If one day a master's program in “Political Acrobatics in Higher Education“ is opened in universities, the first lecture can easily be dedicated to the latest events surrounding the Council of Rectors.
A few days ago, all 52 Bulgarian universities received an agenda that can easily apply for an award in the category “How to resume something that has never ceased to exist“.
The first point proposes to discuss “the resumption of the activities of the Council of Rectors as a body for expressing the common interests of higher education institutions before state authorities“. However, there is one small detail – The Council of Rectors has been performing this function since 1993.
The next point is no less curious. It is proposed to “regulate“ the legal and organizational status of the Council of Rectors as a representative advisory body to the Minister of Education and Science. Lawyers, with whom the editorial office spoke, commented that such a construction raises serious questions regarding its correlation with the principle of academic autonomy, guaranteed in the Higher Education Act. “This means that the rectors are giving up the advisory status of their organization, given to them by law, in order to declare themselves vassals by creating an organization – consultant.“ – commented a lawyer, former Prime Minister.
For dessert, the agenda proposes the election of a chairman and the adoption of rules – as if it were a constituent assembly of a new organization, and not an institution that the architects of the division would supposedly restore.
According to the editorial office, this peculiar legal conundrum was prepared by the rector of NATFA, Prof. Miroslav Dachev. The curious thing is that the document was sent by the rector of the National Sports Academy “Vasil Levski“ – the same one who only two months ago ran for the position of chair of the current Council of Rectors, but lost the election to Prof. Miglena Temelkova.
In academic circles, they already joke that when you fail to head one organization, you can always try to create another.
But the most interesting part is just beginning.
According to several rectors, Prof. Miroslav Dachev has assured his colleagues in recent weeks that he wants a conciliatory meeting of the current Council of Rectors to be convened, at which the contradictions that arose during the meeting on June 11 can be overcome.
It was at this meeting that the chair of the Council of Rectors, Prof. Miglena Temelkova, was subjected to sharp verbal attacks and insulting qualifications by the rector of NATFA – behavior that was publicly reflected in a number of media publications.
According to our interlocutors, Prof. Dachev assured his colleagues that he would personally contact Temelkova, talk to her and invite her to a reconciliation meeting.
However, instead of an invitation to reconciliation, the rectors received... an agenda, which in practice marks the beginning of a parallel Council of Rectors and further deepens the division in the academic community.
„We expected a negotiating table, but we received a draft for a new table“ – commented with a sense of humor one of the rectors.
According to the rector of a private university, what is happening is no coincidence. „This is a logical continuation of the process of division in higher education. Since the fall, attempts have been made to pit universities against each other.“
Another rector recalls the meeting of the Council of Rectors in Veliko Tarnovo, when the current Minister Georgi Valchev, then still the rector and deputy chairman of the Council, stated that if the organization “does not take into account the position of the large universities“, they can leave it. The same interlocutor also remembers the remark that, according to him, was made at the same meeting by the current deputy minister Senya Terzieva: “Kick the private universities out of the hall.“ “Then someone wonders where the division came from“, he concludes.
The editorial team sought comment from Prof. Miroslav Dachev. By the time the article was completed, we were unable to contact him to get an answer to our questions about whether he had actually promised a reconciliation meeting, why it did not take place, and why an agenda was distributed instead, providing for the creation of a new structure.
We also contacted Prof. Miglena Temelkova. She told us that she is currently abroad and does not have access to her official email, which is why she is not yet familiar with the sent agenda. Regarding the allegations of a conciliatory meeting, Prof. Temelkova said that her last conversation with Prof. Dachev was on June 12. She called him immediately after the meeting on June 11 with a proposal that the two of them talk and clarify the tension that had arisen. The meeting was initially arranged, but about fifteen minutes later she received a message from Dachev that it would not take place. “We have not talked since then“, said Temelkova.
A member of the Governing Board of the Council of Rectors, with whom we spoke, also did not hide his disappointment. “It is difficult to build trust when