Key amendments to the Law on Higher Education concern the Faculty of Medicine?

By Amra Varatanović

Before the deputies of the KS Assembly, the Proposal of the Law on Amendments and Additions to the Law on Higher Education should soon be considered, after numerous difficulties arose in the implementation of the current law, especially at the Faculty of Medicine, from where regular and associate professors, as well as assistant professors and assistants, were dismissed due to the interpretation of Article 151 of the law, as they no longer had employment at KCUS. As confirmed by the Minister of Education, Science, and Youth of KS, Zineta Bogunić, for Patria, the Proposal was removed from the agenda today. 

According to the information available, three articles will be amended, and one of the most important is the amendment to Article 151 of the current law, which stipulates that KCUS is the teaching base for the group of medical sciences. Although the law remained vague because it did not define KCUS as the "only" teaching base, this was enough for the free interpretation of the management of the Faculty of Medicine and KCUS.
The amendments should include the declaration of other health institutions in KS as teaching bases for the organizational units of the medical group, namely: General Hospital "Prim.dr. Abdulah Nakaš", JU Health Center KS, JU Emergency Medical Service, JU Institute for Addiction Diseases KS. 

A legal battle has been ongoing for over a year for regular professors whose employment contracts at the Faculty of Medicine were terminated, even though according to Article 94 of the Law on Higher Education, "a regular professor concludes an employment contract for an indefinite period." It is not stated anywhere that there are any conditions for this, especially not that it is conditioned by the teaching base. Among the professors who have been most grossly discriminated against, the opinion prevails that the entire health system should be a teaching base, i.e., all health institutions where young doctors can gain the necessary knowledge and skills for further progress. Due to the arbitrary interpretation of the law's provisions, further academic progress has been halted at the Faculty of Medicine, especially for young doctors. 

Another amendment concerns the majority in the Teaching-Scientific Council of the Faculty of Medicine, meaning it should consist of professors from that faculty, not just clinicians as is currently the case.  

Other amendments relate to the rector's authority to have the right not to sign the decision on the election of a dean if there is evidence that he/she "violated the law, the Statute of UNSA."