process. It also presents international learning models, which provide exemplary illustrations of how to implement effective strategies and actions.

Ключови думи: entrepreneurial university, higher education system, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

Key findings

Absence of a clearly defined role for HEIs in promoting innovation and entrepreneurship

Various policy documents and operational programmes refer to the role of HEIs in Bulgaria’s emerging knowledge economy from skills development and lifelong learning, research, development, start-ups, innovation and smart specialisation. However, there is no common policy framework that brings together these different strands of measures and clearly defines the role of higher education in promoting innovation and entrepreneurship. The new strategy on higher education, whose adoption is currently pending, is expected to increase coordination efforts.

Narrow understanding of the innovative and entrepreneurial HEI concept

The current understanding of the innovative and entrepreneurial university – in the HEI community – is focused on the promotion of start-up activities, primarily targeted at students.

Organisational capacity, stakeholder links, internationalisation, and leadership are not yet associated with the concept.

Marginal involvement of HEIs in smart specialisation

The involvement of HEIs in the smart specialisation process so far has been only marginal. As a result, HEIs are not fully aware of the funding opportunities and requirements. Only few universities have taken on an active role in local development, for example by defining strategic objectives and starting or leading key industry clusters. Information about these examples is, however, not widely available for the wider HEI community and cannot be found on key communication channels such as the Rector’s Conference website1) .

‘Separation’ of teaching and research

The separation of teaching and research, established during the Communist era, left lasting footprints. Research activities, especially in basic research, are still largely taking place in the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. Universities have difficulties in absorbing institutional research funding, although some are very successful with project-based research financing and in establishing themselves successfully in the country’s emerging innovation system.

Knowledge exchange is not yet part of the core-strategy of HEIs

Many knowledge exchange activities of HEIs with business and other external partners are focused on individuals, for example collaboration between researchers in HEIs and researchers in local companies. Without clear and vocal leadership promoting collaboration, knowledge exchange risks to be a matter of personal motivation rather than being ‘part of the job’. Benefits from the high number of projects (often co-financed by the European Union), which provide the opportunity of a salary increase for individual staff members, risk remaining constrained to individual benefits with little or no spillovers to the HEI as a whole. Also, the legal framework for public private partnerships and public procurement has still some open issues, which render business collaboration difficult for HEIs.

Difficulties in the organisation of internships

Organising internships is difficult in a threefold way, in terms of: (i) finding a place, (ii) guidance and support during the internship, and (iii) the latter’s relevance as learning experience. When searching on their own for internship places, many students encountered situations where firms said “we sign the internship report for you, but we are not interested in having you as an intern”. Only students who found an internship through their professors had a contact person to reach out to during the internship for advice. Firms argue that students are not interested in practical learning, and students criticise that there is no learning and that they get overloaded with routine tasks. Entrepreneurial project work, co-designed by students and their tutors, is rare. Furthermore, there is no structured reflection of internship experiences in class. Students talk about this in their free time or, in the best case, extra curricular activities.

Systemic barriers in raising the attractiveness of HEIs

The number of newly enrolled students is decreasing, and reaching ‘critical mass’ has become a serious issue for several HEIs. The number of students opting to study abroad is increasing. The unfilled surplus of 8,000 study places (11.3% of the total offer) in the academic year 2014 risks becoming a recurring phenomenon.

Average numbers of students are between 6,200 for public HEIs and 3,500 for private HEIs. The University of Sofia “St. Kliment Ohridski” is with 21,000 students the outlier, followed by the Technical University of Sofia, which is with 9,200 students the second largest HEI. Co-operation between HEIs remains low and there are examples of spurious competition in establishing faculties, departments and study programmes. The number of PhD programmes per university is very high (on average between eight to 15 programmes). There is a risk that the offer of PhD programmes serves as an additional source of income rather than a way of broadening research activities.

There is an urgent need for re-organisation towards more collaboration between HEIs and more joint utilisation of infrastructure and resources. The aim should be to build a well-functioning system that allows and caters for diversity, so that institutional-level priorities and goals can be realistically set and achieved within the wider system-level strategic objectives.

Accreditation concerns separately institutions and study programmes. Activities to promote entrepreneurship as a key competence are not considered in the accreditation process. Currently the composition of the evaluation panels, mostly professors working at HEIs in the country, presents high potential for conflict of interest. Foreign academics and key local and national stakeholders e.g. employers and research partners, have not yet been included in the teams.

