The UOC will offer another 240 places for the teaching master's degree due to increased demand.

BarcelonaOne of the outstanding issues facing the Catalan education system is the shortage of teachers in certain disciplines in Catalonia's secondary schools. To address this, the decision was made six years ago. allowing one to enter to teach in a high school even if one did not have the teaching master's degree that qualifies one to practice. Of course, with the commitment to remove it. This measure allowed the pool of temporary teachers to be swelled, but all this has resulted in teachers now having been teaching for years without having obtained a master's degree. Last year, the previous Government closed the tap on this practice and established that, in order to continue in the teacher pool, After three years you had to be enrolled in the master's degreeThis has led to the demand for the enabling master's degree, that was already high, has grown even further.

In response to this need, the UOC has agreed with the Department of Education to offer 240 new places in six specialties: career training and guidance, educational guidance, Catalan and Spanish language and literature, English, mathematics, and technology. These new vacancies will be added to the 720 already offered. Thus, in total, the University will offer a total of 960 places for this Master's degree. "The UOC has historically collaborated in all continuing education needs for teachers in Catalonia and, in this sense, we have been progressively expanding the number of places for the Master's degree," explained UOC Rector Àngels Fitó.

The Rector announced that they plan to expand the number of specialties offered on the Master's degree at the UOC because they are "fully collaborating with the department to be able to cover as much as possible all the needs that may arise in this area." According to data from the 2023-2024 academic year, the UOC has 54,600 students in Catalonia, 31,000 in Spain, and 4,800 in the rest of the world.

A distance learning medical degree?

Another new development announced by the UOC is that a degree in biomedical engineering will be offered next academic year. This will be the first degree of its kind offered online in Catalonia and one of the few available in Europe. The degree will be offered in Catalan, Spanish, and English and, according to the UOC, aims to train "professionals capable of developing innovative solutions in fields such as artificial intelligence applied to health, bioinformatics, telemedicine, personalized medicine, and medical device design."

Beyond this new degree, Fitó also addressed the lack of places in Catalonia for medical degrees. While acknowledging that it is not currently part of the UOC's short-term plans, the rector has expressed openness to the possibility of offering these courses in the future. "Everything that can be done in a classroom can be done online. And if it's not feasible to do it in a classroom, centers can be found to do it. If the Government needs it, we're capable," Fitó argued, admitting that, for this to be possible, new internship positions in hospitals would have to be arranged.