1- An active and operational academic organization :
Having set up statutory authorities, the representative committee
of the Université de la Méditerrannée has equipped itself with an administrative,
financial, technical, logistic and educational staff. It has also provided itself with
the material and budgetary means to carry out its mission. Finally, it has established a network
of institutional correspondents within the partnership, likely to mobilize the local players and expertise
to efficiently run and lead the planned actions
2- A developing partnership:
At the last board meeting at Assiut in January 2002, the 22 founding universities were joined by the following universities:
3- An instrument of performing communication:
Important investments have allowed the head office of Téthys to be installed at the inter-university site
of the Technopôle de Château-Gombert in Marseilles, where a video-conference centre has also been installed, containing
audiovisual equipment, equipment for communication and video editing, and high performance digital tools. This technical
potential allows the establishment direct links between the partners under the very best of circumstances. At the same time,
a web site has been elaborated. The dynamic functionalities of this site provides the partners with a space where they can
distribute proper information in the language of their choice and exchange information with each other on the network through
Extranet direct access. This is a valuable and very user-friendly communication instrument, financed through the budget of the
representative committee to benefit the partnership as a whole.
4- A visible effort on the regional, national, Euro-Mediterranean and international levels:
The representative committee has created a veritable communication strategy with:
5- A data base on the resources of ICT within the partnership:
A comprehensive technical enquiry has been carried out among the partners to identify the means
of connectivity, Internet access (capacity), and information technology and audiovisual resources (video-conferences).
A confidential document has been established, carefully outlining the resources of each node of the partnership.
6- Sharing expertise to train lecturers:
There has been a series of seminars in Spain, Morocco and Tunisia, with the participation of specialists
in open distance learning, taking benefit from the expertise of the different partners.
7- A network of laboratories for research on Mediterranean issues:
Networks organized according to subjects are run within the partnership, and even beyond, to exploit
the complementarities of competences, the synergy of means, and the mutualisation of scientific resources.
For example, the Pline network
has established a strong cooperation to create a data bank on medicinal and poisonous plants around the Mediterranean.
Also, teams have gathered to combine their knowledge on Mediterranean diseases, such as leishmaniasis, or to study neurosciences;
this is the Neuroméditerranée network. There is a "grey library" where the partners may consult the documentation issued from
theses from within each member university.
8- Sharing training resources:
The representative committee has arranged for distance consultation of available training resources which can
be distributed through a system of exchange or on-demand requests, on-site as well as remote. The first catalogue of offered
training programmes, including modules as well as complete programmes, has been elaborated in the fields estimated most important
for the Euro-Mediterranean region with, finally, teaching of professionals and researchers. This catalogue has been examined by
the Téthys council for training and science, which has proposed that a process of validation should be carried out by experts in
charge of evaluating the contents which will be proposed for a "Téthys labelling".
9- A community approach within Téthys to introduce the procedures of exchange through adapting the administrative and legal rules of each country:
The council for training and science, with the help of specific work groups, has studied the introduction of a
methodology based on the principle of validating accomplishments through academic credits. A procedure called Euro-Mediterranean
Credit Transfer System (EMCTS) was proposed at the last meeting of the board of directors, which adopted the principle,
recommending adapting it to each individual case in the different establishments. After some experimenting, a generalization
may be considered.
Also, specialists have been mobilized to examine copyright issues with regards to the legislation of each country.
A system of contract, meaning contract of edition, has been proposed. There again, the practice of the field will
allow the identification of a kind of contractual cooperation between the institutions, the procedure where the authors
themselves come under a modality adopted on the local level.
10- Training activities:
Numerous training missions have been carried out in Morocco (El Jadida, Oujda, and Marrakech)
and Tunisia (Monastir) where, after the distribution of mechanics courses on the master's degree level, advanced
graduate studies in "Globalized Industrial Conception" with twice the capacity are now in place. The lecturers of
Marseilles have admitted a group of some thirty students who are benefiting from both on-site and distance training.
However, the programme relating to the distribution of training has unfortunately been delayed because the training
contents could not be produced as expected, considering administrative inertness of the European programme EUMEDIS.
Actually, the project in which Téthys is participating has been finalized financially. This operation led by UNESCO,
entitled "Avicenna Virtual Campus", is at the core of our plan to synchronize the production and the diffusion of training
contents.
To complete another part of its plan of action successfully, the representative committee of Téthys has coordinated a
European project called INTERREG IIIB MEDOCC with its five partners of the Mediterranean Arch (Balearic Islands,
Catalonia, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, Liguria) and seven universities of the southern partnership. This is within the
framework of a joint project aiming to implement an inter-regional approach for designing a digital platform for managing
knowledge about the Mediterranean cultures and territories. The aim for this study has been an inter-regional approach to
the specific problems of public health and the management of natural resources, water, in the Mediterranean Basin.
Other projects have also been proposed through the programme TEMPUS, which recently became available to the Mediterranean
countries.
11- A promising future:
This first phase has therefore made room for the bases of an operational cooperation with a structure
of management which is efficient and adapted to the needs of the partnership. What is left now is to develop the plans of
action and make them last, taking advantage of the experiences of partnerships achieved in the relations that have been
established on both the human and the institutional level. This second phase will be dedicated to: