Press room

The Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (Open University of Catalonia, UOC) is to organise a meeting of over 1,000 of its teaching collaborators at the Palau de Congressos de Catalunya (Av. Diagonal, 661-671). Most of them work at other universities or in professional sectors, while spending some of their time as virtual teachers at the UOC. This group, like the students at the University, work via the Virtual Campus. They specialise in specific knowledge areas and guide students in the learning process.

The meeting, which is to last all day, is to be attended by the President, Imma Tubella, and the other members of the UOC governing team. They are to outline the strategic priorities for the University in the coming years to the teachers. Likewise, details are to be given about the process of adapting to the European Higher Education Area (EHEA); the new methodological developments deriving from the Bologna process; the new courses on offer; the projects about to be developed by the University, and other information of particular interest to the teaching collaborators.

The UOC now has over 2,400 teaching collaborators, counsellors and tutors for the various forms of training on offer (official qualifications, postgraduate studies, PhD, open education and the University @thenaeum). The University selects people in terms of the academic needs for each course. Once selected, they usually combine virtual teaching with other professional activities, generally at other universities in Catalonia and Spain.


Worldwide presence

In the same way that the technology allows the University to have students around the world, so too can it have teaching collaborators from around the world. Most, around 2,000, reside in Catalonia, the rest come mainly from Spain and around 40 live further afield.

Barcelona’s metropolitan area is where most of the UOC’s collaborators are to be found (Barcelonès 938, Vallès Occidental 284, Baix Llobregat 122, Maresme 112, Vallès Oriental 66, Garraf 28 and Alt Penedès 17), followed by the Camp de Tarragona area (Tarragonès 63, Baix Camp 49, Alt Camp 9, Baix Penedès 9 and Conca de Barberà 3), Girona (Gironès 46, Alt Empordà 17, Selva 15, Garrotxa 11, Baix Empordà 13, Pla de l'Estany 5 and Ripollès 3), Central Catalonia (Bages 38, Osona 27, Anoia 21 and Berguedà 5) and Ponent (Segrià 50, Urgell 5, Noguera 4, Pla d'Urgell 4, Garrigues 1 and Segarra 1). Terres de l’Ebre has 16 teaching collaborators (Montsià 9, Baix Ebre 6 and Terra Alta 1) and there are 9 in Alt Pirineu (Pallars Sobirà 3, Alt Urgell 3, Pallars Jussà 2 and Cerdanya 1).

In terms of the other Catalan-speaking areas, the UOC has 105 teaching collaborators in Valencia, 33 in the Balearic Islands, 4 in Andorra and one in the city of L’Alguer, Sardinia. With regard to the rest of Spain, most of the collaborators reside in Madrid (103), Andalusia (51), Galicia (19), Castille and León (17), Basque Country (13) and Aragon (11). Likewise, the University also has teachers of this kind living further afield, for the most part in EU countries (principally France, Germany and UK), Latin America (14), USA (2), as well as Turkey, Japan and China.