Tailoring study programmes to the needs and arising opportunities in the local economy is burdensome and costly. Adjustments during the accreditation time are difficult to organise, and there is a tendency to apply with study programmes that are similar to programmes already accredited at HEIs elsewhere in the country. There is some collaboration on co-designing curricula but this is not yet part of a systemic approach. The focus seems to be more on lifelong learning activities and less on study programmes. Interdisciplinary activities, which are open to students from different faculties, are often limited to extra curricular activities.

Bulgaria is one of the few countries in the EU where the establishment of joint programmes and joint degrees with partner HEIs from abroad is not addressed in legislation (EU, 2012). Currently less than 10% of HEIs in the country participate in joint programmes, whereas in neighbouring Romania up to 75% are participating in international study programmes.

Barriers to up-scale entrepreneurship promotion in HEIs

Many individual academics in Bulgaria promote entrepreneurship in their HEIs and participate in research conferences in the country and abroad. However overall, entrepreneurship promotion has not yet become a matter of strategic interest for HEI leadership. There are some HEIs where motivated individuals receive recognition and support for their commitment and additional work, but only very few HEIs actually have rectors who consider themselves as “entrepreneurship champions”.

Missing links to the entrepreneurship ecosystem

The entrepreneurship ecosystem in Bulgaria is quickly developing. Eleven and LauncHub are seed venture capital funds, which provide support for individuals and teams to develop innovative ideas from very early stages on. They are well known amongst the student community. Start-up weekends are also regularly organised in several cities across the country. Yet links with the HE system are rare.

Key recommendations

Recommendations are presented separately for the Ministry of Education and Science and the Rectors Conference – as key actors in defining the national higher education framework – and HEIs.

The Ministry of Education and Science is recommended to:

Establish a national-level HEInnovate committee which includes senior representatives from the ministries of education and science, economics, and labour and social affairs, the Rectors Conference, and the main economic actors (Chambers, etc., entrepreneurship ecosystem). The objective of the national-level HEInnovate committee is to (i) promote the concept of the innovative and entrepreneurial higher education institution, (ii) identify key national challenges and opportunities in the higher education system with regard to the seven dimensions of HEInnovate, and (iii) to monitor and evaluate pilot projects for a potential mainstreaming. The establishment of working groups, involving HEI representatives, should be considered.

To trigger innovation in the higher education system and to sustain already existing promising initiatives, the creation of a HEInnovate Fund, co-financed with ESIF funding is proposed. The HEInnovate fund should provide co-financing for pilot projects, proposed and implemented by HEIs in Bulgaria. The allocation of co-funding shall be competitive. Key areas of fundable projects should be defined by the nationallevel HEInnovate committee, taking into the findings and recommendations from the HEInnovate country-level review. Further it should be considered to include HEInnovate in the key performance indicators, applied by NEEA and the University Ranking.

The HEInnovate Fund should become the main vehicle to promote and sustain organizational change in HEIs. It is understood that some of the following recommendations require higher-tier level support to be fully implemented.

The recommendations for HEIs are:

1. Review and reformulate the university strategy documents in light of current challenges and possible responses. This will also imply building a common understanding of what the concept of an innovative and entrepreneurial HEI means to a particular HEI and its socioeconomic situation context.

2. Establish a senior management post (e.g.) vice-rector in charge of the innovative and entrepreneurial agenda. To steer and sustain the innovative and entrepreneurial agenda, HEIs should establish the position of a senior management post or Vice-Rector who will be responsible for entrepreneurship, organisational change and interaction with the local community. In addition a “Strategy Council” should be established, which includes members from local/regional governments, key business and industry partners, and civil society

3. Provide training possibilities for staff and reward excellent performance. Training possibilities should be offered to enhance the quality of teaching, organisation of internships, research and knowledge exchange, and internationalisation. Training possibilities should also exist for staff members who wish to contribute to the organisational change agenda.

Excellent performance should be identified and rewarded.

4. Further invest in the establishment of coordination mechanisms for entrepreneurship promotion, and involve students. Existing coordination mechanisms for entrepreneurship promotion, such as entrepreneurship centres and technology transfer centres, should be continued and improved in order to reach out all across campus. The aim should be to develop dynamic structures that link the HEI with the entrepreneurship ecosystem and offer easy access to different publics inside and outside the HEI. Students are an important resource for this.

5. Incentivise the strategic involvement of key external stakeholders. Providing recognition and rewards for strategic partners is important. HEIs may need to adapt or introduce new criteria for awarding external stakeholders for their contributions to the innovative and entrepreneurial HEI agenda.

6. Build strategic bonds with alumni. A network of alumni can be very useful to understand how to increase the relevance of teaching and research. Alumni are also a key resource to promote organisational change and development. To this end, nascent initiatives across HEIs in the country should be sustained and improved.

