1st anniversary of the collaboration agreement between Barcelona and Montpellier
“One year ago, we went to Montpellier to set up a collaboration agreement which, as we have seen, goes beyond academic matters. The King James I was born in Montpellier. Language, culture and shared history unites our two countries”. In this way, the rector of the University of Barcelona (UB), Dídac Ramírez, referred to the Alliance Montpellier-Barcelona Plus (AMB+) to commemorate its first anniversary, which was celebrated yesterday on an academic event at the Aula Magna of the Historic Building of the UB.
“One year ago, we went to Montpellier to set up a collaboration agreement which, as we have seen, goes beyond academic matters. The King James I was born in Montpellier. Language, culture and shared history unites our two countries”. In this way, the rector of the University of Barcelona (UB), Dídac Ramírez, referred to the Alliance Montpellier-Barcelona Plus (AMB+) to commemorate its first anniversary, which was celebrated yesterday on an academic event at the Aula Magna of the Historic Building of the UB.
During three days, the three institutions included in the agreement —the University of Barcelona (UB), the University of Montpellier (UM) and the Paul Valéry University Montpellier 3— have met in Barcelona to analyse the first results of this academic collaboration, started on July 2014. On Wednesday 1 July, twelve bilateral meetings on different issues took place in order to identify common lines of action and establish synergies. The three institutions are interested in matters related to university organization, water, biodiversity, human movement sciences, health, food sciences, law and political science, archaeology, historical heritage and culture, and languages and philology.
“Obviously, these agreements strength universitiesʼ academic issues, but they also establish connections between towns and people, in this case in the Mediterranean region”, said the Rector. The delegate for International Relations of the Paul Valéry University Montpellier 3, Anne Marie Mottard, affirmed that “the Mediterranean brings closer citizens from Montpellier and Barcelona”. “Thanks to this cooperation —she said—, the Department of Catalan of the Paul Valéry University Montpellier 3 will foster actions to teach this beautiful language”. The president of the University of Montpellier, Philliphe Augé, also emphasized it.
The director general for Universities, Lluís Jofre, congratulated the three institutions on having set up such an important initiative and joint work. “Today, it is a great day not only in an academic sense. The collaboration between Catalonia and the Languedoc-Roussillon region is expanding to other fields”, pointed out Jofre, who remembered that the UB is the top Spanish university in most international rankings.
The general secretary of the Euroregion Pyrénées-Méditerranée, Mireia Canals, highlighted the important role that the universities of Barcelona and Montpellier play in their respective cities: “Our potential target is about 500.000 students; we are always working on the creation of double degrees”, he said.
Among the personalities who participated in the event there were Francesca Guardiola, director general of Foreign Affairs of the Government of Catalonia; Edouard Beslay, consul general of France in Barcelona; François Henn, delegate vice-president of International Relations of the UM, and Ramon Torrent, professor of Political Economics and International Economic Law at the UB.
The mobility of lecturers, students and members of the administrative and service staff is one of the key aspects of the alliance AMB+. Realise, a three-year project coordinated by the UM, has been created to promote this aspect. The University of Barcelona is one of its partners, together with eight other universities from Netherlands, Poland, Germany and Portugal.
Moreover, institutions have established an agreement to collaborate in the development and merger of the masterʼs degree in Science and Integrated Management of Water of the UB and the masterʼs degree Water of the University of Montpellier. Valérie Borrel, from the University of Montpellier, and Diana Puigserver, from the UB, will coordinate it.
The meeting of these three universities was organised by the Office of the Vice-Rector for International Policy, directed by Dr Maria Callejón.