This text is part of the special Research section
Over time, the University has consolidated a synergy with the private sector, to the point of devoting, since 2017, a full-fledged vice-rectorate to promotion and partnerships. Light on an approach that enriches the courses of its students in addition to promoting the development of projects with major societal repercussions.
“If we look at the funding statistics in Canada compared to the size of universities, the Université de Sherbrooke is four times the average of Canadian universities in terms of funding for collaborative projects. This is the highest rate [du genre] in Canada, for a university, ”argues Vincent Aimez, vice-rector for promotion and partnerships at the University of Sherbrooke (UdeS).
The Estrie institution has always attached importance to partnerships, as evidenced by the establishment, from its inception, of COOP, its internship system. “We have a partnership with the private sector to place interns in different sectors. This had an influence on the way we do research at UdeS. When we have students who spend time in the private sector, it gives feedback to the teachers, who are very nourished by the reality of the real world. The entire operation of the University is therefore geared towards listening to the business community, even if there is obviously also fundamental research with high levels of excellence at UdeS ”, underlines Mr. Aimez.
Structure good practices
This vice-rectorate was added to this fertile ground for collaborative approaches in 2017. “With the position I hold, we were able to speed things up and structure them. We have made a lot of efforts to collect the various good practices that already exist, which have been improved. [Il s’agissait de voir] how we could globally have more positive impacts for society, while not forgetting that we are doing all this for the university mission, which is the training of highly qualified personnel and the transfer of knowledge ”, indicates Mr. Aimez .
It is from this desire that the Business Partnerships Group was born, thanks – among other things – to the financial support of the City of Sherbrooke and the Ministry of the Economy. “Originally, almost all of the members who started it were people from the private sector. The idea is quite original since, instead of going to see companies to offer them the latest innovation from university, we will rather meet them to listen to their needs and see if we have solutions that could correspond to them ”, explains Vincent Aimez.
Since then, this program has met with great success, giving rise to numerous projects in all the faculties of UdeS. “Over $ 20 million in collaborative projects have been generated. But the most important thing is not so much the numbers as the fact that a significant proportion of the companies we worked with had never collaborated with academia before, ”notes Aimez.
Students definitely benefit from this approach. While the internship service allows undergraduates to compete in the market, the Business Partnerships Group offers the same opportunity to graduate students. “It actually contextualizes their work. Everyone wins. The company has access to expertise and will potentially identify a future employee. For the student, it is a bit of a way of checking what the reality of the market is in relation to his studies, ”explains the vice-rector.
Example of notable partnership
If the examples are legion, there is a flagship in terms of partnership research that cannot be ignored: the Integrated Innovation Chain, bringing together the Quantum Institute of UdeS, the MiQro Innovation Collaboration Center – founded in 2012 by UdeS, Teledyne Dalsa and IBM – and the Interdisciplinary Institute of Technological Innovation at UdeS. “It’s an exceptional environment for training, it allows manufacturers to maintain their competitiveness and it creates a lot of job opportunities”, underlines Mr. Aimez, about this project which has attracted more than a billion dollars. investments over ten years, 60% from the private sector.
One thing is certain, for UdeS, whatever their size and challenges, all forms of partnerships are interesting. “Our colleagues from the Faculty of Education have worked with the region’s school service centers to fight against dropping out of school. Over the past few years, it has had an impact [positif] measurable. In our eyes, it is just as relevant as going to make a new technology, because society needs innovation, but it also needs well-trained and happy human beings in their future careers, ”said the vice-president. rector.