7. Expand existing good practices in novel pedagogies across the HE system. There are several good and promising initiatives all across HEIs in Bulgaria. Information about these should be widely circulated and mainstreaming should be considered.

8. Promote entrepreneurship education as cross-section faculty portfolio. Entrepreneurship education should be expanded and tailored to all students across all faculties and levels.

9. Develop an easy-access system of fundamental business start-up support for academic entrepreneurs. Would-be-entrepreneurs need to know what to do and where to go. Entrepreneurship centres and co-working spaces can be first-stop shops. Key to this will be more institutional links to the entrepreneurship ecosystem.

10. Increase the institutional embedding of knowledge exchange activities. Clear and vocal leadership, guidance and support mechanisms are needed to promote knowledge exchange as an integral “part of their job”.

11. Make internships an entitlement for students and provide support. Internships should be an entitlement for all students. Internships need to be supported by HEIs in terms of information prior to the internship, guidance and support during, and reflection after the internship.

12. Increase internationalisation efforts. HEIs in Bulgaria need to develop their international agenda more. Open issues concerning joint and double degree programmes, and the recognition of foreign degrees need to be taken up at the level of the Ministry of Education and Science.

International learning models

Inspiration for the development of innovative and entrepreneurial HEIs in terms of leadership, organisational capacity, teaching and learning, start-up support, knowledge exchange, and internationalisation can be drawn from practices that work well in other regions and countries.

Relevant initiatives outlined in the report include:

EXIST is a support programme of the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy which aims at (i) fostering the entrepreneurial environment at universities and research organisations and (ii) at increasing the number of technology and knowledge based business start-ups. EXIST is co-financed by the European Social Fund. Most relevant for the Bulgarian context is the EXIST project line Culture of Entrepreneurship. It is an effective approach to stimulate organisational change, and to promote the innovative and entrepreneurial HEI, because of the involvement of all HEIs into a competition and coordination process. EXIST organises regular thematic workshops and conferences, hosted by different HEIs. The institutional commitment of HEI leaders is a core prerequisite for the absorption of public funding.

The “Knowledge antennas” built by the Rovira i Virgili University in Catalonia (Spain) have been key facilitators of the emergence of a viable interface between the university and the local economy stakeholders. It is a relevant example for the Bulgarian context because of the successful introduction of global links for local businesses through the university’s research and teaching networks and the effects this had on the organisation of third mission activities at the university.

The Council for Entrepreneurship at the Universidade Nova de Lisboa is an example of how t ensure shared knowledge and outreach to all faculties, and how having a local celebrity as Chair of the Council for Entrepreneurship can attract key strategic partners.

The Strascheg Center for Entrepreneurship at the Munich University of Applied Sciences is another example of an all-campus approach to co-ordinate the innovative and entrepreneurial HEI agenda. What can be learned from this approach is that strong support of the leadership is crucial to gain institution-wide outreach. It remains important however, to reach out to students. Professors are important conduits for this and their commitment needs to be incentivised and rewarded.

Chalmers School of Entrepreneurship was founded in 1997 at Chalmers, one of the oldest and largest institutes of technology in Sweden. Students are the forefront of the commercialisation process because of their ‘different’ approach to recognising the commercial and societal value of research results. This is a relevant learning point for HEIs in Bulgaria.

The Rovira i Virgili University started in 1992 as a “university under construction” with young ambitious staff willing to fight for career success. To incentivise and reward excellence in teaching, research and knowledge exchange activities, the rector established the Research and Academic Staff Commitment Agreement, which facilitated the identification of training needs and the design of tailored training programmes.

The Technical University of Valencia (UPV) is known for its considerable level of interaction with the regional economy. It has a clear institutional structure to support different types and stages o partnerships combined with a set of incentives to academics.

The Innovative Academic Entrepreneurship Education Network in Poland (SEPIA) started in 2006. This network has helped to share information about entrepreneurship education activities across HEIs in Poland. A similar approach could also help to widely circulate information on the various promising initiatives that already exist in Bulgaria.

ROXI, the Rostock Start-up-Initiative at the University of Rostock in Germany is based on the constructivist learning paradigm. The emphasis is on soft skills development. The concept of entrepreneurship promoted at ROXI includes business entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship, cultural entrepreneurship, eco-entrepreneurship, international entrepreneurship and intrapreneurship. Participants are selected and pay fees. Consultancy and post start-up support are offered.

