Robin, what is your job at Unicorn University?
My Vice-president position puts me in charge of quality assurance. I also process documents for public authorities, mainly Evaluation and Annual Reports etc. I also teach Microeconomics and Macroeconomics in English programmes. Of course, research represents another integral part of my job.
What do you deal with in your research?
I’ve just finished writing a book dealing with market dynamics modelling. Right now, I am working on a paper focusing on allocation dynamics from an even more general perspective. This is applicable across scientific fields, e.g. to produce a probability description of how living organisms compete for nutrients in soil, how viruses reproduce in host cells or how tech firms gain a larger share in the market. Abstract mathematical modelling enables this level of trans-disciplinarity. My work will lead me to traditional social science questions in the following months, however. I am submitting a book on this subject next year. As you see, my topics are varied and research in general makes me quite busy.
What are your goals at Unicorn University?
I have many goals, of course. In general, however, I wish to contribute to directing the university to certain excellence. This does not necessarily comprise struggling to meet externally predefined indicators and the blind race for better rankings. These efforts are unworthy of academia. We simply need to provide our students with the best possible knowledge. The strategic perspective offers a rather direct solution to this problem: We need to engage keen academicians, in our case even renowned professionals at an internationally competitive level. Subsequently, we only need to modify the structure and processes of the institution so that such people can do their best.
In brief, we cannot gain reputation by having history spanning hundreds of years and boasting famous alumni. That’s why we need to concentrate on the quality of the output, i.e. teaching and research activities. They constitute the necessary precondition to generating top graduates. Nothing less will make us a great university. One can find examples of such small successful universities in Europe. Our ambition must be to become one as well.
Is there anything you'd like to tell our students or candidates?
Don’t get discouraged by the demands of the study, especially in the initial semesters. Most technical universities face this problem. Until recently, we lived in a world of simple mechanical tasks with primitive tools. If the V-belt in one’s car broke, one might have used nylons to fix it. Having a shovel was nearly enough to build one’s own house. However, in a few years, mending a car might require an electro-engineer, and a 3D-printer programmer might replace a construction worker. The productivity demands of a large amount of jobs are rising, so we don’t actually want to offer an easy study. In the end, this would come at the expense of the student’s future job prospects. Moreover, a lot of our graduates find a job inside Unicorn. Unicorn is a leader in providing systems to the banking and energy sectors. Therefore, it would prove counterproductive to supply ourselves with sub-educated colleagues into fields where each error costs a fortune. On the other hand, we try to facilitate the study as much as possible by producing our own study materials. We also make the materials available to wider public.
Besides, our university offers unique study opportunities. How many Czech universities enable you to write a qualification paper on ongoing research projects at CERN with the possibility to present the results at global forums? It’s hardly a surprise then that our graduates easily find their use in their field of study and many get their tuition repaid before the end of their trial period. I don’t mean to diminish the mission of universities, however. Knowledge is not gained for immediate exchange. That would be disgraceful. Primarily, I believe that our students – mainly in the master programmes – get the opportunity to build enough competence to actively form the labour market, not to merely react to its momentary needs. It is their social responsibility, after all – to improve institutions governing the conditions of our lives. A good university produces such game-changers, not components of old-fashioned machinery.
