After a wave of resignations that affected more than a hundred researchers linked to Capes (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel), the organization lost its Evaluation Director, Flavio Anastacio de Oliveira Camargo. The low occurred this Tuesday (14).
This is the first high-level dismissal at Capes, an institution linked to the Ministry of Education. Previous resignations affected coordinators and consultants who are not employees of the agency, but who play a central role in evaluating the country’s graduate studies.
According to reports, the director has been uncomfortable in the role, whose role involves postgraduate assessment, at the center of a controversy since late November. He also alleged health problems.
Sought out, the president of Capes, Cláudia Mansani Queda de Toledo, confirmed to leaf who received a letter with a request for dismissal indicating a health issue.
“For the security of the academy, for the stability of the entire graduate system, I will carefully indicate the name of a great scientist so that the academy feels very secure in conducting the evaluation process, which is an inescapable goal of the my presidency,” Toledo said.
The Capes presidency should hold a meeting with the Board of Evaluation this Wednesday morning (15) to address the matter. Camargo was contacted, but did not respond to the report.
The dismissal, according to the researchers consulted, amplifies the crisis that the agency is currently experiencing. Coordinators and consultants from 4 of the 49 postgraduate assessment areas have already left, since the end of November, activities with strong criticisms of the organization’s managers.
These researchers criticize the direction of the agency and denounce supposed pressures to accelerate the opening of new courses and approve distance offers. They also complain about the alleged neglect of resuming the evaluation of the programs, which was interrupted by the courts.
The president of Capes defended, in an exclusive interview with leaf, that the resignations did not represent a crisis in the institution. The reason given by her is that these outputs did not reach the body of servers — now, the frame has change.
Capes appealed to all coordinators to continue collaborating with the evaluation. In addition, the president told the leaf that he expects the resigners to reconsider the decision to leave the works.
Full professor at the Faculty of Agronomy at UFRGS (Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul), Flavio Anastacio de Oliveira Camargo has been in the position since September 2020. His posture was well evaluated by the academic community and he had been spared criticism directed at the presidency of organ.
Internally, there is the assessment that the director could not have allowed the researchers’ discontent to reach the point where they resigned.
Camargo’s departure was also considered unexpected among coordinators of the postgraduate assessment. Within Capes, the Evaluation department coordinates the work of analyzing the quality of master’s and doctoral degrees.
The dismissal caused greater surprise among researchers because Camargo signed, on Monday (13), a joint letter with the other five directors of the agency to express support for the presidency in view of the scenario. He was already in office when Cláudia Toledo assumed the presidency.
At the heart of this quarrel is the Quadrennial Evaluation of postgraduate courses (masters and doctorates) for the period 2017-2020. The activities were interrupted by a court decision in September, and were the trigger for the first resignations.
On the 2nd of this month, the Court authorized the resumption of work. The decision, which responds to the action of the Federal Public Ministry, maintained the veto on the disclosure of results.
Coordinators asked the presidency to extend their terms until December 2022 so that the evaluation can be completed. Toledo had told the leaf that she would study the date, which she understood was too long, but she announced this Tuesday that she will accept the request for the renewal of terms of office until the end of next year.
This process assigns grades that go up to seven, according to the quality of master’s and doctoral degrees. This ranking is related to the number of research grants awarded—scores below three may disqualify programs.
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