“Learning to Think Like an Entrepreneur” is a two-day experiential learning process at EMLYON Business School. Initially offered only to MBA students, it is now offered to all students. Participants develop, in teams of up to five people, a method to assess business plans for start-ups from the investor’s perspective. The key success factors – invite the entrepreneur who wrote the business plan, and take enough time to brief coaches about their role – are key learning points for those leading entrepreneurship education activities at Bulgarian HEIs.

The Gründerwerkstatt – entrepreneur workshop at the Beuth Hochschule für Technik in Berlin is an example of an effective co-working and incubation for young entrepreneurs from all over the world who are willing to move temporarily to Berlin.

The spirit and motto of the University of Bergamo is “learn along the way, less lectures, mor experiences and opportunities for young people”. Internships are mandatory for all study programmes and students co-design their own “internship projects” with the academic and the company tutors. The “internship project” is a key enabler for learning. Students have a greater say and responsibility in designing a process which is meaningful for their studies and professional development. This is a key learning point for Bulgarian HEIs, as well as the fact that the current success of the internship programme has emerged over time as the result of an active leadership, and in-depth research of potential areas of collaboration where often alumni are offered the “deep look” into the needs and ambitions of future partners.

Finally, the Polytechnic University of Valencia is an example of a common institutional framework to promote mobility of staff and students through the creation of functional units to provide information, assistance and mechanisms that promote the sharing of international contacts across the HEI.

Review methodology

Conceptual framework

The methodology used in this review is based on HEInnovate, a guiding framework for innovative and entrepreneurial HEIs. HEInnovate was collaboratively developed by the European Commission, Directorate-General for Education and Culture and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) through its LEED Programme (Local Economic and Employment Development.

For the last decade, the OECD LEED Programme has been providing advice and guidance to national and local governments, education institutions, and other key stakeholders of local economic and employment development on how to develop and sustain a systematic approach that is effective in mobilising young people for entrepreneurial careers, developing the necessary competences and skills, and providing targeted business start-up and growth support. Eastern Germany, Tunisia, the Czech

Republic and Poland participated in a dedicated review series. With HEInnovate the focus of this review series has been broadened by including leadership, organisational change, internationalisation, and knowledge exchange, in addition to entrepreneurship promotion.

Work on HEInnovate started in March 2011 at the University-Business Forum in Brussels, an annual event organised by the European Commission for HEIs and their key strategic partners. Delegates expressed a common need for guidelines and support that helps HEIs to start, implement and sustain organisational change. HEInnovate is a response to this need (see Annex for a brief presentation of the seven dimensions and 45 statements).

HEInnovate self-assessment tool

In November 2013 HEInnovate was first launched. It offers free access to HEIs to use a selfassessment tool with instant reporting and downloadable guiding notes and case studies. HEInnovate is not about benchmarking or scoring. It is a tool to promote peer learning and organizational development. The ‘group function’ allows multiple users from a participating HEI to gather opinions and visualise individual assessments in a group exercise. A main advantage of the group function’ is that it allows the exploration of different understandings of how entrepreneurship and innovation can be translated into a higher education institution. It also helps by identifying gaps and building new synergies. The ‘group function’, can encourage respondents to look beyond their own areas of responsibility and attempt a more holistic approach, taking on the perspective of a possible change agent.

The self-assessment can be repeated multiple times, for example if the aim of the participating HEI is to track organisational change over time. HEInnovate does not store any data for the purpose of analysis by HEInnovate, the EC, the OECD or any other party. At the time of writing this report more than 500 HEIs from all over the world have created an account on the website.

HEInnovate country-level review

The HEInnovate methodology can also be applied in an external peer-review or expert assessment setting, focusing on a local economy, a region or an entire country. The objective is to provide an independent assessment of areas for improvement in the policy framework and at the level of individual HEIs together with a set of recommendations for policy action by HEI and government stakeholders. The recommendations target measures that HEIs may undertake themselves and policy measures that can be promoted by national government and sub-national government structures.

For the review process, a number of HEIs are selected for an in-depth review. These case-study HEIs ideally include the ‘leading’ HEIs in the country, in terms of number of students, breadth of teaching and research, internationalisation, knowledge exchange activities, as well as their aspirations to become innovative and entrepreneurial HEIs. Surveys administered to HEI leaders and students across the entire higher education system facilitate the identification of trends and gaps.

Method applied in the country-level Bulgaria

The first HEInnovate country-level review was implemented in Bulgaria in 2014. The Ministry of Education and Science approached the EC and the OECD with the request to undertake a review of the current barriers, challenges and opportunities in the Bulgarian higher education system, and to propose recommendations for public policy measures and activities at HEI level.

