Inženiring in avtomobilska industrija

When the Faculty of Industrial Engineering Novo mesto was founded, its vision stated, among other things, that it wanted to become a recognised and distinctive higher education institution in the field of engineering sciences with a focus on achieving a high quality level of teaching, scientific research and professional work, continuous improvement of the educational and academic structure of staff and the knowledge of graduates, the development of innovative and internationally comparable study and research programmes, and intensive international cooperation with links to the global education and research space. The Master's degree programme in Engineering and Automotive Industry was launched at FINI in the academic year 2016/17. If the title of the programme could be attributed to innovation, this unfortunately cannot be said of its content, especially as the Faculty repeatedly promotes it as a degree in mechanical engineering, although in terms of content and international comparability this is certainly not the case. Neither is the institution's scientific research activity, which must be the cornerstone of the study process at the Master's study level, internationally comparable. The two main reasons for the unsatisfactory level of scientific research are inadequate staffing and inadequate material conditions, both in terms of the financial resources available and in terms of the research equipment available. While enrolment figures have been fairly stable in recent years, with the total number of students hovering around 20, it is worrying to note that this academic year only two students are enrolled in the first year of the programme. The programme under assessment is delivered as a part-time programme, mainly by distance learning. It is very difficult to speak of a combined form of study, as most of the laboratory exercises, which are already very sparsely timetabled in the curricula, are also carried out at a distance, which is unacceptable in a technical course. The recent curriculum overhaul, which was carried out without a thorough analysis of the existing situation and has not yet been put into practice, has not brought about any significant improvement in this area. On the other hand, by changing the programme's orientation from automotive to sustainable economy, it represents a departure from the strategic objectives set without documented reasons and without a revision of the strategic documents, including a change in the programme's name. Given the material conditions, which do not allow the second degree programme to achieve an adequate level of scientific research and teaching, and the available human resources, which are too limited for a serious approach to the development and implementation of the Master's degree programme, insisting on the implementation of the programme under review is a burden that prevents the institution from focusing all its energy on developing an activity for which it realistically has the appropriate conditions, which it should make better use of. We believe that a thorough self-evaluation of the study programme, involving all stakeholders, would show the same conclusion. There are simply too many serious shortcomings in this report that cannot be ignored and cannot be remedied in a shorter period of time, because some of the key ones, such as the lack of adequate staff, are also beyond the direct influence of the institution.