In January 2014 a one-year collaborative review process was started. It included the indepth peer-review of five case study universities in March and May 2014, an online survey of leaders and students administered to all 51 HEIs in the period May to September, and a final workshop involving all HEIs, to discuss the findings of the case study peer reviews and the surveys organised in Sofia in the end of September 2014.

A background report was prepared to provide an overview of the higher education system in Bulgaria, as well as regional and local economies, labour market and demographic characteristics and trends, and profiles of the case-study HEIs. Key findings from the background report were discussed with the Ministry of Education and Science and five case study HEIs in a kick-off meeting. The report was used to prepare for the study visit and sections of the background report have been incorporated in this report.

Study visits and an intermediate report on the case study HEIs

An OECD-led team of international higher education and entrepreneurship experts visited five HEIs in March and May 2014 to conduct in depth interviews with university rectors, professors, staff involved in start-up support activities, students and other stakeholders in the local entrepreneurship support system. More than 140 people were interviewed. The five HEIs covered in the two study visits were:

– University “Angel Kunchev” in Ruse

– University of Economics in Varna

– University of Forestry in Sofia

– University of Mining and Geology “St. Ivan Rilski” in Sofia

– Technical University of Sofia

An intermediate report was prepared on the findings from the study visit. The report was structured along the seven dimensions of HEInnovate and presented findings for each of the statements. The intermediate report was translated into Bulgarian and circulated for comments to all interview partners. The aim of the intermediate report was to provide detailed feedback with the aim to stimulate a debate around the HEInnovate statements and to help the case study HEIs to establish a baseline for a continued utilisation of the HEInnovate self-assessment tool.

Online surveys and workshop to involve all HEIs

An online survey of HEI leaders was used to complement the information obtained in the background report and the study visit. The questionnaire, available in Bulgarian and English languages, was send to all HEIs in Bulgaria. The seven parts of the questionnaire asked about (i) the strategic directions of the HEI, also with regard to (ii) the management of human and financial resources, (iii) the teaching and learning environment, and current practices in (iv) knowledge exchange and (v) internationalisation. In a final part, respondents were asked, when applicable, about the current practices in (vi) entrepreneurship education, and (vii) start-up support. In developing the questions, the seven dimensions of HEInnovate served as a conceptual framework.

A total of 20 HEIs (14 public and six private) participated in the survey in the period June to August 20142) . Each HEI received an individual report, which compared their responses, in the seven HEInnovate dimensions, to the mean values. For several issues related to the promotion of entrepreneurship, the report included also comparisons with the average responses from an eastern Germany sample (41 public HEIs), and a Polish sample (23 public and private HEIs).

A separate questionnaire was sent during the same period, to students across all HEIs. Various channels were used for this: letters to rectors, emails to entrepreneurship researchers and people met during the study visit, and a snow-ball effect mechanism, which rewarded students for sharing the URL to the questionnaire with other students. 367 students from 23 HEIs participated in the survey and answered questions about work experience and future job expectations. In a second part respondents were asked about their entrepreneurial intentions (Have you already thought of startingup a business), and their experiences and satisfaction with entrepreneurship education and start up support measures. 196 students completed the second part of the questionnaire.

Finally, to discuss and review the findings from the in depth review of the five case study universities and the two surveys with the entire HEI community in the country, a workshop was organised on 25-26 September in Sofia. Representatives of more than 30 HEIs and key organisations of the entrepreneurship ecosystem attended the workshop.

Chapter 1

The Context for Innovative and Entrepreneurial Heis in Bulgaria

Innovation, entrepreneurship and higher education

In Europe and worldwide higher education, institutions are taking up leading roles in promoting economic development and social cohesion. With an all-embracing mission they educate citizens, train researchers, enhance the skills set of professionals, and promote innovators and entrepreneurs. The most successful HEIs are investing in interdisciplinary teaching and research and are building strategic partnerships to address global and local challenges through dialogue, knowledge exchange and the promotion of new entrepreneurial businesses.

Institutional autonomy, leadership and connectivity

To act as sustainable engines for development, HEIs require high levels of institutional autonomy and accountability mechanisms that allow for flexibility. Modern and forward looking leadership, professional planning and management and adequate funding are key building blocks. Close links with strategic partners – such as HEIs, secondary schools, vocational education and professional training organisations, research organisations, industry, businesses, civil society, and governments are indispensable.

We see growing signs of transformation away from the ‘traditional’ HEI model with an exclusive focus on teaching and research towards an innovative and entrepreneurial organisation, which is designed to empower students and staff to demonstrate enterprise, innovation and creativity in teaching, research and third mission, directs its activities to enhance learning, knowledge production and exchange, in the dedication of creating public value via processes of open engagement (HEInnovate, 2014).

The concept of the innovative and entrepreneurial HEI was developed in the early 1980s as a method of examining the way in which HEIs can contribute to wealth creation and sustainable growth (Etzkowitz, 1983; Clark, 1998; Klofsten and Jones-Evans, 2000; Gibb and Hannon, 2006; Guerrero and Urbano, 2012). Many attempts have been made since then to define the concept, but a single, generally accepted consensus has yet to arise.

Whilst this makes it difficult to use the concept for research purposes, the concept turns out to be an excellent lever for HEIs to guide and steer their organisational change processes. Building a common and shared understanding of what being innovative and entrepreneurial means for a specific HEI within a given socio-economic context and policy framework is the starting point for a progressive and reflective process. There is no one-size-fits-all approach. Each HEI will have a unique transformation path. At the same time commonalities across countries and cultures exists, and learning from good practices will facilitate organisational change.

Organisational change: overcoming the standstill

Transformation of traditional organisations, with firmly established hierarchies, rules and routines, needs time and joint efforts to overcome potential barriers. During the last decade the HE systems of many countries underwent profound changes, both at systemic and institutional levels. Nevertheless, the ‘old-fashioned’ understanding of what constitutes core-mission and what not, and the ‘ivory-tower approach’to knowledge show signs of perseverance – in some countries and cultures more than in others.

Overcoming these ‘conceptual’barriers requires a system-wide understanding of what is expected from HEIs. Each institution will need to translate this, however, into its own vision and mission and, most importantly, into an institution-wide awareness of what needs to change and how. A key transformation lever will be the ability to “creatively use” and manoeuvre within the national framework conditions, in particular the Higher Education Act.

In Bulgaria this transformation process has only just started.

The Bulgarian context

Bulgaria has 7.3 million inhabitants and a size of 111,910 km². It is surrounded by Serbia, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYRoM), Romania, Greece and Turkey. With its natural and cultural heritage sites, mountains and coastal areas along the west coast of the Black Sea, allseason tourism has been one of the country’s economic potentials.

Prior to the global financial crisis, GDP growth rates were around 6%. Recovery was slow with real GDP growth averaging 1.1% p.a. in 2010-13. Forecasts for 2015-19 are at approximately 3% (EIU, 2014). The shadow economy accounts for almost one-third of the GDP, which is 1.8 times the EU-27 average (EU, 2014). The country has one of the lowest household incomes in the European Union of EUR 8,496 per capita (2012) 3) .

Regional differences, outward migration and demographic change

Strong regional differences hamper development. The North-West region and the southern border districts suffer from high emigration rates and population decline. Regional GDP per capita accounts here for less than one-third of the EU-27 average (2011), whereas in the South-West– including the capital city Sofia – it reaches 72%. With an industry focus on services and medium to high-tech manufacturing, the region accounts for almost half of the national GDP.

Migration is still an issue throughout the country. According to the 2011 migration survey of the Government of Bulgaria, the lack of career options, low wages and the demand for better education were reasons for leaving the country. For lower skilled workers, current or future unemployment and the lack of jobs were key push factors (SEEMIG, 2013) 4) . Demographic forecasts predict sharp decline in population of 27% by 2030. The hardest hit population group will be the age group 15-24 years with an estimated decrease of 41%. By 2050 the country is expected to have one the most rapidly shrinking working age populations in the world (Government of Bulgaria, 2013).

Growth potentials in ICT but overall low levels of innovation activity

One of the sectors with the highest growth history and potential is information and communications technologies (ICT). In terms of value-added the sector divides into three subsegments: telecommunications (73%), computer programming (14%), consultancy and information services (6%). Since 2005, export products and services in ICT have seen a 14-times increase and account for almost half of the current total exports of business services. The sector also accounts for 90% of all patents registered in the period 2001-2010(Government of Bulgaria, 2013).

Overall Bulgaria’s economy suffers from the low level of innovation particularly in the small business sector. The 2014 Innovation Scoreboard of the EU ranks Bulgaria, together with Latvia and Romania, as “modest innovator” country, whose innovation performance5) is less than half the EU average. Since 2011 Bulgaria has experienced a strong decline in its performance (EU, 2014).

According to the 2008 BEEPS enterprise firms invest in new products and services, but in-house R&D activity remains very low. Only a small group of firms, mostly larger companies, invested in process innovation and innovation-based diversification (World Bank, 2012b). R&D expenditures in the government and higher education sector reached together 0.24 percent of GDP in 2013; which is a decrease of 5.6% compared to the previous year. The R&D expenditure in the business sector reached 0.39% of GDP (+21.5%), with a clear spatial concentration in the South-West region and Sofia.

The commercialisation of research results has not been systematically supported by public policy (World Bank, 2012). Addressing the gaps in the regulatory framework, in particular concerning the involvement of third parties such as companies or clusters, in the management of intellectual property of scientific research results in order to enhance academic entrepreneurship, has been stated as a key priority by the Government of Bulgaria in the 2014-2020 Partnership Agreement with the European Union. To foster academic entrepreneurship, the establishment of so-called “competence centres for applied research” is planned. These centres should foster university-business links and are expected to “have a significantly stronger impact on job creation and growth, as the effect of their work will affect a large number of stakeholders, including public organisations, professional organisations, and […] foreign partners” (Government of Bulgaria, 2013).

Young people are withdrawing from science and research careers. This has been a long term trend. Reasons are low salaries, depreciated equipment and facilities and slow career growth (Government of Bulgaria, 2013).

Efforts to overcome the “separation” between teaching and research

Basic and applied research activities have only recently entered Bulgarian universities. Prior to 1989 the focus of universities and higher education institutions in general was on teaching, whereas research was in the domain of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (BAS). Although this has changed and research activities are also taken into consideration for institutional and programme accreditation by NEAA, establishing research activities in HEIs is difficult. Key barriers are the lack of resources (financing and human capital), technological gaps in infrastructure, and underdeveloped links with industry and business (World Bank, 2012a).

The “knowledge triangle” can only work properly if each of its components – education, research, and innovation & entrepreneurship, reinforces the others. The current system suffers from the conflicting co-existence of the BAS, and a number of HEIs who aim at increasing their research capacity. This bears the risk of a waste of resources, duplication of investment and diminishing diversity.

Several initiatives have been undertaken by the Ministry of Education and Science to build more bridges between BAS and HEIs. A number of BAS members are chair holders or academic staff members in universities and BAS established a network of local/regional offices across the country. The research activities of the BAS, however, seem to lack systemic co-ordination with universities. This is not helping universities to find their role in the national or local innovation systems, particularly as they continue to be perceived by the large industry organisations and businesses as “teaching” institutions which issue degrees.

The gaps in the current system also raise doubts whether research activities carried out at BAS take into consideration the new profiles of graduates, and the career ambitions of doctoral graduates and young researchers. These may lie outside academia or in the university-business interface which has yet to emerge in Bulgaria.

Efforts to promote the role of HEIs in innovation and entrepreneurship

Several of the Operational Programmes 2007-2013 had objectives related to the role of HEIs in promoting innovation, entrepreneurship and graduate employment (Government of Bulgaria, 2013). These programmes were implemented by different ministries and coordination suffered from the absence of a long-term national policy framework. This also constrained the role of higher education institutions in local and regional economic development to the provision of a skilled workforce, neglecting contributions to innovation, entrepreneurship and regional and national competitiveness. A new Strategy for Higher Education has been prepared by the Ministry of Education and Science. The strategy is expected to provide coordination for policies and measures that seek to enhance the role of higher education in sustainable development.

A greater role for HEIs in promoting innovation and entrepreneurship is also foreseen by the 2014-2020 Partnership Agreement with the European Commission. The aim is to direct policy interventions into areas with growth potential and competitive advantages. These are information and communication technologies, electronics, healthcare and biotechnology, nanotechnology, environmental protection and energy efficiency, space technology and applications, food production and processing technologies. An expected outcome is the creation of new innovative firms and jobs in the range of approximately 12,000 new SMEs and 90,000 employees in these sectors.

Trends in higher education and systemic barriers

Higher education in Bulgaria has a short history, which dates back to the opening of the Higher School of Sofia in 1888, the predecessor of Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski. Today there are 51 HEIs in Bulgaria, of which 42 are universities and higher schools (36 public, 6 private), and nine individual colleges (of which one is state-owned). The number of graduates has increased from approximately 50,000 to 64,000 students in the decade 2002-2012. The current number of degree holders in the cohort 30-34 years is 27%; which is significantly below Bulgaria’s Europe 2020 target of 40%.

In 2010 the Ministry of Education and Research introduced a university ranking system, which is freely accessible on the Internet.6 Users – (future) students, parents, firms, etc. – can compare all HEIs across 52 professional study fields against more than 80 indicators, which measure different aspects such as teaching and learning, university environment, welfare and administrative services, science and research, prestige, career development and relevance to the labour market. Users can view predefined rankings or produce their own customised rankings by selecting indicators and assigning importance weights according to their own priorities and needs. Data from national evaluation and accreditation agencies is fed into the university ranking system. Issues around the impartiality of evaluation panels have been causing concerns amongst HEIs.

Almost every district has an HEI, some of which are local branches of other HEIs. A wide range of distance learning programmes is offered. The aim has been to provide access to education for students and employees across the country and in areas with less favourable household incomes (NEEA, 2013). Although this policy has had some success, a regional concentration of HEIs in richer areas emerged with 22 HEIs located in Sofia, seven in Plovdiv and five in Varna. The average numbers of students per HEI are 6,200 in the public sector and 3,500 in the private sector. The University of Sofia “St. Kliment Ohridski” is with approximately 21,000 students the largest HEI in the country, followed by the Technical University of Sofia with approximately 9,100 students.

The higher education system currently suffers from an imbalance between offer and demand and a lack of coordination. In the academic year 2014, 280,000 students were enrolled either as full-time, part-time or distance students. The majority of students (approximately 85%) were in public HEIs. The number of offered places exceeded the demand by 11.3% and 8,000 places of the 71,000 offered remained vacant.

The 51 HEIs act with little co-ordination amongst themselves, if not independently, and there are examples of spurious competition all resulting in losses of efficiency. There is a need for reorganisation towards more collaboration between HEIs and more joint utilisation of infrastructure and resources. The aim should be to build a well-functioning system that allows and caters for diversity, so that, institutional-level priorities and goals can be realistically set and achieved within the wider system-level strategic objectives (see also World Bank, 2012a).

Internationalisation of HE is underway, but there are some systemic barriers that need to be addressed. Bulgaria is one of the few countries in the EU where the establishment of joint programmes and joint degrees is not addressed in legislation (EU, 2012). Currently less than 10% of HEIs in the country participate in joint programmes, whereas in neighbouring Romania up to 75% are participating in international study programmes. The lack of joint degree programmes and difficulties in recognising higher education degrees obtained abroad, even inside the EU, render the international mobility of students very difficult.

Changes ahead for the Bulgarian higher education system

In 2013, the Open Society Sofia published the MacroWatch7 on the current situation of the higher education system in Bulgaria. The key recommendations are:

– Open the Bulgarian HE system for foreign universities, who fulfil the quality requirements set by the Government of Bulgaria. The expected outcomes are higher standards and better quality, more competition and more students studying in the country than abroad.

– Recognise foreign university diplomas. In this way more Bulgarian specialists, academicians, teachers, researchers graduated abroad, as well as foreigners in Bulgaria would find an easy entry into the Bulgarian labour market.

– Introduce a mandatory external/foreign acknowledgement of Bulgarian diplomas to raise their value on international labour markets.

– Enhance dynamic adaptation of study programmes to the current and future needs of local and international labour markets. To this end, the involvement of industry organisations and businesses in regular “quality” checks of teaching and research are recommended.

– Make public university funding to a greater extent dependent upon outcomes, in particular in terms of quantity & quality of graduate employment.

– Promote excellence in teaching through project financing for the development, pilottesting and mainstreaming of innovative pedagogies and education models.

– Encourage the best students to become teaching staff and introduce more quality checks and pedagogy training for new teachers. To raise the attractiveness of academic positions will need comprehensive measures to raise remuneration, professional prestige, training opportunities and career chances.

REFERENCES

1.At the time of this report, the last update of the website was in March 2014.

2. Burgas Free University, Medical University – Plovdiv, Higher School of Civil Engineering (VSU) “Lyuben Karavelov” – Sofia, University of Library Studies and Information Technologies – Sofia, European College of Economics and Management in the town of Plovdiv, N.Y.Vaptsarov Naval Academy – Varna, Varna Free University “Chernorizets Hrabar”, Prof. Assen Zlatarov Burgas University, University of National and World Economy – Sofia, Academy of the Ministry of Interior – Sofia, South-West University “Neofit Rilski” – Blagoevgrad, International College – Albena, New Bulgarian University – Sofia.

3. Latest available data from Eurostat is of 2012. The average household income in the EU-27 was EUR 20,085.

4. The representative survey sample was in the in medium- to high skilled end with 54.6% of the 15-64 years respondents had completed secondary education, 28.5% tertiary education and 17.1% left compulsory education below secondary level.

5. One composite indicator, the summary innovation index, is used to measure and compare average innovation

performance of a country. The summary innovation index includes 25 equally weighted indicators,

which are grouped in enablers, firm activities, and outputs.

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